1953 Ford Customline
In 1963 my parents and I amicably separated. They went to San Juan, PR, and I went to Subiaco Academy in northwest Arkansas for my sophomore year of high school. Subiaco wasn’t on the edge of nowhere, but you could see it from there.
Which was a good thing. It gave us the freedom to do things we couldn’t have done in a more populated setting, such as having a car club. Fr. Nick was our sponsor, and that gave our club the imprimatur to do pretty much what we wanted. To be a member of the Car Club you had to cough up five bucks. A driver’s license wasn’t required, which was a good thing since I didn’t have one. The seniors in the club went to a junkyard in Paris (Arkansas) one Saturday and bought a very straight (but very tired) 1953 Ford Customline Tudor with a flathead V8 and three-on-the-tree for 60 bucks. It was mouse gray (Woodsmoke Gray) and had ceased to shine a long time ago. Actually, it was kinda fuzzy. It had huge, gaping holes where the floor panels once were, but a few sheets of Masonite fixed that problem. Freedom? No registration, no insurance, no problem.
The first modification we made to the car was to remove the muffler so that the flattie could serenade us with its unique sound. We then spent many sunny Sunday afternoons cruising the back dirt roads surrounding the abbey.
In the spring we decided that the car needed to become a Sunliner, and so we cut off the top. Let’s just say that the driving dynamics went from poor to execrable. Before the seniors graduated in May, the car was returned to the junkyard from whence it came.
Fr. Nick’s Air Force International
One of the “institutions” at Subiaco was touring the countryside with Fr. Nick on Sunday afternoons. We shot squirrels, forded streams or just dicked around. The vehicle was an ex-Air Force International flatbed, which at some point had lost its hood and been repainted silver. This was a hugely popular event, as you can see in the photo I took with my trusty Kodak Instamatic 100. Once, when we had to take the hard road (Rte. 22) to get to where we needed to go, we were stopped by a cop who demanded that all legs had to be on top of the flatbed and not hanging over it. He wasn’t concerned about our lack of registration or insurance.
1954 Pontiac Catalina Starcraft on a mission
Subiaco was blessed with many alumni who had lots of crappy old cars they no longer wanted. These became fodder for Nick’s “test drives”. The fact that I can’t remember what happened on this particular torture test (the Pontiac didn’t float) probably means either that the car successfully made it across the stream or that we had to push it across.
These were fun times. I doubt that the school would allow such shenanigans to go on now, but I’m glad to have been able to partake in a freer time.
I have to wonder if this freedom was an intersection of time and place. Being within line of sight of the middle of nowhere had to help!
Alas, there are still times and places one can screw around and do crap like this today and good friends to do it with.
“…and I went to Subiaco Academy in northwest Arkansas…”
Funny how – if you currently live in or around the area – “Northwest Arkansas” now means Bentonvillle-Rogers-Springdale-Fayetteville, while Subiaco and Paris, Arkansas are considered to be in what’s now known as “the River Valley.” I guess we can thank Sam Walton, John Tyson and J.B. Hunt for that distinction, as well as moving the area out of “the middle of nowhere.”
I’ve had the pleasure of working with a few Subiaco grads over the years. It’s still there, and still a good school, from what I’ve heard.
We used to play Bentonville, Rogers, Fayetteville and Springdale in football. They generally beat our butts. My graduating class at Subiaco numbered 50. During the years the school has turned out a disproportionate number of doctors, professors, lawyers and engineers and other good people. It continues doing so.
I grew up in a small town like this, and being a small town, the greatest fear was not from Police, but the Officer saying “I’ll tell (or take you to) your parents.”. Since everyone knew you, your parents had the ultimate intelligence network. Thanks for the wonderful memories.
Good article, I enjoyed reading it. In ’63 my wheels would have been a hand me down Radio Flyer, but things weren’t much different where I came of age in the ’70s. One thing that strikes me about those days is how short the lifespan of an average car was. 10 years old was ancient, 20 would have been an antique. By the mid to late ’70s we were abusing crappy old cars no one wanted that hadn’t even been built yet in ’63.
I had never heard of your school, and looked it up. Benedictines (very practical minded folks), so it all makes sense. Although we have a Benedictine Monastery and seminary nearby (St. Meinrad), I have never heard of them having a car club. Sure sounds like the kind of car club I would have joined. I loved your story. It reminds me of how today, everyone seems so worried about preventing so many bad things from happening, that we prevent a lot of good things from happening too.
Nicely said, sir.
In 1982 I interviewed at Subiaco with the Food Service Company I was working for at the time. I hit it off with all the Friars I interviewed with but was a little leary, as a 27 year old single guy, moving to a place with a sight line to the middle of no where. Had I known about the car club I may have reconsidered. Great story!
Although I am no longer a practicing Catholic, most of the clergy I have come across have been educated, articulate, interesting and above all, reasonable. This story really reminded me a lot of my childhood in Catholic school. We were drilled in academic excellence but they also encouraged us to get out and have fun in the world. Good memories, thanks!
“… today, everyone seems so worried about preventing so many bad things from happening, that we prevent a lot of good things from happening too.”
Quote of the Week!
Growing up in a small town in the early 60s, I had a friend who’s dad gave him a 1956 Oldmobile. We painted it using brushes. It had no license plates or insurance but we drove it all over the place. We once got stopped by a state trooper who chewed us out and told us to stick to back roads and not drive it into town.
I can’t even imagine my son doing anything like it these days. Each generation seems to be pushed closer into a protective shell. I don’t know what this means for the human race, but I feel we’re losing something.