History Cheese it, it's the fuzz

Ah yes, a term many of us have used or heard in the past when we were involved in dubious activities, oft times involving street racing.

That term got me to thinking about hamb era police/ state trooper cars, I was inducted into the red lights in the rear view mirror shortly after getting my license, and promptly lost my driving privilege's for the next month.

Care to share your experiences? HRP

 

I've always been an angel sent from heaven even when I wasn't. Just ask my mom.

 

Thats what my GrandPa would sometimes say to me when he would see me doing something when I was younger. He was a Chicago PD Patrolman and Detective from 46-76. Always had that Dick Tracy look about him. AHHHH MEMORIES. Mitch.

 

I was a good kid but if there was trouble I would usually be close by! HRP

 

My license was suspended when I was 14 and I had to go in front of a judge when I turned 18 to get it back. Needless to say it never stopped me from driving because I didn't have one to begin with.

 

Too many times. Should have been taken to jail on several occasions, but lucked out getting pulled over by either a sympathetic, jealous, or lazy cop.

 

A few tickets but when I was 18 got nailed for drag racing. 5 days in solitary (folks had input into this deal), provisional license to and from JC on Fridays and Sundays only for 6 months.

 

There were a few times, in more recent history, when a letter was mailed from the state of Michigan informing my parents that if I got any more tickets my license would be taken from me.

 

My dad use to joke about me paying for police bonuses with the amount of fines I got for driving to fast for conditions and other sorts of infractions. HRP

 

When they suspended mine indefinitely at 14 it was for missing a court date. I would have walked had I appeared but conveniently for them I was in their custody when the court date rolled around. They dismissed everything when I went in front of the judge at 18 and I drove to the courthouse.

 

I was very good at avoiding the law, I drove several thousand miles before I got my license the day I turned 16. I had bought my first car when I was 14 and promptly started driving it.
Years later my sisters and I were together with our mom and this story was told, I got hell for something that happened 30 years earlier, that old gal was pissed!

 

I had just got my tub running and was testing the brakes when I got stopped for not having a license plate. I was just a few blocks from home and the cop gave me a warning.

This happened when I was living in Philly.

 

For a period in my youth, my daily driver was an 11-second OT Mustang. It looked and sounded the part. As such, the local Constabulary of an adjacent college town which shall remain nameless often deemed it necessary to remind me that they frowned upon cars like mine by extracting funds from my wallet as a way to keep further car modifications from occurring and as a reminder that they didn't like "my kind" in their town. I deserved maybe half of the tickets I got, and that's the truth. I've got some stories, brothers and sisters. I'm hardly the only one, all my car guy freinds know the town I speak of, and have similar stories. If these cops saw a young guy in a hot car, they were going to tax him.

I'm not here to rip on cops, just this town's cops in particular. My hometown cops and the county Sheriffs were always fair. Many of them are also car guys themselves and like to chat us up at the car meets we used to have, telling us about what they had in their garages. It's funy, these two towns are adjacent, but in different states. The fundamental differences in culture and attitude between the two towns are something everyone local knows about. My town hosts cruise nights in the center of town and invites classic car owners to participate in their parades on the holidays. The college town has run every car enthusiast function out of town, and will ticket you for a modified exhaust, ride height, etc. Needless to say where I no longer conduct any business. The car culture many of us enjoyed in our youth is drying up fast. The holdout communities where we're still welcomed are shrinking in number. In the places we're not wanted, often the police are used to enforce the communities' views, typically through harassment. This is not new, and many of us have seen it happening slowly over the years.

Now this same college town is host to a decent sized community of Chinese exhange students driving (often poorly and/or recklessly) $100k plus cars and they might as well be invisible to the local police force. That same harassment we got won't fly when the parents are wealthy and connected.

 

1964, I started driving and street racing, avatar, not proud to say, I drove like a total Dumbass. Got speeding tickets, lost my license, I kept driving, I did run from police a few times successfully and I was caught when I left road into a corn field running from sheriff drag racing, I will never forget the sheriff over PA system,"Lock her up buddy, You are going to jail " spent night in holding cell, went before Judge in AM. The Judge listens to the many charges and we all go into is chambers. The Man cut me the deal of a lifetime, he took note, I never was in any trouble at any time, just finished my apprenticeship for Tool & Die Maker, had purchased our first house all this by 20 years old, 1 kid and working on second. I left the court, had to pay towing for car and a fine for disorderly conduct. Our Agreement was sent to all surrounding communities , If I was caught with any moving violation I'm going to jail (huber law-6 months) I sold that street race car the next day, I bought a nice, pretty and Slow car and behaved myself for many years as the car insurance money was insane. I have Stated many times, I'm a very Lucky man, definitely Luckier than Smart. I was brought up well, Good parents, honest, hard working, I'm very proud of my life's accomplishments, my only vice was street racing and I cured my need for speed, I went open wheel racing for the next 21 years. I hoped and prayed none of my 5 children drive like I did, all survived, all are doing very well, they are my best achievement/reward.

 

I got my first car, a '37 Chevy 2 dr. sedan that I put a 265" sbc into., at 14 years old. Sold that and
built a '40 Chevy to street race, the one in the picture. Had quite a few tickets, and finally got one
for doing 85 mph in a 45, and I knew I was going to lose my license. So I went to the next town over
and told them I couldn't find my license and they promptly mailed me a duplicate one. I went before
the judge and he took my license, and stamped it suspended for 3 months. Went home and there was
my duplicate license waiting for me. I figured that if I drove nice for 90 days, my chances of getting
pulled over might be low, and even if I did, with a little luck I could talk my way out of it. All turned
out well and never got caught. Once I got my license back I continued street racing until I had a
clutch explosion. Never really raced after that, and have always used a scatter shield since.

 

In my ordeal the car was parked when I got hit. A guy came flying over a hill and ripped my front clip off. They had no way of proving I drove the car to where it was.

 

Fondest memory was ducking a fine (just a warning ticket) from Trooper Bennie. He had a notorious reputation of being the hardest trooper on the force. When I showed my warning to my buds with his signature, I developed immediate celebrity's status. Everyone wanted to know how I got off light. Maybe Mr. Bennie woke up on the right side of the bed that day for a highly welcomed change

Joe

 

As teenagers in the time of factory hotrods were all pretty lucky we weren't killed or hurt someone else....Insurance costs were one of the big reason the factory hotrod went away.... Every weekend somewhere there was a teenage kid wrapped around a tree.. Here in Vegas we are having problems with the new round of factory hotrods.... A family of 9 killed by a OT type car....But what the public always see are hotrodders and the laws become worse.....

 

The world was kinder place back in the day, this event 1968, the local police did harass us kids some for loud pipes.etc. but what fun we had. I was sitting at a red light one night on way home from work, late, second job, and a 57 rolls up, a few throttle blips, it's on, my R's up, light turns, dump clutch and bang, driveline failure, red lights come on, cop jumps out, cop car takes off chasing the 57, cop comes to window and asks, don't you look in your rear mirror ?. I did not want to say, No I was watching the light, so I said nothing. He helped me push car to side of street out of the intersection and we talked while waiting on the police car to return, he was a car guy and a nice man. When car came back and did not catch the 57, he was not so nice, he was pissed, wanted to hang me out big time. So those 2 talked a while and the good cop said, all's good, they gave me ride to call from a payphone for my Dad to bring chain and a ride back to my car. The good guy cop says, gotta leave as towing with a chain is illegal, don't let me catch you again, Behave yourself, I Thanked him, Dad comes with chain, I got pretty good at being towed on a chain, experienced. LOL.

 

I have touched on this in the past but - I'm sure most of you have at one time or another played red light to red light who's got the quickest car or decided in a drive-in parking lot to met up on a deserted stretch of road on the out skirts of town to settle it once and for all who is the king of the hill.

Back in the 60's I owned a pretty quick 63 1/2 Falcon Sprint and I was guilty of trying to out run all comers, I won some that I shouldn't have (the good) and lost some I should have (the bad).

The one that hurts the most (the ugly) was the night I was on my way to a play a gig and had my big bass amp & speaker cabinet filling up the entire back seat of the Falcon.

As I was sitting at the red light and a SC/Rambler-Hurst coupe rumbled up beside me and revved his engine, in my time that was reason enough to side step the clutch.

The light changed and I dropped the hammer, I blew his doors off, at least for a moment I thought I did and then I noticed the faint red reflective glow on the white headliner just above the speaker cabinet and realized the light was being emitted from the bubble gum machine on the Police car that was directly behind me and the guy that I thought I was racing never budged when the light changed.

I did learn a valuable & expensive lesson that night - Never, ever try to race someone if you can't see out your rear-view mirror, I didn't mention (stupid) in the title but we crossed that bridge also. HRP

 

I've used the phrase, but no idea how 'Cheese it' refers to 'Stop it'. Constipation?

 

Had a buddy with a 68 mustang, original 390 GT, 4th engine was a 428 from a police interceptor rebuilt to cobra jet
specs. He got a ticket once for 56 in a 55 zone. Of course he had open headers at the time.
The gas station I worked at in high school had a customer who bought his son a 4 year old mustang, 289 speed.
The first weekend he had the car he put glasspacks on the car, then took it out on Sat night. He was reving the motor
at a light just making a lot of noise for no good reason, failed to notice the second car behind was police.
Monday the father brought the car in to have us put a stock exhaust system on it.

 

Had my 400 firebird sitting at a stop light going to turn left. Step-dad in the passenger seat, brother leaned up between the front bucket seats sitting in the back.

My brother's buddy sitting in the car beside us, so I slowly started depressing the gas pedal and the tires slowly starting to spin. A little more throttle and a little more spin until I had the entire rear of the firebird covered in a haze of smoke.

I was damn proud of the smoke cloud! Light turns green and I let off and made the turn just like an old lady going to church on Sunday. When I cleared the corner I noticed a set of red flashing lights coming thru the major cloud of smoke too.

Cop pulls me over and informs me that that was the prettiest burnout he'd ever seen and asked what I thought I was doing, I replied "throttle stuck?" He replied "then I'd have to mark it as unsafe vehicle and have it towed".

Needless to say I got a ticket for " exhibition of speed" and something else, don't remember. Step dad just sitting there shaking his head and my 15 yr old brother saying it was the coolest thing ever.

At 19, sold my car and my motorcycle and walked for 3-1/2 yrs. Couldn't afford insurance because of all the racing, speeding and exhibition of speed tickets. Lesson learned you think..... well kinda, I bought a new fangled thing called a radar detector! Helped alot

.

 

Cheese it, the fuzz! Is generally a term used when you are committing illegal activities and the local law enforcement officers were arriving. 'Cheese it' was first heard in the gangster movies of the 50's, one such movie was West Side Story. HRP

 

No fair. I just can't speak of the familiar feeling of seeing the mirror blow up with blue red, without extensive editing. I'll get back to ya.

 

Friend of mine used to get harassed by the Rockland PD for raising hell with his Chevelle, except John was a very good driver and never did anything stupid. Unbeknownst to John and the police someone in another town had one just like his who was doing all the hell raising, but always managed to get away, with John getting the blame. It wasn't until the cops showed up at his house to complain to his father that the truth came out; he showed them John's car up on blocks in the garage, where he had stored it a couple weeks prior for the winter.

One time I was with my friend Tom riding around in my car when the blues came on. The officer who pulled me over kind of knew me since I went to school with his daughter, and told me I had a taillight out. Suddenly he looked up and waved his hand. We turned and looked back to see the other cop, who was new to the force, had her gun drawn. We just about crapped our pants! He told us, in a nice but panicked tone, to just go home and fix the taillight. I think my entire 17 years of life flashed before my eyes on that one!

 

No doubt most of us have been stopped at one time or another and know the feeling of the hair standing up on the back of your neck.

And the first time I ever saw the bubble gum machine in the rear view mirror the lights were red, now they are blue. HRP

 

He said "Mr Stone, did you think that it was a good idea to go around my cruiser? I said "you were going under the speed limit", and he said "but do you realize how bad it looks when you go around a marked state police car?" And I said it doesn't look any worse than when you blast by me like a bat out of hell with no lights and siren on! Yeah, he didn't like me. Probably pissed him off even worse that I got the ticket thrown away

 

My first stupid run in with the law was a life lesson
Somewhat drunk trying to out run the police in an 80’s diesel rabbit, sufficed to say the slowest and dumbest police chase in history . Learned a lot that day of what not to do and how a stupid decision could of cost me my life , others and worse .


The funny one was when I got the engine back in my o/t vw Bug. No glass , no doors , no hood or trunk lid , sitting on a milk crate I just HAD to go for a spin around the block. Well turn off the side street and ain’t there a copper sitting at the stop sign .

“Pulls me over “. Walks up to what resembled a car and simply stated “ what in the fuck do you think your doing ?”

I looked at him with a half smile and told him I just got the engine in yadda yadda and Mr Officer, do you see that rather large , angry Italian man at the end of the drive there ?

Officer : “ Yes”

me : “ that’s my dad”

he chuckled said , all right kid get home and explained this to your father , he’ll give you more shit then I ever could !