[ponyakr]

Now here's a wild story for you. After they opened the new dirt track in Chatham, a neighbor of mine showed up at the shop one day. We'd went to school together, but he was several years older than me. He worked for the parish (county, we're still French in La.) He drove a road grader dozer and other equipment. He told me he had heard about the new dirt track and that I was doing some dirt racing and he wanted to get involved. Well, that was fine with me. I figured I needed all the hlep I could get beatin these things back into shape every week. He went on to tell me how he had raced at a local track years before. i had never heard much about it. They'd raced mostly 55-57 Chevys. He told me that another neighbor of ours had also raced bak then. They called him "Flipper" cause he had so many end over end wrecks. Anyhow, we pulled my 1sty dirt car out of the weeds, stuck a motor in it and soon he was in the middle of the action. Then 1 nite a Checy drove him hard into the wall knocking the rear end out of it and ripping out the control arm brackets. It was a mess. We decided it would take too long to fix it, so we just went out in the barnyard and got another car. It was MB's 1st racer, the 68 bird. I had come across a good 428, wo we stuck it in the bird and he was back on the track. Now here's where the story gets wild. and I warn you, it may rub you the wrong way, so you may want to unplug here. After the crash with the cutlass I had told him about the possibility of using MB's old car for his next ride, so he went out behind the shop to take a look. Now it was a hot summer day and I already knew the car, so I stayed in the shade of the shop while he went out back to look at it. After a long while he didn't come back so I wnet around back to see what was taking him so long. He was leaned up against the shop int he shade, and was white as a ghost. I said "Hey, man, what's wrong?" He barely could talk, but he said "I'm having some problems, call my wife." Well it looked to me like he needed an ambulance, not his wife. But I did like he asked. He was obvioiusly having some sort of heart attack. After I called his wife I remember thinkin "If I don't do something he ain't gonna make it til his wife gets here!" So I did what I had been trained to do, I ministered 1st aid. Our pastor had told us about how Jesus had prayed for the sick and had instructed his followers to do the same. So there was no decision to be made. I went back around the shop and said "Jerry, is it alright if I pray for you?" Now I could tell that Jerry was not religious at all. But when your back's up against the wall and yo're facing possible death, you don't tell soembody "no, I don't want your prayers, don't pray for me." No, you'll take hlep from any source. So, I prayed for him out loud just like our pastor had taught. From then on I figured he'd make it. But when his wife got there she could see it looked bad, so she called the ambulance. To make a long story short, in a few days he was out of the hospital, back at work every day and at the shop everyday after work helpin me thrash on the bird to get it back on the track. He never talked about it much, but I cand assure you he never forgot what happened that day - nor have I. PTL!

[ponyakr]

Now, if you thought that last post was wild, you ain't heard nothin yet. Now folks, you'll have to realize that what I'm tellin you here is the truth. I couldn't dream something like this up in my wildest imagination. So here's how it went down. Back about '07 I met a man (whom we'll call Joe) who loved close to the dirt track. He loved racin and went to the dirt races every Sat. night. I told him I was getting back into dray racing. So we started talking about it. He indicated that he wouldn't mind doing a little of that himself. Well, if you've followed my story you know by now that I'm always lookin for somebody tha's interested in racing. By now I had a yard full of 3rd gens. I'd seen some real nice race cars using this body. So I told him to come on over 1 day and pick one out and I'd help him thrown something together so he could get a taste of it and see if he wanted to go any further with it. So he did and we did. Now fast forward a few moths. They're having a booked in show of bad Pro-mods at out local strip. So I asked Joe if he'd like to go. He said he wasn't feeling too good but he wouldn't mind going, so I picked him and his teenage son up and we took off to the track. I could see he wasn't feeling well so I backed the van up to the fence, close to the finish line so he could sit on the back and watch. But he kep feeling worse an dworse. He was using an inhaler, but it wasn't helping. It finally go so bad he could hardly bfeath. He said "D, I think I need to got to the hospital." So we loade dup and tore out to the hospital. but we didn't get a mile up the road before he began gasping for air. He said "D, I don't think I'm gonna make it." Well we were at least 20 min. from the hospital and he didn't have 20 min. Then I thought about the ambulance behind the starting line. For insurance purposes 1 has to be there or they can't race. I whipped around and headed straight for that ambulance as fast as I could without running over somebody. When we got there I thought we had it made. He could just get a little oxygen and he'd be OK. But this ordeal was just getting started good. I jumped out and told the EMT or whoever he was, that I had a man who needed oxygen quick. So he threw down his cigarette that he had been intently puffing on as he watched the race, ran to the ambulance or whatever it was and brought out a big bag. He started fumbling thru it trying to find something. Well, by now Joe had slid down out of the seat and was sitting on the pavement leaving back on the van. I asked the man where the oxygen bottle was he told me and I brought it to him. He was still fumbling in the bag full of tangled tubes and lines. Well Joe had held on as long as he could. He flopped down on his back, all the color left his face, then turned sort of lie blue, like on TV when tey pull a cold slab out for someone to identify a body. that's right, he was graveyard dead. Now you've got to picture this scene. While all this is taking place the race is still going on. They're runnin another round of Pro-mods and these suckers are loud, they're shakin the ground and blasting off less than 100' from where we were. The folks in the tower were not aware of what was happening. i was in a pickle sorta like in my 1st dirt race. Then all of a sudden right in the middle of all that chaos, a great calm came over me. I thought of the words in a sermon I'd heards, "What would Jesus do?" Well, the anser to that was EZ. I'd heard that preached too (folks, if it ain't in there, you can't call it up when you need it!) At the tomb of His friend Lazareth, Jesus had prayed to God and spoke to Lazareth and he was raised from the dead. So I did the only thing I could do. I prayed "Father, I ask you to raise Joe up and I declare now that Joe will live and not die, in the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth." And I said it lound - hey the cars were still racin, nobody but god heard me. Well, I'm still amazed when I think of how quick my prayer was answered. Suddenly a young man came running over and jumped on top of Joe an started pumping his chest wildly (enuff to crack 3 ribs) then all of a sudden we heard the sound of a huge fire truck (it looked 12' across) it had very sort of siren and hron blasting and every kind and color of lite flashing. It was awesome. Then, all sorts of different private vehicles started pullin up. They were all ememrgency volunteers. Somebody had seen what was happening and called 911. It reminded me of MASH, when a helicopter came flying in with a wounded soldier. all the doctors and nurses would run out to see waht was needed. That was the scene. there wer lots of men and women running across the staging lane to help do whatever was needed. Well I could see that God had the situation will in hand so I just backed up out of the way and watched it happen. I knew now everything was gonna be alright. they soon had him revived and on the way to the hospital and Joe lived to race again. PTL! By the way, that young man that broke Joe's ribs is now part owner and operator of that track. Joe's problems were caused by too many years of heavy smoking. If you smoke, do yourself and your loved ones a favor - quit before it's too late. Have you ever heard a racin story that wild?

[ponyakr]

Here we go trying to attach our first batch of pics. Hope this works. If it does it is a picture of one of my Pont dirt trackers.

[ponyakr]

Don's 69 Goat and TJ's 68 Bird

[ponyakr]

Pics made at Green Valley, Dallas TX Div 4 NHRA Bracket Finals in 1977. She got her pic put in the Nov. Hot Rod Mag in their coverage of the race.

[ponyakr]

lots of work but it was a rainout

[ponyakr]

1 hp each with 4-wheel drive. note: scooter tied to back of goat-1972. rascal as a baby in 1980. current ride "pokey" in 1999