We got all our parts, got the car ready and left for Union Grove, Wisconsin. This place was a trip with a capitol "T". Bob Metzler (Broadway Bob) was the promoter for the Union Grove Race Track. Let me tell you, this guy was some kind of "crazy" and we all loved him; however, none of us trusted him. Bob was then middle age, his hair was gray and he always wore a black shirt and black pants with white shoes and lots of gold all over him. Bob had a ten- year old daughter who accompanied him everywhere. I don’t even know how to start with Bob.
All of us racers would stay at the Holiday Inn close to the track. We would race there about five or six times a year. On Saturday night Bob would come to the hotel to socialize with the racers. He had a little building where we all would go to get paid. Although I always had a contract, he would try to underpay me. He tried to underpay everyone. It was just part of the deal. That was the way Broadway Bob operated.
I hated to wait in his pay line and only waited there a couple of times. The last time I waited in line, when I got up to the pay window he asked if I wanted to flip double or nothing so we did and I won. After that, instead of waiting in line I would walk around to the back of the building to a window that he sat by and I would tap on the window. He would open the window and I’d say call it and I’d flip a coin. If he called tails I’d say no it’s heads and if he called heads I’d say no it’s tails. He never looked out on the ground at the coin. He knew I wouldn’t cheat. It was a great deal. I almost always got paid double.
Every time I raced at Union Grove the Greek (Chris Karamesines) was there and after the races we would go back to Chicago to his shop. Before heading to Chicago, Chris and I would stop by a Greek bar close to the racetrack. Of course the Greek and the Greek bartender got along great and they always looked forward to us stopping by. The bartender invented a drink that we named a 202. It was half ouzo and half chartreuse in a shooter glass. Oh Lord! A couple of years later when Don Cook and I were racing separate cars, we stopped by the Greek bar and drank way to many of those 202s!
On Sunday the Greek’s girlfriend drove up and brought a girl to meet me. After our stop at the bar, we headed to Chicago. Don Cook left the bar first followed by the Greek’s helper with my helper in the Greek’s wagon. The Greek, the girls and I brought up the rear. Cook was driving forty miles an hour down the freeway and when I caught up to him there was some guy in a station wagon in the left lane running along side Cook that wouldn’t let me pass. After several miles I started to get really pissed. Cook was drunk and sort of comatose and the guy in the station wagon kept giving me the finger when I would flash my lights at him.
Now I’m really beginning to get mad so I drop back and let them get pretty far ahead of me. I sped up to about a hundred mph and went right between the two vehicles. It was ugly! Out of the corner of my eye I could see Cook veering to the right side of the highway and the other guy went off in the center median. My trailer was whipping so hard it was nearly impossible to hold on to the steering wheel. I kept looking in the mirror to see my trailer, but come to find out I had knocked the mirrors off. The girl I was with called me a stupid hillbilly son of a bitch. (How rude!)
I began to feel like there was a parachute slowing me down. Guess those 202s were really messing up my senses. I pulled over on the shoulder of the highway and quickly got out to see what was broken. The axles were sideways under my trailer. I jumped back in my truck and took off literally dragging the trailer. It was just five miles to the Illinois State line and another mile to a truck stop where I finally stopped. The only thing the Greek said during this whole fiasco was, "Nickels, you spilled my cocktail." The Greek always called me Nickels.
I had no sooner got stopped in the truck parking lot where I was trying to hide among the trucks than the guy in the station wagon pulled up and completely lost it. When I ran into him, I didn’t realize that he had his wife and several kids in the car. This guy was going insane, hollering and running around like a wild man. I was trying really hard not to smack him. About that time here comes Cook with the whole left side of his truck and trailer gone. Cook jumps out, runs over to me and says, "Nicoll, I don’t have a driver’s license." I told him he shouldn’t drive that way then especially when you’re on the 202s.
Porky, my helper, and the Greek’s helper pull up next. The guy in the station wagon is still coming unglued! Then the state police from Illinois and Wisconsin pull up trying to sort out what has happened. The guy whose wagon I hit wasn’t hurt at all, guess it just scared him. Anyway, he wouldn’t shut up and we were all getting tired of him screaming and carrying on. I finally got him over to the side while the cops were talking to the witnesses who saw the whole thing. I told him I would give him a hundred dollar bill if he would just shut up and leave. It’s amazing what money will do! He grabbed the money, got in his car and drove off never to be seen again.
The cops weren’t happy about any of it. Since the bump and run happened in Wisconsin, they decided to take me back there. We told the cops that Porky was driving Cook’s rig since Cook didn’t have a driver’s license. They take me back to Kenosha to see the Justice of the Peace. The main thing they were pissed about was that I had left the scene of the accident. The Judge asked me why I went almost ten miles before stopping. I asked the Judge if he had ever tried to stop a forty-foot trailer going a hundred miles an hour. That Judge didn’t think I was the least bit funny!
More to come…
