Property:Has text
From Off the Road Database
This is a property of type Text.
C
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<p>There was little travel on the road and he was forced to remain in a crouched position for some time. Finally he hailed a tramp walking on the railroad and, after much persuasion, got him to leave the tracks and come to the car. He directed him how to turn off the ignition, put the car in reverse gear, then crank the engine, thus turning the sprocket and chain backward and releasing his hand. He reflected later that he might have been caught for hours; as it was, the flesh on his hand was cut through to the bone. Fortunately he had a box of salve in the car, and the tramp helped dress and wrap his injured hand.
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<p>After four or five miles Fred turned to me and asked if I had put the shovel back in the car and my heart sank when we found we had laid it down behind a sage brush and forgotten it in the confusion of starting. Every mile was gained with so much effort that we couldn't possibly think of going back for the shovel, because we could buy one at the next town if we were lucky enough not to need one before we got there; but here, again, we were to find that money did not avail us.
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<p>Many cars had tried to climb Pike's Peak, but a Locomobile Steamer was the first. The second was a 70-horsepower Stearns. The Brush Runabout was the third and went every foot of the way under its own power.
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<p>We were utterly dismayed at the sight. When we fully comprehended the plight in which we found ourselves, we got busy. Fred unpacked the jack while I brought a flat stone from the stream on which to place the jack after he had dug out sand to make a place for it. I brought more stones and he packed them and dry earth he had dug from the bank under the wheels, rocking the car back and forth to pack the base solidly. We worked frantically more than two hours. Finally we started the engine and both of us pushed the car to solid ground and into the road.
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<p>Our shovel was forgotten and the umbrella was worn out from the wear it received back of our heels. Flowers were in bloom—especially oleanders—and when we came to the grape and wine districts, we stopped at a winery and climbed a long ladder to look into one of the immense vats of claret, which looked like a lake of ink. The owner gave us a sample, running it out of a hose to rinse the glass before filling it, as one would water. It was a common sight to see a wagon and hay rack full of grapes.
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<p>The sun had melted the snow, making the road so slippery we slid off several times, stalling often in the six miles to Walcott. We had to dig out the flywheel each time, shoveling earth and packing it under the wheels to raise the car and free the flywheel. We finally reached the town for lunch, wondering how far we could go that day over such roads. We were often in mud so thick that it clung to our boots so we could hardly walk.
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<p>One of the men knew of an old road around the foot of the mountain and took Fred to show him where he could get on to it. Our car pushed its way between shrubs and overhanging trees until we came in view of the valley and down to the road. We were thankful for help in time of need.
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<p>Sometime later a nicely dressed man came into Fred's sales room, introduced himself and said, "You remember me, don't you?" It was the man he had clipped on the chin in the Colorado Springs garage. After a chat, he gave Fred a ticket to the Denver Athletic Club for a certain night, making him promise to go to the fights there. When Fred did, he found that the man was a prize-fighter in the principal bout of the evening. I thought this was a very clever way to let Fred discover his occupation; then and there, Fred decided to be more careful about starting a fight with any other athletic stranger who might not be the gentleman this man was.
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<p>It was sunny weather and we had good natural roads. We kept putting the miles behind us and kept nearing the hazy mountain until we were around the foot of it and in another valley. It was ten o'clock at night when we came to some haystacks and buildings which we could hardly tell apart in the dark. Fred's knock was answered by a voice saying they didn't keep people overnight. After some argument, Fred threatened to sleep in the haystack if they didn't let us in. When the man discovered there was a woman outside, he came to the door partly dressed, with a candle in his hand, and agreed to get us a meal and let us stay overnight, but he said there was no bed for us. We found he was only the cook—a surly old Englishman. The others at the ranch were away, driving cattle to Tonopah. He must have seen how tired we were, for after a substantial meal he said he didn't think anyone would be back that night and that we could have the extra bed. There wasn't a white sheet on it, but everything was clean and of good material, for which we were thankful. Soon we were fast asleep.
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<p>After driving for a couple of hours, Fred stopped the car, got out his compass and map, consulted them and said, "We should leave Salt Lake at Lucin, but here it is on our left, with a mountain range on our right. We must turn around and go back to Lucin."
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<p>"We never would have gotten this far if we did," Fred answered.
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<p>Next day we drove the dirty, dingy car to Golden Gate Park on our way to the ocean, but a policeman stopped us at the entrance and said no autos with signs were allowed in the park. Fred told him how far we had come, how long it had taken, and all we wanted now was to get to the edge of the water and wet the wheels of the car in the Pacific ocean, then it was to be shipped to Detroit, where he would met it and finish the trip by driving it to New York City in time for the midwinter automobile show.
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<p>He said the road down the mountain was good but narrow and steep, and that we would find good accommodations in the valley. We took it slowly, because it seemed the rocks reared their bulk to oppose us in the dark, but as we came to them, there always was a good road around them, though I found myself bracing my feet for a bump that never came. We realized that this passage was never meant for an automobile and that more than once the Brush Runabout had rushed in where a long-wheelbase car would have feared to tread. We reached a railroad at Big Pine in Independence Valley, where much later all the traffic went that way, the road having been built through and the man who had made his living towing autos through the sand at the edge of Death Valley had moved away, there being no business. Years later we learned that the Brush was the first car to go from Tonopah, Nevada, to Big Pine, California, on that road.
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<p>Getting past the brusque-appearing policeman was easy compared to getting past some of the mud we had along the way. He smiled indulgently at our earnestness, and said to go and come by the South Drive, and it would be all right. Having overcome the last obstacle, we drove through the lovely park, past the site of historic Cliff House and Seal Rocks, and down to the ocean, where a wave gently came up, wet the wheels of the travel-stained car, and slowly receded.
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<p>Feeling quite confident, we forded the stream and stopped the car on the sand while Fred leveled the high bank in front of us with the shovel, as I sat near and watched. When we went back to the car we found that the rear wheels and axle had sunk in quicksand and the car was resting on the body, perfectly helpless, and no help near for miles.
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<p>We reached Wamsutter that night without needing a shovel, and we were confident we could buy a new one there. But we couldn't, for love or money. The Union Pacific Railroad owned everything in sight, and no one dared sell any of the road's equipment. We were pretty blue, because a shovel was an absolute necessity to us every day along the road. Nothing which had happened to us so far balked us so much as the loss of the shovel. Now we had nothing with which to dig ourselves out of high road centers and fill in bad places.
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<p>From here we found many dry ditches, one so deep that we considered building it up from the bottom but that would mean we would have to go through soft earth, so we decided to try it as it was. I walked ahead, afraid to watch the car go down into the ditch, but as I heard the continuous chugging of the motor, I looked around in time to see it slowly crawling up and over the edge after an attempt no big car ever could have made successfully. Can you wonder we came near to loving that loyal car?
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<p>On December 20 Fred left Detroit with the old car to complete the trip across the continent, with Harvey Lincoln, a factory man, as observer. They went through Toledo, Cleveland, Buffalo, and to Little Falls, New York, where they were stopped by a blizzard.
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<p>Then I remembered the warning the waitress had given me the day before about the rock in the middle of the road, so we saw it in time although it was nearly hidden in the weeds, and gave it a wide leeway, saving ourselves a bad crack-up that probably would have ended our trip right there.
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<p>After lunch a well-dressed man gave us directions, pointing up a hill. It was long and steep and we climbed it slowly. I noticed a crowd watched us from below near the restaurant, but I thought nothing of it at the time because so many people were surprised to see the car climb steep grades.
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