When I was sixteen, my uncle decided that I needed to learn about car engines. He purchased a 1967 Dodge truck with a slant six engine. It was a rather old truck, red and white with a fair amount of rust. The transmission was “three on the tree”, which means it was a manual transmission with three gears, the gearshift is attached to the steering column. The engine sat between the driver and the passenger, so you can understand if I have no memory of any radio, although I’m sure there was an AM radio. On the dashboard of the truck, some previous owner had placed a label that read “thunder chicken.” I loved that truck.
We spent a lot of time rebuilding the engine, and my uncle ended up paying more for parts to fix the truck than he initially spent to purchase it. I loved the time I got to spend with him and loved having a “project” to share with him. My uncle lived three blocks away, my father lived two states away. Somehow, my uncle walked the delicate balance of filling in for some of the gaps my father’s absence left without taking over the “father” job. I knew he was always there for me.
Driving the truck was always an adventure. Once we got the engine working, we had other small obstacles to normal driving. First, the emergency brake didn’t work. The solution to this was to always leave the truck in gear when you parked and to take the railroad tie out of the bed of the truck and place it under one of the wheels. Second, the truck had a bad habit of getting stuck in first gear. This tends to limit the speed one can go.
There was a whole procedure for when the truck got stuck in first gear. You needed to pull over, turn the truck off, get out and reach into the front grill to move the tie rods. This usually worked. If you had a passenger, it was pretty quick and easy. The passenger would move to the driver seat and hold down both the brake and the clutch while you moved the tie rods around. If there was no passenger, things got interesting. You had to pull over, turn the truck off, and get the emergency brake (aka railroad tie) out of the truck bed. Then you got the long handled squeegee and wedged it between the clutch and the underside of the dashboard (so that the clutch was pressed down) then go move the tie rods. Once the rods were moving again, you had to reverse the process. Sometimes, the truck would run fine; sometimes you would have to repeat this process a few times to get to your desired destination. I got pretty fast at this procedure and pretty used to having greasy hands. When you are sixteen and have a vehicle that you can drive whenever you want, greasy hands is a small price to pay for that freedom.
It’s been almost 30 years since my uncle drove “thunder chicken” into my life. I have always loved that truck and loved that it was something I shared with my uncle. I can look back now and know that the truck was also a way for him to help his sister (my mother) deal with two teenage drivers and one family car. For me, it was the fact that he created a project for us to do together, a reason to spend time together that touched me the most. The memory of the truck is always a reminder of my connection with him.
A few weeks ago my uncle called me. He’d just bought himself a new truck. He wanted me to take his old truck. He said that his old truck had such sentimental value that he couldn’t bear to sell it. Now, how could I turn that down? I wasn’t prepared for my reaction to my new truck. As the delivery day grew nearer, I got more and more excited. When I finally got to drive the truck, I fell in love immediately. It’s a 1994 Dodge Ram truck, green with dents, rust and peeling paint. It’s a five speed with roll down windows, nothing fancy, just like a truck should be. Behind the seat I found a long handled squeegee, just like we had in the first truck. I find reasons to drive it often; it reminds me of my uncle and all the ways he has been and is there for me.