Greenfield, MA. where my mother was from, and my grandfather was an engineer for the Boston&Maine railroad.
That Tri-Power emblem on the fender in front of the door takes me back to my ‘teen years. We hung out at a greasy spoon diner, Jim Ladd’s Snappy Service System No. 9. Ladd only had the one diner but No. 9 looked more impressive up on the sign. Anyway, his BIL worked there as a cook and he drove a metallic green four door ‘59 Catalina with the 315 horse Tri-Power 389. Had to be a rare combination.
Hello, The torrential rainfalls we have been getting in So Cal these past few months and elsewhere in the USA usually causes flooding in the low-lying areas. Whether it is the runoff from higher elevations or an over flow from a creek that turned into a raging river… water goes to the lowest levels anywhere. City streets included. The rains and flooding, always brings back those memories of the gutter races we had with our small model ships. The 1/24 plastic cars were lined up on the curb out in front of our Westside Long Beach house, as the audience was gathering for the races. Just inches away, the flow of water in the gutter was whizzing by to head for PCH just blocks away. The main drain to the LA River is on PCH. The flow was very fast and wide. Out in front of our street, the gutter crosses all intersections and ends up in front of the Olympic Auto Parts Store and the power wash business. The huge drain is on PCH and connects to the outlet somewhere in the flood control channel just blocks away in the fast flowing Los Angeles River heading for the ocean. For some reason, usually too much water rising and covering the outflow pipes, the exit is slow and backs up into the lowest areas, which in this case, our neighboring streets. If one looks at old photos prior to the building of the concrete high walls protecting and enclosing the flowing river, this whole low lying area was usually underwater from the early settlers and the horse and buggy days. “Water always wins” is a current popular saying. It is always searching for the lowest spot to gather. One day in the local Long Beach Press Telegram newspaper, There was a photo of a flooded intersection. It was the corner of Caspian Ave. and PCH, Westside Long Beach. (our old house is three blocks back in the photo) If we did not stop the boats at our corner with the metal rakes, they went down to the next block. Once we did let one old battleship go all the way to the big sucking drain at PCH and it whooshed away. Jnaki Oh, those rainy days gave us a ton of fun, wearing our yellow raincoats or later on, clear plastic jacket-raincoats that showed what we had on underneath. But, the play in the falling rain was perfect for our old boat races in the fast flowing gutter, searching for the larger areas to flood. L.A. River on the left, almost getting to the top. The Long Beach Freeway 710 from the harbor heading inland towards Los Angeles.
The Jalopy Journal
