that wing couldn't deploy faster if it were anchored behind him and stayed put while he launched
this was either the coolest thing to happen at Goodwood, or the 2nd coolest and the other thing's been kept a secret
!:56 to 2:40 on the video
Showing posts with label so awesome it made my day. Show all posts
Showing posts with label so awesome it made my day. Show all posts
Thursday, July 16, 2026
did you see Pastrana's self adjusting wing at Goodwood Festival of Speed? Deployed in less than a second.
that wing couldn't deploy faster if it were anchored behind him and stayed put while he launched
this was either the coolest thing to happen at Goodwood, or the 2nd coolest and the other thing's been kept a secret
Sunday, July 05, 2026
Thursday, June 18, 2026
a claw hammer, a borrowed Ford truck, and no patience left, meet Sophie Zielinski and the Moving Crew, circa 1932
Sophie Zielinski was 44, Polish, a landlady on Chene Street with six cold-water flats, three of them already empty because nobody could pay.
She had a claw hammer, a borrowed Ford truck, and no patience left.
On January 12, 1932, after watching the Kowalskis across the street get put out with a baby six weeks old and a coal stove still warm, Sophie walked across with that hammer, knocked the new lock off with three swings, and carried the stove back in herself, with Mrs. Kowalski holding the door.
By February there were twenty-two women, Polish, Black, Italian, Hungarian, wives, widows, factory girls laid off from Briggs, all with hammers, all with a list.
On January 12, 1932, after watching the Kowalskis across the street get put out with a baby six weeks old and a coal stove still warm, Sophie walked across with that hammer, knocked the new lock off with three swings, and carried the stove back in herself, with Mrs. Kowalski holding the door.
By February there were twenty-two women, Polish, Black, Italian, Hungarian, wives, widows, factory girls laid off from Briggs, all with hammers, all with a list.
They called themselves nothing at all.
The newspapers called them the Moving Crew.
For two winters they followed the bailiffs.
For two winters they followed the bailiffs.
When an eviction went out, the crew went in that night. Locks knocked off, furniture carried back up three flights in the dark, stoves re-piped, windows stuffed with newspaper against the cold, a pot of soup left on to warm, so the children coming home from school would find home still home.
They moved two hundred and eleven families back in, between January 1932 and March 1933. They lost count of stoves. Sophie kept count of hammers broken, seven, notches cut in the handle of hers for each one.
The police arrested Sophie twice. The judge dismissed both times. The second time he told the bailiff, off the record, to stop calling, he was tired of seeing Mrs. Zielinski in his courtroom.
When work came back in 1934 the evictions slowed, then stopped. Sophie went back to collecting rent when people could pay, and not collecting when they could not, which was most of the time for another three years.
She kept that claw hammer hanging behind the kitchen door until she died in 1961, seven notches deep in the hickory handle, head worn smooth on one side from knocking off locks.
Her great-granddaughter has it now, in Detroit, in a toolbox. She used it last winter to hang shelves in her first apartment. It still pulls a nail clean.
They moved two hundred and eleven families back in, between January 1932 and March 1933. They lost count of stoves. Sophie kept count of hammers broken, seven, notches cut in the handle of hers for each one.
The police arrested Sophie twice. The judge dismissed both times. The second time he told the bailiff, off the record, to stop calling, he was tired of seeing Mrs. Zielinski in his courtroom.
When work came back in 1934 the evictions slowed, then stopped. Sophie went back to collecting rent when people could pay, and not collecting when they could not, which was most of the time for another three years.
She kept that claw hammer hanging behind the kitchen door until she died in 1961, seven notches deep in the hickory handle, head worn smooth on one side from knocking off locks.
Her great-granddaughter has it now, in Detroit, in a toolbox. She used it last winter to hang shelves in her first apartment. It still pulls a nail clean.
Thursday, May 07, 2026
John Eads Cushman shop built a lightweight racer using a Cushman (named Black Jack) with a bored out cast iron engine using a piston from a Studebaker six and an overdrive unit giving it two gears. took it to the drag strip and it went 89 mile per hour in the 1/4 mile, a record for a scooter.
John Eads of Kokomo Indiana lived a 102 years despite crewing a bomber as a gunner on 50 missions in WW2
He was born in 1923, in Kokomo, and Married Thelma in 1952
John enlisted in the Army Air Corp on December 5, 1942, at the age of 19 with plans to be a mechanic. But after his enlistment, he was sent to a gunnery school and was assigned as a waist gunner with the 97th Bomber Group, 342nd Squadron of the 15th Air Force in Italy.
He was honorably discharged on March 26, 1945, earning the rank of TSgt.
He was an Army specialty Airplane Mechanic Gunner and during battles, engagements, skirmishes and expeditions, flew in 50 heavy bombardment missions over enemy occupied territory from 1943-1944.
After WW2 he bought a Cushman dealership and also sold Whizzers, it was open until 1958 and worked for Martin Wrecker Service in their office and was very involved at Bunker Hill Dragstrip
After WW2 he bought a Cushman dealership and also sold Whizzers, it was open until 1958 and worked for Martin Wrecker Service in their office and was very involved at Bunker Hill Dragstrip
His Cushman used an old lawn mower handle for steering, a hand ground cam, and a hot water bottle filled with alcohol that he used as a seat for a fuel pump and supply. It weight 136 pounds.
He was a member of Greentown Road Kings Car Club, Kokomo VFW and the Cushman Club
He set the track record in 1958 at 89.4 mph 14.46 seconds in the quarter mile at Bunkerhill Drag Strip.
in this video he went down the strip on an exhibition pass at age 90, in 2013
Yes, I've got 65,000 posts and have forgotten most of them, and if this one is something you've never read before, you oughta consider looking through the last 19.5 years of archives.
Wednesday, May 06, 2026
OUTSTANDING WW2 history! Truk Lagoon, April 30th to May 1st, 1944, in the Caroline Islands
Carrier strikes in the area had left several U.S. aviators downed inside the lagoon, a place still firmly within enemy territory. In response, a Vought OS2U Kingfisher floatplane from the USS Indianapolis (CA-35) had been dispatched on a rescue mission and had recovered a downed pilot, but while loading him aboard the plane, the Kingfisher was swamped and capsized.
Another Kingfisher from the battleship USS North Carolina (BB-55) piloted by Lt. j.g. John A. Burns with Radioman Aubrey J. Gill, saw their capsized compatriot and landed to pick up the three aviators. The Kingfisher could have just taken off with one downed pilot on board, but with three, it was too overloaded. Burns made the decision to taxi out of the lagoon and rendezvous with the lifeguard submarine USS Tang (SS-306) who took the three men aboard.
But Burns wasn't done yet.
After delivering his first three rescues, Burns took off for the lagoon again. Over the next few hours, he located seven more downed airmen scattered across the choppy waters. As he kept picking up survivors with no hope to take off again, Burns packed men into the fuselage, onto the wings, and even towed one of the downed aircraft's rafts to carry all the survivors.
He taxied for five hours through heavy seas, finally returning to the submarine. By the time they rendezvoused with the Tang, the Kingfisher was nearly out of fuel, listing badly from a leaking pontoon, and battered by the waves. The survivors as well as Burns and Gill all were transferred by raft to the sub.
Once the survivors were safely aboard the Tang, the damaged Kingfisher was sunk by gunfire. For his extraordinary persistence and resourcefulness, Burns was awarded the Navy Cross.
Sunday, January 25, 2026
Louisa County High School in Virginia has been doing something awesome for the past 8 years, they have been fixing up donated cars and then giving them away to single moms who could use a lift 4-5 times a year (Thank you Steve!)
That's a bunch of teenagers, doing something great for single moms.
My parents divorced when I was 2 or 3, and then my mom was struggling trying to get by and keeping 2 kids and herself fed and with a place to sleep.
My parents divorced when I was 2 or 3, and then my mom was struggling trying to get by and keeping 2 kids and herself fed and with a place to sleep.
Used cars were 50 bucks back then, in the early to mid 70s, but they were completely worn out. And every damn little thing that could wear out was worn out. That's the only reason those worn out 60s cars were sitting on used car lots, the replacement parts cost more than the cars were worth.
Around 20 students are working on cars each semester in the school, about an hour northwest of Richmond. The teacher, Shane Robertson, instructs kids on how to perform brake and tire repairs, change fluids, test batteries, and maintain heating and cooling systems.
“They get the real-life grit behind why they are really doing a task,” Robertson said in an interview with ABC. “This is somebody’s real car and you’re really making a change in the world.”
The program began in partnership with the nonprofit Giving Words, a local charity that works to support single parents by providing complimentary vehicles and car repairs.
Founder Eddie Brown and his wife were both single parents who had struggled with transportation issues before launching the nonprofit.
“So far, we’ve given over 60 cars away, and repaired more than 260,” Brown told WTVR
“They get the real-life grit behind why they are really doing a task,” Robertson said in an interview with ABC. “This is somebody’s real car and you’re really making a change in the world.”
The program began in partnership with the nonprofit Giving Words, a local charity that works to support single parents by providing complimentary vehicles and car repairs.
Founder Eddie Brown and his wife were both single parents who had struggled with transportation issues before launching the nonprofit.
“So far, we’ve given over 60 cars away, and repaired more than 260,” Brown told WTVR
For the news video of the above, word for word: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YA5k9qmEihU
It's a complicated world, and there are many odd ways that cars end up being given to charities, one is for a tax write off, one might be (darned if I know) when people without next of kin die and their cars are suddenly abandoned. Maybe the many cars that are impounded by the county or cities after being abandoned on the streets and ticketed for enough months, end up in these charities. I don't know.
But I know that rarely does a single mom have any spare money for repairs, and I can tell you that a broken radiator is 800 just for parts, Shop rate labor is now around 300 an hour, up 50 an hour from just 2 years ago. I shit you not.
And there ain't many people who can afford to fix up a run down ol car, and it's the path to perpetual poverty to be without reliable transportation, as IF there is public transportation, the TIME wasted on a bus, trolley, or train, takes away all a persons time to take car of family.
20 years ago I didn't have a commuter, I just had my 69 R/T, and that was 12 dollars a day to drive to work, and 20 minutes. So, I spent many months taking the San Diego Trolley 3 days a week, and driving the R/T twice a week, and that trolley took about 75 min each direction. So, 2.5 hours wasted to commute to a job that a car could simply take 40 minutes a day to achieve. Time is money too. It's valuable and important to have as much time off work as possible to enjoy living. Even if it's just relaxing.
I know what it's like to do a daily job without reliable transportation. And how damn expensive it is to fix up old cars. I never had a new car until I was 40. So, the first 20 some years after high school, was all old cars.
But single moms? They don't get time to relax, they got kids full time. So they need a reliable car that won't drown them in debt in repairs, so they can spend more time raising their kids, because without a parent spending time raising a kid, that's probably going to turn out to be a person with serious problems, a lifetime of them. If that can be prevented with a reliable car? We got to recognize and respect those that can help.
Friday, December 26, 2025
the coolest thing that has happened to me all year.... Larry sent me a Christmas card, and doubled down with a tip jar dragster! Then tripled down with the compliment of the year!
Ain't that the coolest!
Thank you Larry! This is incredible, you made my day, clanged my tip jar (and designed a new one!) and sent me a Christmas card! That's so dang generous, and awesome!
Tuesday, December 23, 2025
Sunday, December 07, 2025
Thursday, November 27, 2025
Coolest thing I've seen today. Tell me why the billions of tires filling canyons, dumps, fields, alleys, etc can't be easily, quickly, and cheaply cut into freeway noise barriers for every city, airport, etc?
These walls are built from shredded tires mixed into rubber-rich panels that soak up traffic noise and keep thousands of tires out of landfills
I've posted about tires getting pulled out of rivers, lakes, reservoirs, streams etc...
I've posted about tires being dumped off bridges into canyons, farms, and country roads where it's called Fly Tipping
And there are so many examples of guys getting paid to take tires away - just make them disappear, that we don't hear about. Imagine how much better the system would be if the tires everyone dumps in alleys, etc were worth 10 bucks apiece - like all the copper that the meth freaks steal, and got cleaned out of city alleyways, to get turned in for the refund, just like cans, bottles, etc.
I'm pretty sure that's why so many states put that 5 or 10 cent refund, or CRV, on the garbage we toss - so that the homeless who go trash can to dumpster, all day long, through city alleys and parks, and bring everything that they can make make money from to the recycle drops.
At least, they do here in San Diego. Guys come up from Tijuana with trucks, and load up washers, fridges, heaters, AC units, and mattresses. Everything they can get money for when they get it back into TiJuana.
Friday, November 21, 2025
This is incredible... the grand daughter of the guy who made these bookends, somehow came across that I'd posted them, and emailed me!
One of the clocks came from his car, that he drove his wife and newborn daughter home from the hospital in... and that daughter, is the mom of Sharon, who emailed me!
Her email:
In a convoluted manner I came to your justacarguy.blogspot, read your post about the two Studebaker Elgin clocks inside of maple cases, built for them by Harry Reid Anama.
Her email:
I was rocked and knocked to read your comments about the two neat, secret notes contained within the cases. BECAUSE HARRY REID ANAMA WAS MY MATERNAL GRANDFATHER and "Helen" was my mother.
My grandfather worked for Western Electric for 35 years, relocating in San Diego, Los Angles, Seattle and San Jose, every few years, and always living in the same general part of San Diego.
Harry was born in Kansas in 1903, and his youngest working years were in the Santa Fe Rail Yards of Albuquerque, doing fine interior wood work on the passenger cars.
Harry was born in Kansas in 1903, and his youngest working years were in the Santa Fe Rail Yards of Albuquerque, doing fine interior wood work on the passenger cars.
He learned from his father and his grandfather, and eventually worked in the woodworking part of the Los Angeles Santa Fe Rail Yard.
He honed his mechanical skills, including working on clocks and watches along the way.
When he retired in 1965, my mother urged him to fill his time collecting and repairing clocks and watches. At yard sales and swap meets he collected broken furniture pieces of oak, maple and walnut, which he planed, cut turned table legs in half to use as columns, and made beautiful clock cases, with lovely key wound chiming clock works.
He built 30-40 of such clocks, most with one or two secret compartments. The cases for the Studebaker clocks were simple, utilitarian but finely done. He always did a handwritten printed note about the where, when and how a clock case was made.
Do you live in San Diego? I will be visiting family at Christmas and would love to meet you.
Thanks for making my day!
Do you live in San Diego? I will be visiting family at Christmas and would love to meet you.
Thanks for making my day!
.................................................................................................................................................
Ain't that the coolest thing?
Tuesday, November 11, 2025
Wednesday, September 24, 2025
Sunday, September 21, 2025
Friday, September 19, 2025
I hope everyone gets as much satisfaction looking around on Facebook as I do... there's so much wonderful stuff that people are sharing on it, like this "lending library" of Hot Wheels
Making it look like the store hook, and Hot Wheels packaging, is just superb!
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