THIS SITE IS DOPE AF

When I got my DL, spring '88, my father and I were looking at vehicles and we saw this really clean F150 with a for sale sign. Kinda cheap for an unrusted seacoast NH truck. Something was off. Took a few minutes to see "it". The wheels didn't match the fender wells, though from a distance it was hard to see.
An adult came out and chatted with my father. The adults' son was driving drunk with the F150 with a Fisher 7' plow on the front. He did not have the safety chain set, went speeding through a series of famous NH frost heaves which sent the lift chain off the hook, and was plowing the pavement. He missed a corner and slammed the plow into a curb. The impact sheared/pushed the frame cab and bed mounts 3"+ back off the body.

 

One of the only reasons I would watch ABC's Wide World of Sports.

 

I lived in the high desert of Nevada, we built jumps out of dirt mounds. We had one down by the basketball court that was about 6/7 feet tall. You could build up good speed across the concrete basketball court and hit the dirt trail for about 100ft then hit this monster we built.
I finally got up enough nerve to hit at full speed and I ended up pulling on the handlebars to hard and next thing I know I am upside down and hit the dirt about 20 ft out. I slid on my back for about 12ft. When I finally got my wind back, I still had to ride the 1.5 miles home.
I got home and I looked like i had been attacked by a lion. More dirt and rocks in back then you shake a stick at.

 

Throw in an evil stepmother who liked to throw punches instead of giving hugs and you were a man before you sprouted the 1st wisker!

 

My dad was a doctor, a GP. One week he had to sew my little brother up three times because my aim was a little better when throwing rocks at each other.

We would both get our asses beat then we'd march over to his office for the stitches.

That was the end of our rock fights.

 

I must have listened to Snap!'s "The Power" a bazillion times on this walkman.

 

TW is very cool

 

The good ‘ol days where you could have a nice game in the front yard

 

I lived in an area that was flat as the prairie, early '80's maybe 9 or 10 years old. The only hill around was at a park and we would ride as fast as we could down this small hill to another to jump off that one. Only problem was it was a blind hill... and I still, to this day remember landing on that kid running behind that hill!!!... he took off crying, we high tailled it out of there!

 

We used to stand in a circle, one person in the center with bow and arrow. Person in the centre shoots arrow straight in the air.... everyone scatters (at least he dumb ones). Smart ones don't move, knowing that arrow isn't coming straight back down.
We also had bb gun wars and rock fights.

 

We used pellet guns but same concept

 

I can one up you both. We stuck .22 shells in a straw and threw them in the air in gravel parking lots... So while you had to be tough to grow up back then, you didn't have to be smart lololol

 

Me - adding to Spotify play list

 

loved playing that at my grandparents place

 

Late winter 1979....10 years old. Jeremy Wipple's family had a big garden in their backyard. Being winter is was not being used. So it was basically a giant rectangular pile of dirt pointing down hill a bit. We proceeded to dig out a massive hole about a foot deep but 6' wide and probably 10' long. We then took all the dirt and made a beautifully sculpted marvel of a ramp....made even higher by the dug out area after said ramp. We then laid down a piece of plywood stolen.....I mean found at a nearby house rehab.....because laying down wood on the ramp just seemed like the right thing to do.

Exhibit #1.....Enter Roy Highland's Huffy.....tan colored with an ugly ass white banana seat.

Exhibit #2.....Enter a snazzy 1970s exercise bike located in Jeremy's basement, belonging to his mother.



That little tiny wheel....look at it! A thing of beauty it was. Just begging to be removed and installed on the front of Roy's Huffy. Roy's dad had a bunch of tools. And the swap was successfully made. We had turned Roy's ugly Huffy into a bad ass "chopper".....especially designed and built specifically for winter time garden ramp jumping.

Admittedly we made a tactical error. How were we, as 11 and 12 year olds, to know that the wheel from an exercise bike was meant solely to rotate and was not even remotely designed with the massive loads and dynamic forces that would be applied if one were to.....say.....not pull up on the handlebars as clearly written in all young boy's epic ramp jumping manuals....a maneuver that all of us had performed countless times.

43 years later we still don't know why Roy didn't perform the proper handlebar pull up as he left that ramp. He had great speed, great technique all the way down the garden. He even had iron-on patches on his jeans from previous adventures. But for whatever reason Roy did not pull up on the handlebars that day. As the bike's trajectory gave way to gravity the bike did what all bikes do when not properly launched.

As the front wheel dug into the ground damn near every spoke sheared away from the hub causing the forks to dig solidly into the soft, recently excavated Earth. For a brief moment Roy's legs were perfectly straight up above his head and perpendicular to the ground. But instead of continuing his fateful 196.7° arc, he made a second grave error and let go of the handlebars.

As per the laws of physics in all preteen male epic ramp jumps, his energy was then transferred straight down to the face plant. Something all boys from that era have experienced at least once...or 35 times.

Roy's front teeth went through his upper lip. He also fractured his nose, left collar bone and broke his left index finger. Not to mention the numerous bruises and cuts.

Roy was heavily disciplined for costing his dad big bucks at the ER (there was no insurance) and for getting into his tools.

Jeremy got his ass kicked for ruining his mother's exercise bike and f**king up the garden.

Myself? I didn't dare mention a damn thing to any of the adults in my life.

 

I used to have white new balance velcro shoes. Loved those things! I was 23 at the time, had to beat off the women with a stick when they saw those shoes.

 

When I was a kid I built Go Carts out of wood. One day I made a real cool looking one with a wood roll bar to keep me safe back in the early 60's? It had pull handles for steering it, simple steel rods for axles and wagon wheels. My older brother said he would pull me with his Motor Cycle down the street at a fast speed. Told every one including my Mother I would be OK? Had a heavy jacket on and a Foot Ball Helmet but my brother would not let me borrow his riding leather gloves? Anyway off we went down the road every thing was going fine till the axles got hot enough to burn in haft and lose a wheel!! Well I had a Strong Roll Bar and it worked except I grabbed it when it went on it side! With no gloves on my bare hand was held tight on the asphalt as it slid to a stop and ground the skin down to the bone!! I still have a polished mark on my Left Hand and learned a lot. First Lubrication is important, bearing are also important along with folding your arms on your chest in a wreck!! Roll Bars are as important as other safety gear and designing stuff right helps a lot to cover other possibility's! It could have been my Face ground off! My Brother got chewed out over it too! I just got in bigger wrecks as I got older. Rolled several cars off roads, but never got hurt was always strapped in good and thumbs out of the steering wheel!

 

I came from a very poor family and we couldn’t afford any toys. The only toy I had was a hole in my pocket

 

Seems like that could be fun if the hole is in the right place

 

Next door neighbors had those. We used to throw them straight up has far as we could and hold metal garbage can lids above our heads.

We also used those lids as shields when we shot at each other with BB guns. Can't remember the kid's name, but he threw his lid down and ran up a tree. Sucker took one in the ankle at close range and it embedded. His older brother....probably 17 or 18 got it out using a car speaker....i.e. a big magnet