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From Off the Road Database
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C
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<p>About halfway to Montello the car came to a stop. One look under the hood was all that was needed. Three teeth were broken out of the timing gear. That meant three things: First, to get a team to tow the car into Montello, for we were determined to keep advancing; second, to get a new gear from the factory; and third, a long wait, perhaps making us get to the Coast too late, although we still were on the main railroad and that was in our favor in getting the gear from the factory. So much had happened in the last twenty-four hours, and now to have our cheerful little car silent and still was tough luck.
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<p>Fred put in the batteries he had taken off the running boards to keep them dry, and at the first turn of the crank the motor was chugging, ready to go. We neared Granger, Wyoming, at noon, but could not go into the village because there was no bridge across the river. We were told we would find one eight miles up the river if we followed the Oregon Short Line Railroad. This we did, stopping on the rustic bridge for lunch from our hamper, as no one was at home at a ranch where we had hoped to get a meal. There was hardly a sign of a road on the other side so we decided not to go back to Granger for our main road, but to go across the prairie toward train smoke we could see at times in the distance, keeping on the high ridges where it was smoother for the car. There was more or less uncertainty in this, but it was necessary at times that we should decide many problems by ourselves, so we took the risk. After an hour or so we came to a road; we followed it and it turned out to be the right one.
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<p>After good food and a restful night at Rock Springs, we were quite ourselves again as we started another day's work. We ate lunch at Green River and continued, slowly covering ground in this barren land. About sundown we came to a river which high-wheeled wagons and long-legged horses could ford, and Fred was sure he could drive the car through it, but it was pretty wide with rapids and I walked over the railroad bridge, while he and the little car plunged into the water. The motor stopped in midstream.
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<p>Fred cut a small tree the right length and size with his hatchet, notched it to fit where the truss rod should go, drove it into place to hold the axle firmly, and we were on our way again. He had to repeat this procedure several times, finally carrying several pieces with him as they kept splitting. We reached the Barnes ranch long after dark.
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<p>After leaving this place we had to use the shovel three times in the first mile, and put in a strenuous time over lonely country roads, reaching Rock Springs for the night. There we found a new hotel with steam heat, but we shocked the proprietor by asking him for a room with bath, and found there was no such thing in the building.
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<p>Nearing the top, they came to the famous "W" where the road travels left for half a mile, then doubles back on a hairpin curve to the point where it started but about 200 feet higher, then back on another hairpin curve, completing the "W." The camera man, tall and heavy, climbed from road to road taking pictures of the car on the "W." They climbed completely around the mountain, coming to the top from the opposite side of the "W." It was a 23-mile climb and had taken all day. Often during the trip both men sat with one foot outside the car so as to be ready to jump to safety if they saw the little car tottering on the edge of the narrow, crumbling road.
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<p>That afternoon's journey was slow and monotonous. After dark we crossed the North Platte River on a bridge that careened so much I was afraid we might slide off into the stream; then we progressed along a muddy road on the sloping bank of the river to Fort Steele, a big, barren building. It was a relic of the old Indian fighting days, but we found that food and shelter were the most important things after a hard day's work.
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<p>From Albany they went down the side of the Hudson River, but on a steep hill the car coasted to a stop. They found the timing gear had lost some teeth again. It was similar to the accident we had had in Nevada. Fred, fearing much trouble, had the foresight to add an extra timing gear to his parts at Detroit before starting. They simply pushed the car to the sunny side of a barn and made the change in zero weather. After an hour and a half the new gear was in place, the engine timed, and they were on their way.
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<p>We found a bathroom in this hotel at Ogden, but could use it only by paying extra. We stayed in Ogden half a day, sending and receiving mail. Then we were on our way to Promontory in the afternoon through a fitful wind and under threatening skies. A single Mormon family lived there, but they kept travelers. We stayed with them two days during a rain, meanwhile hearing much about the bad roads ahead of us around the edge of Salt Lake. We were told we would have to drive on the railroad tracks to get through, but we thought this was a bit exaggerated. We were glad for the chance of a rest at Promontory, which gave us a chance to catch up on our correspondence.
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<p>We came as near to catastrophe this day as any time on our trip. It was uneven country with some steep hills, and on one I walked behind the car carrying a rock to block a rear wheel when necessary. The roads often followed creek or river bottoms on the climb to the summit, where the mountains usually broadened out before the descent on the other side. But on this one, the descent began as soon as we reached the top, and on a curve we had to avoid a bad rock that towered in the center of the road.
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<p>My husband, Fred A. Trinkle, began driving and repairing automobiles in Denver, Colorado, as early as 1900, and in 1907 he became agent for the Brush automobile for the state of Colorado. The car was designed by Alonzo P. Brush and built in Detroit by the Briscoe Manufacturing Co. The Brush Runabout was a two-seated, one-cylinder, double side chain-driven car with a coil-type spring under each corner, acetylene headlights and Prest-O-Lite tank, with no top, windshield, or doors. It was a very sturdy car and could go anywhere there was a road. The chain-drive on each side gave it great climbing power although it was not fast. But that was not a serious deficiency because there weren't many good roads on which to speed in those days, and drivers were not speed-crazy.
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<p>When he joined us at our table, we felt acquainted at once, since he knew drivers and automotive friends of ours. He gave us much valuable information besides drawing a crude sketch of our roads and the ones we must avoid on the way to Tonopah, a distance of 250 miles with no place to get gasoline on the way.
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<p>I went into the house and sat down behind a warm stove, very meek, cold, and hungry while the men were putting the car under shelter. The rancher's wife was there, and when Fred came inside, he asked me, "Did you tell this lady we haven't had any supper?" I smiled and said, "No, I didn't." She got busy at once and soon we were enjoying an excellent meal.
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<p>At Lakin, Kansas, he stopped with cousins for a few days, meanwhile selling two cars to be delivered later.
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<p>Once a motorist approached a Michigan farmer driving a spirited team, and seeing the fright of the horses and the women passengers in the buggy, he stopped his car, alighted and gallantly offered to lead the prancing horses past the machine. The farmer said: "Never mind the horses, young man, I can take care of them. You just hold the women."
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<p>We couldn't understand where we had gone wrong, although we had commented on an increasing steepness and roughness of the track. We had come down hills so steep that when we went back I walked behind the car carrying a rock to block a rear wheel when Fred stopped to speed up the engine on these hills, so that if the brake didn't hold, the car wouldn't start rolling backward. When the car started, I would pick up the rock and follow to be ready when he stopped again, and so on, to the top of the hill, when I would drop the rock and get into the car.
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<p>A man cooked us a meal there. Many Indians were around the place. Our principal thought was to get an early start the next day, but Fred took time to go to the woodpile, where he found a piece of broken doubletree of hard, tough wood from which he shaped a substitute for the broken truss rod. It lasted more than 200 miles across a desolate section of Nevada. Perhaps Mr. Briscoe had been right to call him resourceful.
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<p>We were now east of Mount Whitney, the highest point in the country, and we must go a hundred miles south to find a lower mountain to cross. We had level roads and warm weather and enjoyed our ride through Independence Valley where workers on the mountainsides were constructing a $49,000,000 aqueduct to carry water to Los Angeles. We had a little experience with deep sand in this valley at the edge of the Mojave Desert, getting into a spot where our wheels went round and round without moving the car. We could have deflated our tires and pumped them up by hand, but we thought it easier to get out our two canvases, spread them on the sand, and run the car on them, then carry one ahead, spreading it in front of the car and driving onto it, and so on.
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<p>When we stopped to rest, I lay down on the ground to relax and recover my poise. We did not even stop for lunch, as the skies were dark with clouds and we didn't want to be caught in rain on narrow, slippery roads where we might go over the edge and get hung up in a tree. At last we realized we had been going downgrade all day. About dusk we came into open country and long after dark we reached Kern, a town of oil wells and derricks near Bakersfield, California. Here we found a hotel and a much-sought-after bath after our strenuous riverside ride.
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<p>The brakes were slow in taking hold and we were headed for the rock when Fred, with a supreme effort, brought the brakes into concerted action with the steering gear, missing the rock by only a few inches.
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