interesting! there is some stuff i didn't know.
p.s. the name of my boat it The Pam, after my little sister
interesting! there is some stuff i didn't know.
p.s. the name of my boat it The Pam, after my little sister
My last boat (a small Glen-L designed mahogany runabout) was named "Hard Wood". The double entendre made a few folks smile as they read it.
My grandfather owned a few race boats - his name was Paul Bills - there were a whole bunch of family involved in the racing - the team and boats were called " LOTSA BILLS " - because of all the people and all the money!
My better half, June Perry's father had Gerry Waldman's cabover (Spooker 15) and lost his life trying to catch Bill Hosler at Frostproof in 1972. Screaming boat but was taken out of balance when Ben Perry removed the lead from the front of the hull. And don't forget one of Tim Butt's original Aerowings. His wife's name was Ruth and the A/B Aerowing was called 'Ruthless"............and that's the way it turned out.
Charley Bradley
Wayne:
Thanks for mentioning my "Champagne Flights". There were 10 of them in all, including the 1st one which was the 2nd Rhoades boat I had (C&D Alky Boat) and then the others that I used while competing in RB Hydro in the 80's and 90's after my tunnel boat blow over in the mid 70's and laying out of racing for several years.
The last one was a Krier boat that Mike Krier and Denny Henderson collaborated on for Todd Brinkman and I, that Tim Brinkman won both the National Championship and UIM World Championship with in 125CC Hydro. Tim was injured the next year when he hit a wake from a boat that was not on plane after the 1 minute gun, was thrown out and then hit by a following boat. He almost lost him arm in this accident and retired from competitive boat racing. I had several other boats that for one reason or another did not perform well and decided not to name them "Champagne Flight" as that name was reserved for boats that Eileen and I could be proud of.
The name came from a nightclub act by a night club comedian named Woody Woodbury. He primarily entertained at a night club in Fort Lauderdale, Fl., but did tour some, and I had heard a record he put out in the late 60's/early 70's. On it he had a skit called Champagne Flight. He came to St. Louis to the Ramada Inn for a show, and Eileen and I just had to go and hear him live.
It (the skit) was about a Flight Attendent who worked for a small airline that operated from Fort Lauderdale to the Bahamas on a flight fittingly called "The Champagne Flight, as they served chilled Champagne on the flight. The story was she had been there so long, even the ground crew "knew her". One of her responsibilities was to keep the Champagne cold and because the ice had been left off this particular flight the skit was about, she sat on the case of Champagne to keep it cold until it was ready to be served. As Eileen had not been with Ozark Airlines but just a short time at this point in time, she was very proud of her job and her efforts to perform it properly, but as she also has one of the best "senses of humour" of anyone I have ever been around (even now) when she heard the skit she really thought it was funny, and hence the name on our boats ever since. The painting Wayne mentioned was of an attractive blonde Flight Attendant sitting on a case of champagne and was on all the cowls of all the boat with the name.
I only had two other boats that were named, one officially and one not. The one that was not was a Goff hydro I had for the first several years after I started back racing. For whatever reason it spent more time in the wood repair shop almost, than on the water. Because of the large amount of different colored wood from all the repairs by Homer Branson in KC (builder of the famous Fillenger SP? hydro's) the last time it was repaired before I sold it I had it painted black to hide all the repairs. Bob McFarland (Billy Seebold's brother in law) named it the "Coffin Craft" because of all the accidents and the high cockpit sides that were now black in color. This was before the commonality of high cockpit sides so he said it looked like a coffin.
Only other boat I had that was "named", was a Krier runabout that was purchased by me for Butch Leavendusky to drive as he was going to "un-retire" and start racing again in the mid 80's. The deal was for me to purchase the boat and he would purchase a 250 motor and he would run RB and 250 Runabout and I would run RB and 250 Hydro off the same trailer as he wanted to get back involved after having been out of boat racing for several years.
Ken Krier called and told me the boat was ready so I went and got it and took it to Billy's paint shop for paint and lettering. I called Butch and asked him if he wanted the name "Fantastic" on the boat, as that is what all his Runabouts had been called to that time. He said "you aren't going to be very happy with me" and I said "why"?. He said "I retired again". So I ended up with a runabout after not having driven one for almost 30 years. I named the boat "Butch's Substitute" and I don't know to this day whether his Dad, Stan Sr. was happy or mad about that. He always accused me of leading Butch astray, although I think he knew deep down, Butch did not need any help with that.
Butch's Substitute was a big help in my achieving membership in the Hall of Champions, as I won the Nationals in 1986 in both RB Hydro and Runabout along with setting a competition record at Lakeland in the Runabout and other records in the Hydro that allowed enough points for induction into the HOC. That probably would not have happened if Butch had not UN"unretired" and I had only driven the Hydro that year.
Who was June Perry's dad? What year did this happen?So, Tim Butts's wife divorced him???
Lee Sutter was the first person I ever saw add lead to the bow of a tunnel boat. John Drake add 20 pounds of lead to an F Hydro DeSilva about 1952....
My dad always wanted to call my boat "The Sunkist Kid", I resisted that name. 20:20 hindsight, I was the Sunkist Kid....
Anyone actually know how many "Spookers" Jerry Waldman had? I miss Jerry, though we frequently argued, we both loved boat racing.
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