Thread: Wayne Baldwin's Amazing Story: Baldy's Eual Eldred Baldwin

  1. #431
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    Here are the results published in the November/December issue of Roostertail.
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  2. #432
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    Gina Mishey wrote a fabulous article about the race. I read it as I did everything in Roostertail, and recognized so many names, but then there were some I didn't...until later. Like Joe Rome and I always say to one another "...If we only knew at the time..!"

    I'm not sure anyone knew in advance that a whole host of legendary racers would descend upon Fort Buhlow Lake at the same time. There were people not only fron the typical Midwest and South that ran the NOA circuit, but drivers that came from the northeast and also crossed the Rocky Mountains. And many that built and sold boats and parts to racers.

    Just take time to register the names that Gina Mishey mentions in her article. If we could only remember those times when we really didn't think much about them when they happened.
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  3. #433
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    Here are pictures Claude Fox took of the champions. Three of them Baldy and I met regularly at the races in Texas.
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  4. #434
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    Of these two groups of photos, all but Kerry Rogers from Sidney, Australia, and Mama Smith and her grandson Roger Smith were all guests at Baldy's house in South Texas at one time or another. I'm sure Baldy also met Armand Hebert at Alex and most likely Kerry Rogers. I don't remember meeting Kerry, and I can't place for sure the timing where I first met Armand, but I do recall that he was like a long lost friend. He was friendly to me the very first time I talked to him. It may have been at the prize giving

    In between Papa Smith and Gloria Steelman is Clayton Elmer's Mom Ouita. Some of you might remember a column she wrote in one of the boat racing magazines. I will add that when I find out which one it was.
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  5. #435
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    I added an update to post 418 with a group photo and names of three officials. I think I know the name of a fourth but not sure so I didn't include it.



  6. #436
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    It was around this time during the latter part of 1967, or at the latest very early in 1968 that an old boyhood friend approached Baldy with some money to invest. I don't know exactly when all this began, but I remember approximately when things got moving. Baldy was not a long drawn out lawyer type of negotiator. If anyone approached him with what he thought was fair, he would listen. He was never one to try to gain an advantage. He always figured it should be equally good for everyone involved, and his handshake was his word.

    When Baldy's Stepdad Arky moved his family to Corpus Christi following the oilfield, Baldy got settled into high school, and was finally in one place long enough to make some friends. When Arky got done with his job, he and my Grandmother pulled up stakes to head for the next oilfield town needing wooden derricks built. Baldy said he was not going and stayed with his sister Estell, who was newly married and living in Corpus. Then, he moved in with the Hendricks family. They were cotton farmers, and also operated cotton gins in the area. Baldy became friends with Wayne Hendricks, whom I was named after.

    The oldest boy was Joe, followed by Bud. Baldy was about Bud's age, and Wayne a couple of years younger. There were two sisters, and another brother that was much younger...about 8 or ten years younger than the rest. I think his name was Bobby.

    Old man Hendricks took a liking to Baldy and let him live there while he finished high school at Miller where he was on the State Championship Football Team of 1938. Baldy then played a little semi pro football for a beer team, and were paid in beer when gate receipts were low. He eventually wound up in the Panama Canal Zone working on the Panama Canal when World War II broke out.

    I never heard of what the Hendricks family did during World War II, but I met all the Hendricks' men except Joe when I was a young kid. He had left Texas during a seven year drought in the early 50's. He ended up in Guatemala and started over growing cotton there. He was very successful, and expanded his acreage significantly. He became a part of the society down there, and was able to buy an airplane and learn to fly. I'm not sure about how things went in those days about a norteamericano flying his own plane around, but before he left he flew a twin engine Bonanza.

    Joe and his wife LaMonte had four children. All girls. They were all beautiful girls, and when I got to know them I always thought Joe never gave them the love he should have.

    The oldest, Olive, married into one of the leading families of Guatemala. In fact, her Father in Law was president from March of 1963 until July 1966. Colonel Alfredo Enrique Peralta Azurdia was the defense minister for President Miguel Ydigoras Fuentas when he took over the Presidency in a coup. He was the one that set up the Institutional Revolutionary Party, (a pro military group) that stayed in power until 1982.

    Olive Hendricks married Alfredo Peralto who did not want to be a part of the military like all his family before him. He lived through the coup's and power grabs and wanted a settled life. When Baldy and I first met him he owned a brassiere factory and had a good family life.

    In the fifties and sixties Communists were running rampant all over Central and South America. At some point around 1966 or 67 Joe did something to catch their attention. They were moving across peoples lands, on rivers and streams, and moving all about to cause havoc. I heard second hand what he did, but I will not repeat it, but it sparked an assassination team to collect his head. This next part I heard numerous times at party's at Barbon when guests wanted to hear what happened.

    Very briefly....Joe knew he was targeted, but he thought it was to be a kidnapping and ransom gig. Joe had bodyguards on the payroll for a long time, but he added more, and some with more expertise and better weapons. It was after one of the new guys spotted an assassin in a tree about thirty feet from the window of Joe and LaMonte's upstairs window that Joe decided he better sell out and leave Guatemala. It was night time, and Joe's bodyguard shot the assassin who hit the ground along with his sniper rifle.

    I don't know how long it took Joe to sell, or how much loss he took on a quick sell, but he left Guatemala with a lot of money. When I first met Joe, I had always heard it was a suitcase full of money. About eight years ago, I met the guy who shuffled him around South Texas with the money in the trunk while he looked up old friends who needed a partner. He told me it was two suitcases.

    It was some time at the end of 1967 or early 1968 that Baldy Baldwin and Joe Hendricks became equal partners in all endeavors, except for his brother Wayne who had invested with Baldy in the aloe vera venture, and MX 237 The Master Oil. Wayne had a little stock in that company.



  7. #437
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    I never knew how much Alice Specialty was worth then, but Joe Hendricks was both in a bargaining position, and in need to invest cash. After Hurricane Beulah dumped all that water, the oilfield in South Texas came to a halt for more than a month because the heavy equipment couldn't get in and out without bulldozers. The oilfield had slowed down some then anyway, and a big percentage of Alice Specialties work was on the King Ranch where Humble Oil and Refining held all the leases.

    They held a fifty year lease and when they changed their name to Exxon , it lasted still until around 1997 or so. They signed the original lease sometime right after World War II ended. All of that property from Kingsville down to Raymondville sixty miles south had a large part still muddy. The contract with the King Ranch was very strict. You cannot even pick up a stick for firewood off the side of the road. They did not want their roads (built all by Humble Oil & Refining) rutted and messed up.

    Baldy welcomed Joe with open arms, and they filled needs both had at the same time. Joe infused his cash into Alice Specialty Company, and then looked at other places to invest money. Joe had been gone a long time, and Baldy was the first one he contacted that was willing to do business with him. I think they probably had a good idea of how to spread Joe's cash around to diversify. I don't know this for sure, but I think Baldy put up Alice Specialty with all the hard assets and ongoing income for Joe to put up the money to buy land, and a marine business. That way they were diversified.



  8. #438
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    Baldy had approached Mrs. Wade (that's all I ever knew her by) about buying four or five acres of land on a hill overlooking the southeast most point of Lake Corpus Christi sometime in 1967. She told Baldy she would not sell those few acres, but she had 534 acres she wanted to sell that the portion of land Baldy wanted was located on. There was an easement to the part Baldy wanted, and his purpose was to build a house there and race boats. It was in a cove nobody every skied in. There were fisherman that fished there, but since it was an unknown cove with a lake full of underwater trees, no waterskiers, or recreational boaters ever went back there.

    Baldy, my Uncle Jay, my brother, cousins and myself fished back in there sometimes, and we knew there were no trees underwater except for a knoll near the entrance that had about ten big live oak trees with branches sticking out of the water after the lake had filled to capacity. That was probably the sentinel guarding our secret racing hole because we fished there when the water was ten feet lower.

    Since Hurricane Buelah had just recently filled Lake Corpus Christi to its maximum level for the first time, Baldy convinced Joe that there would be a lot of people wanting to buy lots at the lake. Joe understood real estate, money, and a good opportunity, and he agreed. He told Baldy to make the deal because he got along with Mrs. Wade.

    Joe and his brother Wayne were also friends with Thomas Priestly and his wife Gus who was a daughter of Mrs. Wades sister, but it was Baldy who had previously made an offer to buy her land that she considered fair. In Baldy's own words told to me. "A lot of people tried to buy her land but she refused, she told me "Mr. Baldwin....you're the only one that ever offered me a fair price." The shook hands and did the deal.

    Baldy and Joe formed Barbon Corporation which became a company to develope and sell lakefront property. As they were surveying the acreage, Baldy put his stakes on five acres with a hill that stood just to the right of what would be the pits and judges stand for Pro boat racing for almost ten years.

    ADD:

    I never did meet Mrs. Wade, but she had a very colorful history. Her husband died young, I think in his 40's. They had fought off bandits from Mexico during the time of Pancho Villa, and never patched a bullet hole made in their front door. It was a heavy door and the bullet didn't pass through.

    In 1975 Joe Hendricks took us to Mrs. Wade's house northeast of the property Joe and Baldy bought and I took a few pictures. My scanner's not working quite right so I only scanned a few negatives. This is just a very small sampling of the inside of the house. Mrs. Wade modernized the furniture sometime just after World War II. The guest book was amazing. People would come out in their horse and buggy from Corpus Christi to visit. It was a two day trip because they always guested overnight. The book was very thick and the Wade's had lots of guests from all over. Check out the great big radio they had from the old days. In fact, there were two there.
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  9. #439
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    Joe still had some cash left to invest so they bought Emmord's Marine in Corpus Christi.

    Baldy had bought our Evinrude powered Thompson cabin cruiser from Ralph Emmord in 1961 or 62. He later added an additional 75 horsepower Evinrude to make it twin engine. Ralph Emmord owned the premier Evinrude dealership in the area, and it was located on Lexington Boulevard on the way toward Flour Bluff and to North Padre Island and Mustang Island across the intracoastal canal.

    Ralph and Baldy became acquaintences and Baldy found out Ralph had a private zoo of South Texas animals. Baldy told Ralph about my trapping. I had trapped some animals and tanned their hides, and Ralph asked if I could trap a racoon for him. I built a wooden trap to catch one without damage and baited it with sardines. Yes....racoons love sardines and they can smell them a mile away. Soon Baldy delivered a healthy young racoon to Ralph and Ralph gave Baldy half a dozen Rouen ducks. They look exactly like mallards, but they are domesticated, almost twice as big as a mallard and are too heavy to fly.

    Flash forward a couple of years.

    Ralph was ready to retire, and told Baldy he wanted to sell out so when Joe Hendricks had more money to invest, Baldy mentioned the marine dealership. That seemed to be a pretty diverse spread of investments. Oilfield, real estate and recreation. So they made the deal and Baldy was now a partner in a boat dealership with a line of motorcycles as well.

    They sold Thompson, Larsen, MFG and Ouachita boats, Evinrude outboard motors and Honda motorcycles with a parts warehouse, a couple of boat mechanics and one or two motorcycle mechanics, parts man and a couple of salesmen.

    The preliminaries in putting these deals together were late 1967 or so. The action wouldn't start taking place until early 1968



  10. #440
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    I added a little bit of commentary and three pics to post 141.



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