Go West
My Very First Wheels
It was 1937 and I was all of 17 years of age and becoming less and less enthusiastic about the existing market value of my Roadmaster bicycle. A friend, who was comparatively well-off financially, offered to buy a used car and give me half interest in it if I were to give him my bike. As it is with most teen-agers, I suffered much from the symptoms of "wheels fever", so I readily agreed to his proposition.
We both went car shopping and decided to invest all of $25 of my friend's money in a 1925 Dodge Touring Sedan. As can be seen in the picture above, this was some classy chariot! Its four-cylinder engine was then known as the "lazy four", probably because one could crawl along at as low as about 10 miles per hour in high gear without stalling out. It is an exaggeration, but the cylinders each appeared to be almost as large as a 10-quart bucket. This is probably the reason it could mope along so slowly in high gear
To me, the most interesting feature of this car was the Northeast electrical system. The battery, a 12-volt job, was well ahead of its time. The starter and alternator were one and the same mechanism, which was geared permanently to the flywheel. After this combination starter/generator managed to get the engine rolling, it immediately began to charge the battery without any kind of mechanical change being involved (there was no Bendix spring).
Since we were living during the Great Depression, there was practically no money available for fuel. As a result, we often exhausted what little gas we could afford while enroute. On these occasions, we merely brought the car home by powering it with the starter. Of course, speed was greatly diminished, but we moved fast enough to avoid being harassed by the police (either that or they just ignored us).
To be truthful, we usually were within a few blocks of home when the tank ran dry, so we didn't have so far to go that the battery would be drained completely. By the way, the battery was as large, or larger than is installed in any car today.
As one can guess, joint ownership of a car by two teen-agers will undoubtedly result in some, if not a whole lot of friction. This was the case with regards to the other co-owner and myself.
On one occasion, my partner managed to put a few gallons of gas in the tank and, to prevent me from taking the rig for a ride and thus waste his precious fuel, he removed the rotor from the distributor.
Finding the car unguarded and not being aware of this attempt at disablement, I climbed into the vehicle, started it and drove it on about a 15 mile joy ride. I did notice that the engine was not running as smoothly as it usually did. However, as it is with most youngsters, such an inconsequential condition was not of any special concern to me. After all, the car was running!
When he discovered that I had no problem taking "our" car for a ride, burning up at least half "his" precious fuel, my partner was absolutely flabbergasted! On those rare occasions when we do meet these days, we still laugh about it. To this day, we wonder just how the "lazy four" managed without such a super critical bit of ignition hardware.
Except for weak brakes and bald tires, the "lazy four" gave us excellent service. All that was really needed was a scant supply of green stuff to remedy these shortcomings. Unfortunately, money was in extremely short supply as far as I was concerned.
Although the old Dodge finally wound up in the junk yard, fond memories persist.
GALLERIES