Mamie Johnson was my first grade teacher, but she had medical
problems midway through the year and had to resign. Mrs. John Spoolhoff
(I can’t remember her first name) was hired to complete the school term.
The Spoolhoffs lived about six miles from school, and Mrs. S. did not
drive, so John drove her to school every morning and picked her up after
school.
County trunk E, the road on which the school was located, went
north a quarter mile, then turned west and joined U. S. Highway 8, which
came down from the north and made a large-radiused turn to the west.
County Trunk E was a gravel road, and its sharp curve was fairly steeply
banked.
John’s car was a Model T Ford touring car that had been
converted to a small truck by removing the rear seat and adding a wooden
(4 ft. x 6 ft.) platform with 12 inch high panels along both sides and
across the front. Both driver and passenger side doors had also been
removed, and the canvas roof had long since been discarded. That
home-made-pick-up configuration was commonplace in northern Wisconsin
during the depression days.
One spring day all of us students happened to be standing on
the front steps of the school when John started home after delivering
Mrs. S. to school. Most of us were watching John as he drove north and
turned west to follow Highway 8 to town. When he had about half
completed the turn, in the most steeply banked part of the curve, poor
John fell out of the car, and landed on his side in the mud-puddle,
while his Ford kept right on chugging towards town. (Model Ts were
equipped with hand throttles.)
While we watched, John got up, wiped the mud from his face and
took off in hot pursuit of his Ford. In a few seconds he caught the
runaway, climbed onto the truckbed, over the seatback and settled into
his seat. He continued on his way, probably hoping that nobody
had seen the incident. I’m sure the older kids gave John a lot of
razzing in the next few days, but he was a good natured old geezer (He
must have been at least forty years old by then!) and could laugh even
when he was the butt of the joke.
Send comments to Dan Machesky at dan@beesky.com