Life at Lake X in the '60s

For years I have wanted to pass along some of the experiences I had at Lake X from 1962 through 1970. This is going to take awhile and will be a living document. That means that I will add bits and pieces over time. Additionally, I invite anyone that was there to add their experiences. CAVEAT! Do not expect everything to be accurate and correct. It's not that I don't want to be correct. But, unfortunately, I will have to work from memory and the few items I still have as clues. Also, I have been known to embelish. If there is one thing I have learned in my life as a former boat racer, fisherman and fighter pilot; it is that boat racers, fishermen and fighter pilots are the greatest liars in the world. I especially know that is true about boat racers because we would always run every race boat through the measured kilo at Lake X many times as we tried new things and as Don Schwebbs banged on our props. We always knew exactly how fast our boats were running before we left the lake. The only significant variables were fuel loads, water conditions and whether we were running in salt water. SOOOOO...you would not believe how many times somebody at a race site would tell me that they were running at 75mph and I would walk past them in an absolute 62mph boat. Excuse me if I get names, places, dates and alot of other things wrong. Also feel free to correct me. I am Steve Sirois and my brother was Bill Sirois. Many of you may have heard of or known him. Very few of you will have known or heard of me. In my next post I will try to explain how we got to Lake X. :rolleyes:

Great post - keep it going!

Greg

Steve, I'm sittin' on the edge of my seat and can't wait. I only went to Lake X once and glad I was able to go before Swebbie left. I hope you've got some pictures also.

I just spent an hour writing a post about how Bill started racing and ended up at the Lake,,,,,and then when I submitted it,,,,,, it must have gone to Mars, because I lost it all. Sooooo...I will try again, in smaller bits - Steve:confused:

Man - I Have So Many Pics Of Me My Dad And Swebbie At Lake X , Wish I Had A Scanner

OK, Let's try again. Circa 1950, When we were kids in Indiana, our Uncle George Horner owned a small Fish Camp on the Kankakee River by Shelby, IN. Bill would have been 9-10 & I 6-7. Bill purloined one of George's fishing boats and was terrorizing the local fishermen when he ran afoul of the local Game Warden. The Fuzz, holding Bill by the ear, returned him to George with the admonition, "You better watch this Kid, he's a menace on the water." If he had only known what the future held!.....I'm going to do this in small pieces so I won't lose too much again - Steve

Parker, I have a scanner ;)

Sam - Man You Would Have A Pallett Show Up At The Door ,
I Dont Know Where To Start , As Far As Loading

1959 Bill was an officer in SHS JB's Club (junior JC's I think). He convinced members that a good project would be to sponsor a boat race on Sarasota Bay. Needless to say, Bill would be the race chairman. I not sure that he told anybody in advance the he also planned to compete. He cobbled together an old fishing boat and attached a Mercury KG-9. I think he did quite well. Bill was also a outstanding swimmer on the SHS swim team and Coach Carlie Cleland was thorougly p---ed when Bill quit the team in order to go to work for Al Holub at Sarasota Marine. Al also had a part interest in a small boat building business and after sending Bill through Mercury Service school began to let him use one of his hulls and a Mercury to run in local races. Bill was forever grateful to Al for that. I went to a race with Bill and his girfriend Suzanne (Willy) Williams in Palmasola Bay. He won that one handily and soon had caught the attention of Mercury. I think that Bob Burford, who was married to Helen Kiekhaefer, got Bill in the door. Anyway, he was soon at Lake X running endurance. A side project was helping to build the 17 mile road around the property. Chet Strickland was right along side of him as they slogged through the swamps. Bill and Chet had been good friends through High School. Chet was also a very successful racer in both the US and Europe. The last time I saw Chet was at Bill's funeral. More later - Steve

I love your stories! Please post more! Its always great to get first hand accounts, especially from a person that can tell a story as well :)

June 1962. Right after SHS graduation, Bill helped me get onboard with Mercury at the Siesta Key test station. A point to be made....Back then it was Kiekhaefer Corporation. Later it became Mercury Marine. Gene Wagner was the Boss there and a great guy to work for. Had alot of fun running endurance in salt water and will provide many stories about that in the future. I started at Manatee Jr College in the Fall and barely hung in for awhile. In 1963, I flunked out of MJC and went to work full time at Siesta Key test station and shortly ended up at Lake X driving endurance. Ted Collins ran the admin side of things and Joe Anderson was the boss in the shop. Over the next several years I worked on and off at Lake X and Siesta Key while I also returned to MJC and then Univ of South Florida. Finally eked out a BA in Management at USF in 1968. We ran 24 hour endurance at Lake X from Monday AM until Saturday at Noon when we would pull the boats out of the water an wash them. Often I would then drive a truck to Sarasota to pick up parts at the Airport Distrubution warehouse and return Monday AM. We worked hard sometimes, but played hard all the time. Needless to say, there was a copius amount of adult beverage consumed. Many stories about that in the future. I honestly do not know how I survived those whiskey years. More tomorrow night, I hope! -Steve:rolleyes:

Thanks for sharing Steve,

Keep it rollin' :D :D

great stuff. Keep it up. thanks, James

The lake that I never had the chance to go to......but with these stories it almost feels like it.

please keep it coming!

I am with the others, please write as much as you wish ...

And we need to all pitch in and get Parker a scanner ;)

Love the stories. Keep em comin'

Parker....you could take a lil out of the sale of your ride and buy a cheap scanner man....I've got one here at the house also if you need some help with that. Just get up with me. Let me know if I can help. I'd like to see more on the Hammer Down stuff also.

I Know!!! Im Waiting For Lake Racer 99 To Post The Rest Of Them !

I have at least 5 stories that fit this category. In 4 of them, nobody got hurt. Sad to say, the other one was tragic. I will post them individually and it may take me until later tonight of even tomorrow to post them all..............Very early during my time with Kiekhaefer I was running endurance out of the Siesta Key.....Ooops gotta go...back in about an hour or two....-Steve

These are great. Keep it up. Reminds me of sitting around with my grandpaw and listing to his great stories. These are the best. THANKS FOR SHARING

OK, so we were running endurance out of Siesta Key. Gene Wagner was the boss there and he would see us off early AM. There would be 4 or 5 of us and we would be running anywhere from 20 to 50mph depending on what engines we were testing. Several years prior one of the endurance driver had the sun in his eyes as he went under the Siesta Key Bridge and ran over a fisherman causing serious injuries. Well, Gene was always worried that such an event would recur. Anyway, Pete Brogan was running a Alim with twin big mercs and I was running a small cat with twin small mercs. He would have been running around 50mph and I was probably doing 35. Pete decided that he would wash me down. I'm sure most of you know how that is done. He is head on to me when he started a big arc to set me up. Seeing this, I decided to counter. Take it from me, never turn into someone that is trying to wash you down. Always turn the opposite direction. We met in the middle of the turn and I literally went through his boat doing much damage and taking out one of his engines. Fortunately neither of us got hurt. As we came to a stop, Pete was livid. He was screaming something about having a family to feed and how he needed this job. Wisely I kept my distance. I told Pete, "Don't worry about it. I'm single. I'll take all the blame". I got out of there and headed back to the base at my stately 35mph while Pete limped back off-plane. When I got back I approached Gene and told him I had bad news. The blood immediatly started to leave his face. When I told him I had been involved in a collision, he turned ashen. No doubt he thought I had run over a fisherman. When I told him I had only run over Pete he was so relieved that he didn't even fire me. However, I can tell you that it is no fun climbing under the deck of a small cat and grinding fiberglass for an hour or two. Being my first experience grinding fiberglass, I didn't know what I was in for until later. Jumping off the dock and staying in salt water for an hour does not help one bit. Follow this bit of advice from me that I learned 8 years later in USAF pilot training. If you are closing on another airplane (or boat), make note of whether or not he is moving on your canopy. If he is stationary on your canopy (or windshield) and you never change the geometry, you are in big trouble.

Ted Collins is my grandfather....he talks a bit about his Lake X days, I always enjoy watching the old movies from the demo days out there when they would show off for the corporate big wigs....12' tiller steer jon boats jumping ramps and stuff like that...I've been out there twice, heck I live close enough that I could hear the boats running when the wind was coming from the right direction....It's funny as heck when he starts talking about Mr K screaming at techs at Fond-du-lac when a motor blew up on his lake! :D

This is probably the stupidest thing I ever did in my life. Well, maybe not the stupidest, but it ranks right up there. Driving endurance at Lake X on the midnight shift and the sky is beginnig to lighten up enough to see without lights. Phil Schenk had pulled off to the inside of the course at the South end of the lake. As we often did, I pulled off and rafted up with him to talk. Phil went to the transom and proceeded to relieve himself over the edge. There must have been an evil demon sitting on my shoulder and whispering into my ear. Without thinking, I acted on an sudden impulse to reach into his boat an jam the shift/throttle lever full forward. You know it's kind of like that urge to laugh when someone falls down. For about a micro second it was funny. Then I noticed that Phil was hangin' out the back of the boat (in more ways than one) and fighting to get himself and it back in. Meanwhile he was screaming something akin to what Pete Brogan was screaming in the previous story. Fortunately, neither Phil nor any part of his body was injured. At least I don't Think he or it was. This was another occurance in which I felt it wise to keep some distance between my victim and me. Once accept some advice from a guy who has managed to survive 61 years on this planet. Never act on a sudden impulse! There is a difference between the sane and the insane. I have always believed that everyone has a rare moment when some foolish thought run through your mind. The difference is that the sane man laughs at himself but does not act on it. The insane man does. Everybody knows that every boat racer has just a little bit of insanity lying just below the surface. There is an old saying that runs in aviation circles. "There are plenty of old pilots, and plenty of bold pilots, but very few old bold pilots." Personally, I believe that you must be bold to compete and win in the world of racing. Bill was bold, but he always knew when to lay back and let the other guy destroy his equipment. Sidelight here: Bill always had lots of humorous one liners. One that I thought was particularly funny and self-effacing was, "It's not very big around, but it sure is short". Later Gators......Best regards - Steve Sirois

Awesome Bullet - Let me tell you, your Grandfather is a very good man. Several years ago I was passing through St Cloud and looked him up. We had a nice talk. Sorry everyone but Awesome B. just made me remember a totally different and totally stupid thing that I did. I think it was Ralph Seavey and I that had been in St Cloud for many hours day-drinking and enjoying the cowboy hospitality of the J&A Bar. I once saw a well oiled cowboy ride his horse right through the front door. His act was well recieved by the clientele and I nearly fell off the bar stool laughing. Anyway, Ralph and I decided it was about time to make our way back to the lake in my early '60s Corvair. Damn that car was fun to drive. It was even more fun when the "Whiskey Man" was riding on my shoulder and whispering into my ear. I don't know if you have ever had that experience, but he tends to tell you that you have super-human talents. He told me that I could drive the entire distance from the Lake X turn off to the lake gate without ever actually getting on the pavement. I guess that was another time when I let myself slip across that thin line into the world of the insane. The weeds along the roadside were roughly the same height of a full grown Corvair. Therefore, for about 5 miles, all we saw was the weeds at the distance from the windshield to the front bumper. From the road, it must have looked like a wild pig running through the weeds. The amazing thing is that we actually made it to within a hundred yards of the gate when we re-emerged onto the pavement and gathered enough speed to fully engage the emergency brake and spin the steering wheel full left, thus causing the white Corvair to wildly spin in a screeching 180 degree turn amid great clouds of smoke and gales of laughter coming from the two idiots inside. We finally came to a dead stop directly in front of the gate and facing the other way. When everything finally got quiet anyone could still hear us laughing from a some distance. That included Mrs. Kiekhaefer and Anita Kiekhaefer who were both standing at the gate with stunned looks on their faces. Ralph and I suddenly realized that we would probably be packing our stuff very soon. Upon awakening the next day we were summoned to the main affice for a visit with Awesome Bullet's Grandfather (Ted Collins, the Boss). Ted was always a very laid back gentleman. He very quietly asked if anything exciting had happened to us the previous evening. I immediatly replied. "I cannot tell a lie. He did it." and I pointed at Ralph. Much to my relief, Ted laughed and simply said, "You guys need to take it a little easy. Get back to work." I think we both bowed several time as we backed out of the office. Soooooo, Awesome Bullet, the next time you see your Grandfather, tell him how grateful I am to this very day that he saw fit to have mercy on a couple of idiots 40+ years ago. That's all for tonight folks. Best Regards from someone that survived his own stupidity many years ago, but is around to laugh about it today. - Steve Sirois :rolleyes:

I always believed it is much better to be foolish at a younger age ;)

We're like rubber. When it's new, it's REAL flexible. When it's gettin' on in age, NOT so flexible :eek: :D :D

Thanks for sharing Steve :cool:

The woman who literally changed my life 31 years ago and my wife of 30 years, reminded me late last night of 2 things. #1: Be a little careful of what you say in that forum. People may think you were a drunk. and #2: Don't get a big head just because some may enjoy your stories. As usual, she is right. As to #1, things were definately wild and wooly in the '60s. I was in my late teens and early 20's. There was not the stigma attached to alcohol as there is today. How we survived in those days was usually only by luck, and I certainly had my share of that. I have always believed that you change with the times or you die. Believe me when I say that I have changed with the times. How else could I have evolved through several stages to end up as a School Safety Inspector. However, I'm don't believe that I would have made it through those evolutions were it not for Iris. I know that may sound corney, but it is true. I love her dearly. As to #2, The only thing better than telling a good story, is realizing that someone might actually enjoy it. However if I get too wound up, as I sometimes still do, tell me to cool it. - Steve :o

Keep it coming, this is the best read that has been on here in a long long time.

RT

I Don't remember exactly when this event occured but it really doesn't matter. I drove the midnight shift endurance for 9 straight months. That was a lot better than rotating through shifts every week. Actually I eventually got used to it and enjoyed it. We used to do a lot of reading while driving endurance. I must have read a hundred books during that 9 months. I took one of those little 12 volt lamps that you strap to your head and attached a long cord with alligator clips on the end. I could reach under the deck and attach them to the terminals on the back of the boat headlight switch. Joe Anderson told us not to read while driving but we did it anyway. Early one morning as the sun was coming up and I was cruising along at full speed, I sensed a presence. I looked to my right, and there was Joe tucked in about ten feet to my right. I don't know how long he had been there but when I looked up and saw him he just peeled off. I thought I was in trouble, but he never even said a word about it. On another occasion, I had driven to Miami and back during the day to pick up a boat for the Company. I got back to the Lake just in time to start my midnight shift at 11:30PM. Usually you would settle into an almost trance-like state during the night. Sometimes you didn't even remember the last couple of laps. I think it was about 3:00AM as I was going down the backstretch that I observed an overpass over the trees at the end of the lake and I was headed for it when a Greyhound Bus passed me on the right. WOW! That woke me up. Several guys ran into the trees while driving the night shift. That usually resulted in getting sent down the road with your bags. Fortunately, I never had that experience. However, I came very close one night. We were testing the prototype Super-Speedmasters. We had two Merc 6's (I don't remember if they were 1250's or 1350's) on the back of a 19' S-22 and it ran in the mid 60's, which can be kind of neat in the middle of the night. When you pulled out of the slip at Lake X, you would cross the course and do a left 270 degree turn onto the course. I guess I zoned out a little early one night because I pulled out of the slip and just went straight. The lake is only about 1/2 mile wide at that point, so it didn't take long before I was staring at trees, but only for about 1/2 of a second. Boat Racers always turn left (By the way, so do Fighter Pilots) and that's what I did. Rather abruptly I might add. Seems that the boat didn't want to cooperate and responded by swapping ends. Naturally, when the boat went hard left, my body kept going straight. At least until my head met the gunwale. A few seconds later I came to my senses and discovered that I was still in the boat with my head under the well and the engines were screaming as the props cavitated about a foot behind me. I managed to get up and pull the throttles back. I eased back across the Lake and into the slip and told the midnight Mechanic (Ed Luthie) that I had a bodacious headache. I sat down for awhile with an ice pack on my head and then went back out on the lake for the rest of the night. At least I didn't end up in the trees. Anyway, that's one more stupid act the turned into a good story. For the next story, I was not in a boat, but if you were at the Offshore Worlds in Key West one year you might have witnessed it. :o :rolleyes: Best Regards - Steve

Next Stupid Act. Fast forward a decade or more. Bill is with Al Copeland (Popeyes) and they are making a go at the Offshore Worlds in Key West. By then I had left the world of Boat Racing and had entered a different world. In 1970 I had attended USAF pilot training. That was an interesting year at Craig AFB in Selma, Alabama. I could talk about that and the next 28 years forever. Next I checked out in the F-102 and flew it with the Florida Air National Guard in Jacksonville for 3 years before transitioning into the F-106. If you want to know a little about the Six just type F-106 Delta Dart into Google. What an incredible machine. Single engine, single seat and Mach 2. They didn't call it the Cadillac of fighters for nothing. I had the ethereal pleasure of flying the Six for 10 years before kidney stones said no more single seat fighters for you Bub. After that I flew 3 different transports (C-131, C-130, C-26) for another 14 years. Anyway, Back to Key West. I managed to wrangle a Six to go to Key West NAS (Boca Chica) on a "very important mission". I bummed a ride to Truman Annex and spent the next several hours with Bill in the pits. After which I went back to Boca Chica and fired up my trusty aluminum Dart. I took off VFR (Visual Flight Rules) and headed about 20 miles South. Let me interject something here. You have got to understand that NORAD was a little bit nervous about any unknown low and fast movers approaching from the South. Remember Cuba is only 90 miles South of Key West and they had Mig's. Since I had descended to about 300', turned North and pumped it up to about 600 Knots, I definately met that criteria. It didn't take long before I had the pits in my sight. Once I had reached about 1/2 half mile out, I lit the afterburner and pulled straight up. You have to understand that the Six is an incredibly loud aircraft when in full afterburner. My guess is that several corpses in the graveyard sat bolt upright to see what the Hell was going on. I rolled over on my back at 15,000' and filed an IFR clearance to Jax. Naturally, after the thrill had worn off, I began to see my flying carrer going down the drain. Once again I had acted on a stupid impulse. This time I was screaming at myself in much the same way that Pete Brogan and Phil Schenk had done in earlier stories. However, for the next several years, I heard comments about the crazy SOB that attacked the Offshore Worlds. The unbelievable thing is that, I was neither caught nor killed. Once again luck was with me. To this day, I still do something stupid once in awhile. But never again anything that stupid. :eek: :eek: :rolleyes: -Steve

I have a few older uncles (some not with us) that trained on PT's and graduated to P-51's. When they would ferry from base to base as needed, they would deviate from their course in order to drop "flour bombs" on their brothers farms.

Quite the site when one is bailing hay...lol

AND another foolish moment when one holds one's breathe in a questionable career move. ;)

Imagine some of the kids trying today, the things WE got away with when younger :rolleyes:

Great "truths" ie: non-fictional, stories= fictional ;)

OK, the next act did not include me. I think this occurred in the mid 60's. I was no longer driving endurance. I had been away from the lake for a few days for some reason I don't remember. I walked into the shop to find out that there had been a collision on the North end of the lake during the previous night and Jim Prey was missing. Jim was one of the Wisconsin guys that had come down to drive endurance. He was well liked among the folks. He was one of those that was just a really nice guy. Let me say at this point that I don't know who did what, but apparently someone had decided to turn their headlights off and run the opposite direction on the course to scare the pants off of someone else. As you might have surmised from some of my earlier stories, such acts were not unheard of. We were always trying to sneak up on each other and throw something (like a rotten banana) at or wash the other guy down. Anyway, the tactic turned tragic when they had a glancing blow and Jim was ejected into the dark water of Lake X. Since it was the middle of Winter he was wearing heavy Winter coveralls. We immediatly began to drag the bottom from several boats and motorized barges. This went on for about 3 days and nights. I was assigned to one of the barges with 2 other guys. By then Jim's family had flown in from Wisconsin and was sadly waiting for the recovery. During the search we must have hooked hundreds of logs off of the bottom and we were always a little nervous when we pulled something up. It would ususlly pop up 50 or a hundred feet behing us and we would pull in the next log. On in the wee hours of night 3 we hooked another one but this time it was Jim. It was another one of those images that will be forever burned in my brain. By the time we got back to the boat slip, word had spread and Jim's brother was waiting in the gloom for us. Someone convinced him to move away a bit since it was not a pretty sight. We loaded him into an ambulance and they left us all standing there in the night surrounded by utter sadness. I don't know what transpired after that event, but I think things tightened up considerably. That's all for today. Maybe some more tonight. Remembering this event has left me a little down. For the past couple of years Iris has been a hospice Nurse and we have talked alot about events that she has been a part of. After awhile you get over the shock of it, but it never gets easy. :( Don't worry, I promise that the next story will be fun. :rolleyes: -Steve

Steve, these have been some great stories I hope you keep them coming. I know you mentioned in a previous post that EC fired Bill several times in one day. From what I understand Bill was one of the few people that could stand up to the Old man and live to tell about it. I guess both of them had a pretty good temper at times.
I had also heard a story about Janish getting fired one day and getting hired back the next day during the Drift r Cruise Houseboat run by EC. I think your brother suggested to Doug to stand up to EC. Ops!!! Janish got hired back the next day at a Press Conference for the return trip south.
It sounds like you guys went through some vehicles as well, while at the lake, and that a few Cars went into the ditch on Old Melbourne Hwy. Any drag races on the air strip?
Keep the Stories coming.
Bruce Washburn

Bruce - Thanks for reminding me about one of the most incredible survival stories I've ever heard. 1st let me bring others up to speed on the background of your previous post. Once again I cannot put a date on it and it would be much better (and more accurate) if told by either Doug or Larry. Mr. Kiekhaefer (or maybe it was Joe Swift)somehow decided that it would be a great PR gambit to pull a group of very attractive skiers behind a Drifter-Cruise houseboat powered (I think) by 4 Mercruiser 160's. Since Doug Janisch was a top notch mechanic and organizer (Man I hope Doug doesn't see this) he became the driver of record. I don't know who else ran the boat with him, but 6 lovelies came along to do the skiing, sometimes all six at once. One of them was Alice, Doug's future bride. Anyway, the schtick was to pull the ladies all the way up the Mississippi from Nawlins' to the Great Lakes and continue up through the St. Lawrence Seaway. I'm not sure if they ended it there, came down the East Coast, or went back the way they came. Once the Loooong trip was over the boat and Doug ended up back in Nawlins'. I think he was then supposed to transit the Gulf of Mexico to St Pete, which by my calculation is 450 mile straight line. I don't know who else was with him other than Larry Smith. Larry was and still is a photographer of considerable reknown. He took many photos of Offshore racing and later also took many for us in the Florida Air National Guard. Larry had injured a leg or ankle and was wearing a cast on his lower leg. They set out across the Gulf on calm seas that had a surprise for them. Somewhere in the middle of the Gulf and the middle of the night. An incredible storm blew up and Larry got seasick so he went in the back and hit the sack. Yes there were beds onboard. Doug and Crew fought against the seas for hours just to survive. Somewhere along they way Doug sent someone back to check on Larry. Much to everyones dismay, Larry was gone. I have been in situations where someone just disappears. It is probably the most helpless feeling in the world. Anyway, they sent out a distress signal to the Coast Guard and doubled back on their course. Now, I can tell you this. I have searched for boats at sea from the air during the daylight and in pretty decent weather. It is extremely tough even under good conditions. You can only imagine what it would be in extreme weather, in the dark, in the middle of the Gulf and you have no idea when or where he went overboard. Add to it that you are fighting to even keep your own vessel afloat. Meanwhile put yourself in Larry's situation. Suddenly your are overboard in the aformentioned conditions with only an inadequate life preserver and that is it. The lights of the boat quickly disappear and now you are alone. The cast on your leg is now water logged and is making it very difficult to stay above the water, and getting worse with time. Larry is one of those guys that is a born survivor. I'm not talking about one of these chicken s--t TV programs either. This is the real thing. Many people would have just given up and taken the big gulp. Not Larry. He remembers that he has his car key in his pocket. He very carefully extracts it and taking big breaths, ducks under and starts to saw away at the cast with the key. Good God Larry, don't drop the key! After some time and Hurculean effort he manages to cut the cast away and is now more bouyant. But he is still up a creek without a paddle. Meanwhile the sun is starting to lighten the sky and the Coast Guard has entered the search. I'm not sure about any of these details or how long it took, but I think it was Doug that finally found Larry and pulled him aboard. I've always believed that attitude and perseverence are the most important characteristics of survival. I think even Ernest Shackleton would have been impressed with this event. I think Larry still lives here in Jacksonville so I will try to locate him to get a better handle on this story. Meanwhile, if anyone out there is in touch with Doug, and you can get him to talk about it, pick his brain and fill us all in. Also ask him if he's eaten any skrimps lately. :rolleyes: -Steve

Steve:

You are where I was about 4 years ago.....new to this type of thing and laying it out there for anyone to read and enjoy.

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http://www.offshoreonly.com/forums/s...ad.php?t=14410

This stuff is terrific...and a credit to both you and your brother....who was a friend of mine.

Post away...you're damn good at it!..... and it's a lot better than reading about the cheapest way to buy used outboard parts.....

T2x

P.S.....Got any tidbits about the Lake X "motel"?

Sometime during my life at Lake X Ralph Seavey showed up from Sarasota to drive endurance. Ralph had been a good friend all through Sarasota High School and I was really glad to see him at the lake. We had many adventures over the years and I always appreciated his friendly ways. During his first week at the lake he was on the day shift which handed off to the swing shift which ran until 11:30 and then handed off to the midnight shift. This was during my 9 straight month stint on the midnight shift. Meanwhile some of Freddy Kiekhaefer's college friends were at the lake to drive endurance for the Summer. Mr. Kiekhaefer was always very friendly toward guys that were working their way through college and that included me. For that and many other things I will always be grateful to him. Anyway, one of Freddy's friends asked Ralph if he would like to take his place on the swing shift so he could go out with friends to sample a bit of that famous St Cloud nightlife. Or maybe they were going to Cocoa Beach which was always a favorite of ours. Soooo..Ralph said sure, I can handle 16 straight hours on the lake. In reality, we had all done that, and more, on many occasions. Well one of the great fun tricks (besides coating the inside of a newcomers bag lunch sandwich with multi-purpose grease) was to roll a banana on a surface until the inside turned to mush and then throw it at the other guy as you went by him in the middle of the night. What a great splat it made if you were right on target at 40mph. I once got hit by a catfish thrown by my brother while he and Chet Strickland were poaching the lake in the middle of the night. Boy, there is another great story that I'll get to some other time. Back to Ralph....I had reported to work and had walked out to the base of the old tower with a nicely mushed banana to blast Ralph as he turned off of the course at he end of this lap. I saw his lights coming up the West side of the lake and they slowly drifted further to the West and toward the trees. There was a spit off land that jutted about 100' out in the lake where the Grumman Goose (amphibian aircraft) could exit the lake onto a ramp. The spit of land was protected by a wooden seawall that stuck up about 2 or 3 feet above the surface of the water. You guessed it. Ralph had drifted off into the Lake X coma. The next thing I knew his headlights suddenly shot straight up into the air and there was one hell of a boom. Needless to say this awakened Ralph from his comatose state and he wondered how he had somehow suddenly bocome an aviator. Albeit for a very short flight. He completely cleared the spit of landed and plopped into the lake on the other side. Along the way he had gathered a rather impressive hole in the bottom of the boat and rid himself of one of those pesky sterndrives. Meanwhile the mid-shift mechanic (Gene...sorry can't remember his last name) was already in the rescue boat and headed out the slip to retrieve Ralph before he sank. For my part, there I stood with a perfectly good mushed banana in my hand and nobody to blast. Soooo...when Ralph came into the mouth of the slip on the end of a tow rope, I figured, what the hell? and let fly. I think I got him pretty good. Ralph went off to nurse his wounded ego and I ran my midnight shift. The next morning Joe Anderson arrived back at the Lake from one of his forays to Sarasota. After he had been informed of the previous nights excitement he beckoned Ralph to follow him. Remember, this is the end of Ralp's very first week in the employ of the Kiekhaefer Corp and he was already in deep kimchee. Being a good and loyal friend that only wanted to blast ralph with a banana the night before, I walked with him and Joe to survey the damage to the boat which was now on a dolly. We all three bent over to look at the bottom of the boat and then Joe stood back up and said, "Ralph, I think you better go pack your bags". Ralph was devastated. I think it was Freddy that came to his defense and explained to Joe that Ralph had just been trying to be a good guy and took the other guys shift which resulted in 16 straight hours on the lake. Joe relented and Ralph spent several years at the lake and raced many a good race. Circa 1978 I got a call late in the evening from Ralphs brother Kenney. Kenney's exact words were, "Steve, I got out of bed this morning and walked out into the living room. Ralph was sitting there in a rocking chair stiff as a f---ing board." Good-bye too early to another true and good friend. We've all said too early Good-byes to too many friends. :( Later Gators - Steve

T2x - I was standing next to the motel with mushed banana in hand the night that Ralph gained the name of "Seawall Seavey". For those of you that are interested, the motel was under the old timing tower. It consisted of 6 or 8 one room....motel rooms. VIPs would be invited to stay there. Mr kiekhaefer always stayed in the Northern most one when he was there and Joe Anderson always stayed in the Southern most one. When running endurance one would see (usually very late) Joe's headlights pull in by his room. He would then stand there in the dark for awhile before he turned in. When Mr. Kiekhaefer was there, one would often see him standing on the seawall in front of his room just as the morning light was beginnig to show. When we finished our shift we would go to the dining room and Joe Dumbolton (the morning chef) would fix us whatever we wanted. Mr Kiekhaefer would almost always come to breakfast while we were in there and he would always have a few kind words. There were 4 round tables (this was in the original kitchen in the old building) and he would sit in the corner at the executive table. I heard some of the most amazing conversations that you could imagine in that kitchen. The food at Lake X was incredible. Mr Kiekhaefer often had the best possible steaks flown in from Wisconsin for "his boys". Sometimes he would do elaborate cookouts for us and he would personally do the cooking. God, those days were great! :) -Steve

Sorry..Thats T2X, not TX2
:D -Steve

Tx2 - just read your links back to your first posts. Loved it. I think I need to peruse my way back through alot of old posts or threads or whatever they are called. Here's another one of my "I've always believed".

I've always strongly believed that the best medicine for a man is to have a good laugh at himself. Anyone that is incapable of laughing at himself has his underwear on too tight. :D -Steve

This is terrific reading. Keep it coming. And welcome to S&F.

Best reading I have done in a while keep it up I LOVE it :D :D