Things WERE Different Then
Submitted by Pete Norgeot
If you read Part One, you know that I couldn't have learned to drive at home.
You probably thought that if I didn't know how to drive, how was I going to drive in Nickerson State Park? Well, using the lessons learned by baby birds when mom pushes them out of the nest, they damned well better learn on the way down.
While I didn't quite have the short time frame in which to learn as the baby birds did, the concept was the same. Flap like hell and hope it works.
One thing I learned the hard way was that a car with poor brakes doesn't stop well. I learned the meaning of the phrase that is used in a current TV commercial "if the brakes don't stop it, something will".
The biggest obstacle I had in driving through the "new" road I had just cut with a hatchet was avoiding the stumps I had created. Some of them would go right through the paper thin tires. (you didn't think Dad would give me a car with good tires did you?)
My maiden voyage across Route 28 was uneventful. Back then if even one car drove by, everyone stopped and looked. Not many cars were on the road then.
It took many trips back and forth to figure out how to actually get into Nickerson State Park. There were dirt roads everywhere going in many different directions. It turned out that you could also drive to school along the "Hi lines" in you travel easterly. If you travel westerly you could wind up at the sand pit alongside Freeman's Way in Brewster. Lots of places to go.
On one of my excursions towards the State Park I had two passengers. One was a local kid who lived right down the road from me and the other was a visiting friend of his from Middleboro. Being stupid, like stupid kids are, we were speeding down a narrow section of dirt road that had been cut into a hill and which had steep sides. I lost control and started skidding. First to one side, then the other. We climbed the bank on one side a flipped the car on its side in the road between the two banks.
Except for the spare battery I carried in the back which ricocheted past the heads of my passengers, we were all ok. Now we (read that me) had a problem. We needed a wrecker because you can't tow a car on its side very well.
We walked back out to the street (Rte. 28) where I hoofed it to Orleans center. I went to Knowles' Bakery which was owned by my Uncle Gaston. He wasn't there but his wife Aunt Doris was and I blurted out my problem, being sure to tell her that my parents shouldn't hear about this.
Doris was up to the task and said she would take care of it. She did.
Before long Judah Eldredge (Judah's Garage) showed up in his early 1950s Dodge Power Wagon and told me to hop in. We headed to the car resting peacefully on its side. He got turned around so he could lift it and I wish I could remember how he did it but he quickly got the car upright and he towed it to our house. The only damage we could find to the car was a broken fender brace which could be easily repaired. Judah left. Doris even paid him.
For reasons I don't remember, I decided that the wood body had to go. (remember, it was a "Woodie") I ripped off everything that was wood which left the chassis and front, bench seat and the rear bench seat. The rear seat didn't look right so I put an old sofa in its place.(no idea where the sofa came from) Now my passengers could ride in style. I forgot to mention that I had aged a year and was now almost 15.
In all the time that I went back and forth into the State Park I never met anyone on the road so I figured it was safe to travel on the paved road in the vicinity of The Brewster Fire Tower which was only manned from Spring through Fall. I'm not sure who was in the Tower the day I drove right up to it but the guy leaned out through the trap door and said we better get out of there because Red Madden is coming.
The name "Red Madden" struck fear in the hearts of every kid who hunts. He was a State Game Warden and seemed to be everywhere, at the same time. If you were goose-hunting in Pleasant Bay he was watching. If you were setting up a blind at Pochet Island he was there too. Somehow he would be on Lieutent's Island in Wellfleet at the same time. A magician.
Red taught my first gun safety class so he knew me by sight. Scary thought.
My memory is so bad that I don't even remember who was with me that day, (I think it might have been Bill Carey - Fred's brother) but we did a u-turn and took off. Just as we took off we spotted him coming around the corner and we knew he had seen us.
We were toast. Nevertheless we flew down the various roads we came in on. He was hot on our tail and we knew he was going to catch us if we didn't do something drastic. Hmm, there's an idea, do something drastic to Red Madden.
Visualizing firing squads and electric chairs we opted for something drastic anyway.
As we skidded around a particularly sharp corner we stopped and dumped the sofa across the road and sped off. Red had two choices, stop , get out and remove the sofa or run over it and risk losing control. We never found out because we got across Rte. 28 and back home but never saw him come out.
It was common knowledge in Orleans that I frequently "patrolled" that area in my "limo" so I fully expected a visit from Red but he never came. In deference to him, I stopped going into the State Park.
