With an average weight of 165 lbs per passenger and another maybe 30 lbs of duffle bags, totaling around 1755 lbs., it was a load! While Squashing down Henry’s transverse rear spring, we began our journey !!

As Wichita Falls disappeared in the rear view mirror, my stiff “High Boy” Ford V-8 had been sunken down to a Chevy Low Rider look. The rear bumper scraped entering the gas station. I filled the tires to 40 lbs, to remove some tire squash, and I bought an extra spare. However, we blew out 3 rear tires before the New Mexico border. Quoting one rider, “There goes the Last of the Mohicans!”, as we thumped into a gas station. The station operator suggested, “’bout the only thing I can think of is to put some 6 ply's on.”

I don’t remember the cost, but I’ll never say a word against Firestone. Those 6 ply's did the job! In fact, the wagon no longer drove like an elephant on a wet clay bank. They got rid of some of the roll whenever we rounded a curve.

We made the “Hammock Swap” at the following fuel stop, which lasted a short while. The guys on top would roll to the center of the hammock and the three would sink down on top of the guys underneath. Another stop and the hammock was out and the center seat in again.

It’s nightfall and those yellowish head lights sort of lit the road ahead. However they missed some black ice on the railroad under crossing ahead. By the Grace of God, he let us slide thru there side wise, and not turning my wagon into a pile of dry rot kindling for a roadside Navajo salvage. Everyone was asleep, no need to wake them as we lurched back onto the straight and level direction of travel. By the time we completed that 50 hour travel marathon and I had delivered everyone to their doorstep around the Bay area, it seemed it was time to get ready for the return.

Maybe the return trip was without incident or that one passenger was one way only, or I gave up on the hammock idea, or most of the freeze and snow had cleared away. The 1600 miles was less eventful, except for rounding a turn to see a mobile home cross wise ahead on that cold down hill slope out of Flagstaff, Arizona.

Fortunately it was far enough ahead to gently brake down and stop. It was Air Force Blue to the rescue. With my travel team, we pushed that mobile home sideways, to clear a way thru. That road was so slick it was difficult to stand up on the patchy thin layer of frozen road ice that had spun him out of control. The couple thanked us for straightening them out and I thanked myself for not towing the mobile home in the dead of winter.

We finally checked in at the base a day early. I’ve paid my transportation debt, finally paying for my car. However, that freeze followed us to Texas. Next morning I checked the radiator for water in the now “Old Reliable” 1948 Ford V-8 Station Wagon, to find it now frozen solid, with a cracked block.  MERRY CHRISTMAS 1952