To say that Tom Medley led a full life is indeed an understatement. He played basketball on a level that afforded a college scholarship, but turned it down to journey to Southern California to attend Fullerton Junior College. While still in Oregon after graduating high school he was on an AAU team that played against, amongst others, the Harlem Globetrotters. After the onset of WWII Medley was drafted into the Army and was shipped to Europe in time for the Battle of the Bulge. Stateside after the War, he attended the prestigious Art Center College for a time and worked on hot rod related jazz records with musicians that included ScatMan Crothers.
He fought in the Battle of the Bulge (he was awarded a bronze star), was a national champ of flying free-flight model airplanes
Joe Iskanderian picked the winner, this Bug won built by John Hale.
Hot Rod sent a few photographers down to Santa Ana Raceways, our slot car shop, to take pics for the magazine Joe showed up to award the $1,000. prize and they found out the car was a slot car!!
They made some calls to the legal dept and Yup they forgot to add it had to be a real car!! so they took some pics gave my John Hale $1,000. and it did appear in Hot Rod on a back page in 1967..
John's son Chris saw Joe in about 1998 at a trade show, and asked him about it... after a few cuss words Joe laughed and laughed remembering it well
if you listen to the words he's singing, then read them as the song is meant to be.. by The Rolling Stones no less, I'm sure as hell not telling Mick what the words are supposed to be, well, if you compare what he's singing to the words they tell us are supposed to be in the song? You;; agree with me that there's not a way in hell that us listeners can make out what the words are when he's drunk, stoned, or too damn old to remember them.
If you start me up
If you start me up I'll never stop
You can start me up
You can start me up I'll never stop
[Verse]
I've been running hot
You got me ticking going to blow my top
If you start me up
If you start me up I'll never stop
Never stop, never stop, never stop
[Chorus 2]
You make a grown man cry
[Verse]
Spread out the oil, the gasoline I walk smooth, ride in a mean, mean machine
[Chorus 1]
[Verse]
If you start it up Kick on the starter give it all you got, you got, you got I can't compete with the riders in the other heats If you rough it up If you like it you can slide it up
Slide it up, slide it up, slide it up
Don't make a grown man cry
My eyes dilate, my lips go green My hands are greasy She's a mean, mean machine
Start it up
If start me up
Ahh... give it all you got
You got to never, never, never stop
Slide it up, baby just slide it up
Slide it up, slide it up, never, never, never
You make a grown man cry Ride like the wind at double speed I'll take you places that you've never, never seen If you start it up Love the day when we will never stop, never stop Never, never, never stop
Tough me up
Never stop, never stop Anyway, my point is that this could have a cool video if someone made one with motorcycle racers
Kathleen Brooks showed to her beloved 1967 Volkswagen Beetle. At age 73, many things have changed throughout Brooks' life, but the red Beetle nicknamed "Annie" has been a constant since she first bought it in December 1966 in Riverside, California.
Continuously used as a daily driver, the Bug now has more than 350,000 miles on it. Volkswagen got wind of Brooks and decided to pay her commitment back with a gesture of kindness.
As a measure of thanks, VW's North American Region decided to give Annie a full factory-spec restoration.
The stalwart Bug was brought down to Puebla, Mexico, the Beetle's home in North America and for the past 11 months, a team of about 60 workers recharged Annie to the fullest extent. According to VW, 357 pieces were restored, and about 40 percent of Annie's part were replaced. The project was somewhat of a resto-mod, as VW wanted to make the Beetle driveable for years to come rather than focusing on making it exactly period correct and prepped for a museum. Thus, in addition to fixing several rust and electrical issues, VW added better parts such as disc brakes, a new radio, an upgraded suspension, a rebuilt and updated engine, and upholstery.
you can enjoy the abvoe video a little more at 2x speed
Some prankster contacted the CZ motorcycle manufacturer, and ordered a spiffy 500 cc two stroke twin with a lot of gold plating, supposedly for papal escort duty. When it was done they contacted the Vatican, where of course they knew nothing of it, much less wanted the thing. Fortunately the bike still exists today.
here's hoping Joffrey got slapped so damn hard his head rang like a bell too! A big old Italian church bell!
Since Jason added a note " Your blog is an oasis in the vast emptiness I call my workday. It NEVER fails to entertain and teach me." I felt I must add some tip jar humor to fill in the vast emptiness of his work day, because these tips are keeping me off the stripper pole to raise a couple bucks for car parts, and at my age, no one wants to see that.
In the
early 1960s a Chicago orthopedic
surgeon imported this 1925 3 liter 4 seat tourer The good Doctor forgot to
inform his wife he had ordered a vintage Bentley
from England and was forced to promptly
sell the car to his friend
Alexander "Alex" Toth was an American cartoonist active from the 1940s through the 1980s, listed as #7 of “10 Most Influential Comic Book Artists of All Time” by Wizard Magazine, and mentioned by animationresources.org as the elite 3rd of all time comic book artists, after Eisner and Kirby. That's the height of fame in comic book illustration right there.
Toth's work began when he sold his first freelance art at the age of 15, subsequently illustrating true stories for Heroic magazine through a comic book packager named Steve Douglas. Although he initially aimed to do newspaper strips ("It was my dream to do what Caniff, Raymond, and Foster had done"), he found the industry "dying" and instead moved into comic books.
After graduating from the School of Industrial Art in 1947, Toth was hired at National/DC Comics. Green Lantern #28 (Oct.–Nov. 1947) was one of the first comics he drew for the company. He drew a canine sidekick for Green Lantern named Streak and the dog proved so popular that he became the featured character on several covers of the series in 1948.
He worked at DC for five years, starting at the age of 20, drawing the Golden Age versions of the Flash, Doctor Mid-Nite, and the Atom and penciling several of the company’s comic book series, such as Action Comics, Detective Comics, The House of Secrets, Green Lantern, All-American Western, and numerous others.
Throughout the 50s, Toth bounced around a little, both physically and professionally. He left New York for California, DC for Standard, but he is also known for his animation designs for Hanna-Barbera throughout the 1960s and 1970s on Johnny Quest, Space Ghost, and the Herculoids
He was drafted by the Army in 1954 (and it's amazing to consider that he'd been a working professional for several years and was still young enough to be drafted) and served in Tokyo, Japan. While in Japan, he wrote and drew his own weekly adventure strip, Jon Fury, for the base paper, Depot Diary.
However, Toth is best known for his animation work for Hanna-Barbera Productions, Inc. Beginning in 1965, he was responsible for inventing and designing many of their cartoon characters in addition to storyboarding their television episodes. Through sketches and model sheets, Toth conceived and shaped the look and feel of some of Hanna-Barbera’s most popular characters, including Space Ghost, Birdman and the Galaxy Trio, the Super Friends, Thundarr the Barbarian, Captain Caveman, and many others. Working with Hanna-Barbera over the next two decades, Toth gave life to the heroes of a generation of television viewers.
It would be an injustice however to not mention the other half of the Hanna-Barbera magic touch, they discovered two great voice actors, Daws Butler and Don Messick.
Butler provided the voices for many of the most popular characters of Hanna-Barbera’s cartoons through the years, including Huckleberry Hound, Yogi Bear, Hokey Wolf, Quick Draw McGraw, Snagglepuss, Elroy Jetson, Wally Gator, Peter Potamus, and numerous others, he also filled in for Mel Blanc as Barney Rubble for five episodes of The Flintstones while Blanc recovered from an auto accident.
Messick’s most famous voice was that of Scooby-Doo, from the character’s debut in 1969 until he retired from the role in 1994. He also provided the voices for Boo Boo Bear, Ranger Smith, Bamm-Bamm Rubble, Astro from The Jetsons, Dr. Benton Quest, Ricochet Rabbit, Atom Ant, Muttley, and many more.
That's my childhood cartoon tv watching saturday mornings, right there. Call it 1975-77
Recognized for his contributions to the comics industry, Toth was awarded the Ink Pot Award in 1981, and inducted into the Jack Kirby Hall of Fame in 1990.
And though that entertains the Comic Con people, like me, there are the Millar's Drag Cartoons and Big Daddy Roth comics fans that will be happy to learn that in 'Toth - One For The Road" put out by Michael Auad Publishing, has a complete collection of all the great cartoons he wrote and drew for Millar's Drag Cartoons, Hot Rod Cartoons and Big Daddy Roth comics.
His character Granny McGo had a patchwork quilt parachute to slow down her slingshot
Saturday evening he took a theft report for a senior resident who is bound to her wheelchair and had her aluminum ramp stolen. On Sunday he took initiative to work with the resident's family and installed a temporary ramp so the resident could get to her appointments or leave in an emergency.
To introduce the new 3.8-liter Mk II to the
American market, Jaguar wasn’t about to just
show a shiny new car on a turn table. Oh no,
it was going to make a splash, make waves,
and shine bright. In a press release dated April
12, 1960, Jaguar announced that it would be
showing “the ‘Golden Jaguar,’ a one-of-a-kind
show car...a Jaguar 3.8 sedan transformed
into an Easter confection in gold-and-white.”
Valued at $25,000, every bit of exposed metal,
inside and out, was gold plated—the bumpers,
grill, door handles, trim, switches, wheels,
tire valve screws, ash trays, mascot, even the
exhaust pipe. The body was “hand-finished”
in white while the interior was trimmed in white
“English glove leather.” Veneers were walnut
and two occasional tables were fitted for the
rear occupants.
Debuting at the New York Auto Show, the car
was accompanied by an armed guard from
the Burns Detective Agency and Ms. Dorothy
McDonough who was dressed to match the
car—”in a specially designed gown of 24-karat
gold thread, 24-karat gold hose, gold shoes (gold
garters), gold and precious gem jewelry including
a tiara given to Empress Josephine in 1804 by
Napoleon.” The tiara, which was on loan from Van
Kleef and Arpels, contained over 1,000 diamonds.
The car was a smash hit and while the press
release stated that there had been several offers
to buy the car, after it was shown it was sent back
to the factory, stripped of its gold, retrimmed and
sold as a standard road car.
