MY ROOTS
Please pardon this brief diversion from my normal biking content as I try to figure out why I have had this life-long attraction to wheels and wings.
My dad loved W & Ws. At least a third of the photos we have of him show some kind of crazy contraption in the foreground or background. Apparently the family lived in a high-risk rather than high-class neighborhood (judging from the porch drop-off).
Whether a tricycle, a pedal car, a bike, a motorized bike, a car or plane, my dad was always on the move. The house was brick by this time, and they've added a railing.
Apparently things like furry friends and fenders were cast aside, to be replaced by goggles and helmet in the quest for speed. The neighbors have erected a fence for protection from his vehicles.
Giant gears and motors were grafted into bike frames (he wasn't one to pedal if he could help it).
It wasn't long before his monthly paycheck was being spent on this fine Studebaker Airline Coupe.
The pay he earned from being a Navy pilot.
I can't remember when I didn't love things with wheels and wings. Did I get this from him? But how does it happen? My dad Bert was lost when I was 7 months old. He was the pilot - his PBY flying boat exploded, crashed into Galveston Bay. Nine men died.
In this photo, a PBY is making a safe landing in Florida.
Understandably my mother never really wanted me to learn to fly. But we did travel by air a lot - unlike many families in the early 1950's we flew to a lot of places. I can't remember this event. Mexicana?
