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

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    I had not met up with Joe Bowdler since that first encounter a few weeks earlier. Texas A & I was known as a "suitcase college" back then, but Joe wasn't just going back to San Antonio on weekends to see family and friends, it was time to get everything cleaned up and ready for the upcoming 1968 racing season. I was busy doing a lot of that myself. In fact our new shop was ready in the backyard and we were busy putting in the motor racks, shelving and tool racks.

    I did see Steve Jones a couple of times then. I don't remember how he tracked me down, but as an independant salesman, he traveled and could pretty much set his own agenda. The first time he found me sitting in my car waiting for a class he was selling popcorn that was in a throwaway aluminum skillet with metal wire handle. The foil covering was designed to expand as the corn popped. This was seven years before I ever saw a microwave oven, and this was designed to be popped on a stove, or I guess it would work in an oven, but you would not be able to shake the little pan as the corn was popping.

    About this time two months later Steve was selling Red Man chewing tobacco. These were the first two of many products I came to know that Steve sold over the years I have known him. He was a good salesman, but he also had his eye out over the horizon always chasing the rainbow.

    One thing he was quizzing me about though was if he thought he could get a distributorship to sell MX-237 The Master Oil. I told him he needed to talk to Baldy, but I thought something could be worked out. Steve's Dad Bill Jones had just retired from the postal service and wanted not only to be able to supplement his retirement, but give him something to do. Bill and Steve met with Baldy and talked him into giving them a Manufacturer's Rep position selling to refineries, industry, parts houses, etc. in the Corpus Christi area and vicinity. As it turned out, Bill Jones ended up running with it and Steve doing a little help on the side, but Bill sold Master oil from 1968 until he retired sometime in the early 90's.



  2. #532
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    Default Jean Tennell I think you're right.

    I was going back to check on something I had written and stumbled across a post by Jean Tennell that I had missed at the time. It was regarding the city in which the tannery was located in Georgia. Jean thought it sounded like Buford. I went to her link, then also looked up the history of the city. I think you're right Jean, that it was Buford. That building looks like the tannery, but I'm not sure it was the same one. Jean's post was #380 on page 38.

    I found a Tannery Street that was cut in half. I'm guessing it was because of an EPA cleanup around the area. Jean, it looks to me like where Wilson and Moreno Street come together where a part of Tannery street ends at Wilson looks like it might be the location. The old house would have been just off Wilson where it makes a corner onto Moreno. If it is the right spot, we would have driven down Tannery and parked on the right where it runs into Wilson and walked across the street to the restaurant.

    According to the history there were a half dozen or so tannery's owned by the same people, and some were larger than others. They made different leather goods, the largest was the biggest horse collar manufacturer in the world at one time. Tandy Corp bought out the tannery company in 1968. After the EPA came into being they charged Tandy with a cleanup of the tannery sites. They cleaned the area up, but closed down the factory in 1977, because they thought it would be too expensive to upgrade.

    Sorry for the delay Jean, but I'm glad I chanced upon your earlier post. I'm sure Buford was where Tommy and I stopped on the way to Greensboro, N.C.



  3. #533
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    While I was looking in my files, I came across a Bill of Sale from Red Adair. I had thought it was dated mid to late spring, but it was actually from the end of January 1968, so I missed getting it in the proper order, but I can't do that just yet until I get the main computer back because that's where the scanner is. In the meantime, I will continue with putting together a larger pit crew, because all that was coming together at the same time anyway.



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    Jeanie Huff and her family had traveled to Baytown in the fall of 1967 to watch us race. All our lake friends came to the November race at the State Park at Lake Corpus Christi, but none yet were in the pit crew. As we were enlarging our trailer to carry two more hydros, and more Konig motors, plus adding the shop behind the house in Alice, the group became more interested in our racing. They had all gotten to know Jack Chance by now, and wanted to become part of our boat racing efforts.

    Baldy became a Konig distributor with the purchase of seven new Konigs--one FA and six rotary valves. These were B's, C's and D's for Clayton Elmer and myself to race. Plus he ordered a whole bunch of parts from 4 and 6mm bolts, washers and nuts to check valves, drive shafts, drive shaft couplings, pistons, rings, rotary valve belts, carburetor floats, rotary valve discs, points, condensers, coils, throttle wire, etc. Everything we would need to stock for ourselves and our customers.

    It was one or more of the girls that suggested we not just race as a team pitting beside one another out of both trailers, but that we come up with a name. A lot of names were tossed around, but they always came back to Baldwin/Chance, or Chance/Baldwin. Finally someone thought of just using initials and we all settled on CB racing team. This was a few years before the CB radio craze came about, so that had nothing to do with the name. They girls got together and picked out light blue windbreakers in the correct size for everyone and took them to a sports outlet where the name CB Racing Team was sewn across the back. I can't remember if the name was in white or some other color.

    All the while, we were having all the boats painted that funky, uninspiring blue color. It could have been a good color for the navy to paint their ships during World War II, and I still don't know why I liked it back then. The boats were pretty dull looking.

    We did not repaint the trailer that color, and we didn't ever paint CB Racing Team on any trailer. The name was just on the windbreakers. The team consisted of Baldy Baldwin and Jack Chance as Crew chief an chief mechanic respectively as well as owners of their equipment. Baldy provided all the financing and Jack kept us competitive. Clayton Elmer and I were the drivers, and the pit crew was Mark Baldwin, Bob Burnham, Bud Turcotte, Andy Turcotte, Betsy Turcotte, Susan Turcotte, Jeanie Huff, and Mary Jean Sanford. There were other family members that came to the races, but did not do any pit work.



  5. #535
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    Baldy and Red Adair had known each other years before we ever started racing boats. Baldy did not know that Red was a boat racer. They met fighting wild well fires.

    When an oil or gas well blows out, it normally catches on fire, but not always. Most of the time some flint rock or something blowing out of the hole strikes the derrick and all hell breaks loose. In the 1960's Red Adair was the one to call. He learned the trade from his Father-in-Law....a man named McKinley. (That whole scenario of a hired hand marrying the daughter of a man who invented the way to walk into a blowtourch and snuff it out seems very interesting to me).

    The term "Wildcat" applied to a well drilled today is far different from when the "endearment" came out of troubles with drilling in places that could "bite you in the a$$" before you could see it coming. Nowadays, it is a way to get some leeway in burdensome regulations regarding production. When the name Wildcat Wells were really being drilled was in the days when there was no previous well logs, no idea of depths or pressures, no communications between the "Company Man" on location and the engineers or higher officials whereever they might be, and every service company was on a steep learning curve as they stepped out into new territory.

    The consequence of oil and gas companies willing to take the risk in those days were blowouts. There were too many unkowns to fathom in the office. The guys in the field just had to drill and deal with whatever happened. These were the real hero's that spearheaded the consummate oilfield class we have today. But back then, they ran into problems they did not foresee, or in many cases it was human error.

    When a blowout occurred south of San Antonio, Texas in a line east to the coast and west to Laredo and all points south, Red Adair's office called Alice Specialty. The first three calls in South Texas were made to Halliburton...a drilling contractor...first probably Flournoy Drilling or Harkins, and third to Alice Specialty.

    The second two calls were to the premier drilling companies to see how soon they might be able to move in to start a relief well. Flournoy was called first because no drilling company can rig down....move with their own trucks...rig up, and spud a new well any quicker.

    Alice Specialty was called because we could provide so much of the equipment and products they needed to kill the well. We had vacuum trucks to load and haul water and drilling mud, we had the mud, we had the tanks to put it in, (both 200 and 500 barrel), pumps to transfer fluids, winch trucks to haul tanks, pumps, and any other equipment required, and the engineers to supply them with all the fluids they needed to kill the well, supplied from our yard in Alice, Texas.

    We had worked many jobs with Red before I ever met him. The first time I saw him was at the Neches River Festival in Beaumont, Texas. It was in 1966. That was one of the very few places we ever came in contact with inboards. There were a few in the "Golden Triangle" and I love to watch the inboard hydros race. They were the smaller classes that could run on the river, but the SS and SK's seemed to like the river racing.

    Red Adair and Richard Hatteburg had open air tents over their boats at Beaumont. Just to look at the site in the pits would remind one of an Egyptian tent. It was not meant by Red to be a position or royalty, or superiority. Red, as you might realize, was fair skinned. He spent his career not only working in the blazing sun, but facing an even hotter enemy to bring under control. When Red was ready to "relax", he wanted to be out of the sun and it's corresponding heat as much as possible until it came time to fire up the SK's



  6. #536
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    It may have been the second race at Beaumont that Baldy talked to Red about one of his SK boats.

    My brother Mark did not want to race, but Baldy saw how much Mark liked to drive fast boats. Baldy had bought him a seventeen foot Mustang built by Pete Delackner, and we had gotten it to run faster and faster....up to 72 or 73 mph with a Mercury "bored out" 110.
    I have no clue as to how this transaction was inspired, put in place or even done until Richard Hatteburg showed up at Baldy's lake house at Pernitas Point. It may be that I just forgot, and that I thought the inboard flatbottom was cool, and Mark needed something fast to drive on the water.

    I do remember Richard getting there early in the day, spending a lot of time with Mark explaining everything....and I mean everything!... about the boat. Richard stayed the evening and we got to know him. He and Red raced inboard flatbottoms. He told us lots of stories. We got to be friends with Richard that night, and he never ever talked about firefighting wild wells with Red. As far as we were concerned, and as Baldy knew, Richard was Red's partner in racing boats.

    ADD: The letterhead with the boat is not the same one he used in wild well control. That one does not include a boat.
    Attached Images Attached Images



  7. #537
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    Default I Was Thinking About My Dad, Today!

    Wayne, you probably didn't meet my dad at the Golden Shores Winternationals, but he was the chief inspector there every year we had the race. My dad was either LOVED or hated, few weren't sure.

    At the Parker 9 Hour 1967 (Somewhere here on BRF I've told this before) but my DeSilva twin engine Evinrude was on the trailer "Broke down" when Red Adair's Mandella broke a steering and ran on the beach and "T-BONED" my DeSilva. The best part of the story was that Ted May was under the trailer hooking up the lights and wanted to know who was trying to kill him....at the time Red's boat hit the beach.

    Red tried to pay for the boat, which my Old Man explained to him that wasn't how racing worked.

    The day before the race, Red's Team showed up with a Semi and two boats and two new RED Cadillac El Dorados...My Needles "Playboy" buddy explained he'd just read about Red in Argosy Magazine....

    Anyway, after Parker, may dad worked the Galveston 250 races in Texas, for many years, and Red always had my dad and mom stay with him at his house. Red was a real gentleman.

    I was thinking about my dad today because I'd like to tell him what a great father Chad is, not to mention what a great propeller builder and business man he's become.

    Great story here about Baldy. He was bigger than life!

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    Ron, I would have met your Dad at Needles though not formally because I went to inspection several times. I didn't know who he was though. My loss. About the only people I knew who they were on the west coast at that time was you, Rich Fuschlin, Ted May, Doc Collins and maybe a few others. Seems like the scales were on land and you had to carry the boat up a little embankment and balance it on the scales. I could be wrong, but I have a vague recollection of the inspection area.

    You are right about the red Cadillacs. That's what all of Red's firefighters drove also. And every one of Red's people wore red coveralls when fighting wild wells. No other people were allowed to wear red on location. If anyone other than Red's people showed up in red, they either had to change clothes, or were not allowed on location. Red wanted his people to be able to identify each other and where they were in an instant.

    It was actually Richard Hatteburg who was driving the boat that hit your DeSilva Ron. Richard told the story to Joe and I one time when I was in Houston...maybe at one of the boat shows. His rudder broke and the boat went into the pits, and slid up on an empty boat trailer that then acted like a roller skate. Richard was helpless as the boat went through the pits, not hitting anything directly, but with glancing blows knocking all kind of stuff around until it ran into your boat. Richard said it was very fortunate that no one was hurt or killed and he also stated, which I remember well, "Only me and my dry cleaner know how scared I was!". When Joe talked to Richard several years ago after receiving some type of award from the city of Houston, he told Joe "Thanks for reminding the Arizona Highway Patrol about that. Now they might start looking for me again. I wasn't able to go through Arizona for twenty years." Richard had just read the account that you had posted on BRF you referred to and that Joe had added to five or more years ago.

    The article in Argosy you mentioned was probably the one about him fighting a fire in Saudi Arabia or one of the middle eastern countries. It could still be the largest blowout in history, and it burned a long time. It was called the Devil's Matchstick or something like that. Red later said he was more scared appearing on the Johnny Carson show telling about fighting that fire than he was actually putting the fire out, and bringing the well under control.

    Red was a great man and innovator. Your Mom and Dad were very fortunate to have been friends with Red. I might have crossed paths with your Dad at Galveston as Joe, Baldy and myself attended a number of the Galveston races in the seventies.

    ADD: I looked it up on the internet, and the blowout was in Algeria 1962, It was called the Devil's Cigarette Lighter. You can type in Red Adair and the Devil's Cigarette Lighter and you will find an excellent clip produced by the History Channel on the controlling of this well. Red always had 16 mm films made of the wells. I tried to get Richard to come down to talk about firefighting at one of our monthly American Petroleum Institute meetings in Alice one time. He was in Indonesia, but had Red's office send a large spool of film with about five different blowouts and different scenario's on how they were fought. They had lots and lots of professionally produced films on their firefighting. It is well worth taking a look at that little clip. I would link it to here if I knew how.



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    The Continental boat that Baldy bought from Red Adair always backfired or briefly sputtered just as soon as it broke over. It came out of the hole quick, and once it broke over, it would accelerate quickly. It would top out at around 80 miles per hour, and seemed to run clean all the while. The only time it ever stuttered was at the point of breaking over, and it always did that.

    It was an L88 chevy engine, and as all our family drove Chrysler/Plymouth/Dodge products we didn't have any personal connections to the Chevy dealership, although Baldy was friends with Hank Bowman the owner, and we had some General Motors products in the fleet at Alice Specialty.

    Mark hauled his boat down to Bowman Chevrolet on the corner of Main Street and U.S. Highway 281. There, we became acquainted with Steve Vickers, a young mechanic around 25 years old. Steve immediately fell in love with that motor. Being in an oilfield town he knew who Red Adair was and that made it even more special that he could work on it. Steve checked the timing, the plugs, fuel flow, everything, and there really wasn't anything he found, but told Mark about some better plug wires he could buy. Mark took the boat home and purchased the wire next door at Burton Auto Supply. We bought a lot of boat racing supplies there and Mark and I both were high school friends of Bill Burton.

    Mark cut the wires all the same length, then one by one went about getting the boot on, then replacing the old wires with the new. He may have bought some other plugs too, but I don't recall that.

    The L88 Chevy had a magneto, four dual Weber carbs with velocity stacks and wet exhausts exiting through the transom. While it was primarily a two seater with snug bucketlike seats in front, it also had two rear facing seats with the same common backseat as the front seats. They weren't real stand alone bucket seats, but had side supports that went most of the way around each side of a persons body, and the seat itself was just held in place by friction and a tight fit.

    Whoever sat facing backward on the driver side had to bend their left leg because of the exhaust manifold, and the right leg stretched out. It was just the opposite for someone facing the rear on the passenger side. Right leg folded back and left leg out. The first one to grab a rear seat also latched onto the base of the magneto, because otherwise you would have to hold onto the front lifting bracket for the motor. The magneto was more comfortable and easier to hold onto. While underway, the passengers in the rear were constantly pushed backward by the wind, but more importantly by the thrust and angle of the boat. There were not any handles so you had to find something to hold onto that was not hot or dangerous to keep from being thrown back toward the transom. Even though the exhaust manifold was water cooled, it still got pretty hot, and we usually got a few warm spots on our legs or arms while riding in the back.

    Mark took the boat out after replacing the plug wires, but it still did the same thing. Steve Vickers came up to the lake for a ride after work to see if he could figure out the problem. While Steve was an excellent mechanic, he knew nothing about boats, and since it always backfired at the same point of breaking over, he thought it had something to do with that. Mark even tried bringing it upon a plain at different speeds, but he always had to give enough gas for it to come out of the hole, and so it always backfired at that same point. Even though I now know why it did, it still doesn't really make sense.

    Steve loved being around that motor so much he started coming by our house to help Mark so he wouldn't have to charge for working on it. They really didn't do any serious work though. Mostly just look at it and talk about it. It was only a short time before Steve met Baldy and they took an instant liking to one another. Baldy was also very happy to have someone like Steve teach Mark about automotive motors. There was no one in our family that knew much other than changing oil, filters, belts, tires and alternators. It was a beautiful boat though, and it was heavy enough to survive rough water. Red Adair and Richard Hatteburg ran some sprint races, but mostly they ran marathons, and this boat was up to that.

    As mentioned in the Bill of Sale, it had adjustable cavitation plates, and the V drive was just in and out. It was not fully shielded though. There was a small gap between the front seats and a middle console type thing that something small could get down to a spinning driveshaft. In the backseats though the driveshaft from the engine all the way to where it went under the common backrest was fully enclosed.

    Mark now had the fastest inboard on Lake Corpus Christi. Prior to that an acquaintence of ours from Alice held that distinction. He had the first jet boat we ever saw, and it was top of the line for performance in its day. I don't remember what the make of boat, motor or pump it had, but it ran around 60 or so miles per hour. It belonged to Bill Chiles who was a couple years older than Mark and myself. He lived down the street from us in Alice, just on the other block beeyond Billy Zimmatore's house.

    Bill's dad Clay Chiles was a friend of Baldy's and owned Chiles Drilling Company, one of the premier oil well drilling contractors in South Texas. I say we were acquaintences because he was older, and we didn't hang out like friends, but we were all friendly to one another. His younger sister though was friends with Brenda all the way to high school, then she went off to one of the big schools back east. Her name was Lois Chiles and she ended up being one of the first of what is now called supermodels. Because of that status she landed the leading lady role in the James Bond space film. Bill went off to one of those same type schools, so they did not graduate from William Adams High School, but went on to one of the ivy league colleges after the "finishing schools" or whatever they were. Bill later on designed and built the very first untitized and completely zero discharge drilling rigs for offshore drilling. I think he is in Houston now. The last time I remember seeing him was racing Mark with his jet boat.



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    I was going to post some letters from Scott Smith, but after talking with Joe today, he had some more news. He told me a customer of his had bought a bunch of stuff from a Ford dealer that went out of business, and he got all the chemical stuff. He was showing it all to Joe and Joe said "This is outboard oil", referring to one item he saw. It was a full unopened quart of Scott/Atwater motor oil. Joe told me that he wished Joe Holland was still alive so he could give it to him. Since he was not, I said "So you're going to put it on that shelf with all the old motor oil's?" And Joe said "Yeah....next to the old Master Oil gallon I got from Louis...the one with the white paper label". I had completely forgotten about that.

    Joe has a shelf behind the cash register and above the many stocked rows of auto parts, and tools that hold some old oil cans and other types of additives that collectors would love to have. These are some old famous ones that are gone, or have a Route 66 memorobilia type attachment.

    So I say to Joe, "You mean the one with the white label and red and black logo?" He says "Yeah!" I remembered him telling me this then after Ricky LeBlanc had driven to Beaumont to pick up Louis' boat, motor and trailer that Mary wanted him to have.
    Mary told Joe to take anything he wanted. All Joe got was the Grant fuel tank and the partially full gallon of MX-237 The Master Oil. I have not seen Joe since all that happened and I forgot about it. The gallon can just happens to play a part in the Baldy thread since this is now the time that that particular label and time came about. So I told him he needs to take a picture of that can, and the Scott/Attwater oil. He needs to then post the Master Oil on the Baldy thread and the Scott/Attwater on the Bill Holland thread. We both agreed that it would have been great to see Bill's face and eyes light up if Joe had been able to present him with that quart.



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