Let me tell you about Bumper Carz

I’d been driving on the family farm off road since I was big enough to reach the pedals and see over the wheel. Once upon a time when you turned sixteen you could get a “365” learner’s permit and the following week you could take the driving test and get your driver’s license. Taking driving lessons would lower your insurance premiums but otherwise, if you could drive, you could. Now there’s the graduated license which means you have to pass an initial driving test and then work towards a second test before you are fully deemed a driver. The summer I was sixteen I had a pair of broken legs which put an end to the driving lessons I’d started that spring. It wasn’t until the next spring that I got my first stage Driver’s License that allowed me to drive on my own and a few months later I was finally fully Licensed to drive on the Freeway.

While I was fifteen turning sixteen I couldn’t get behind the wheel, but I spent lots of time under the hood in High School Automotive Shop. While the other guys were tuning their little mo-mo-mobiles to sound like lawn mowers on steroids and putting lots of lipstick on those little piggies I was rebuilding an antique tractor.

I always had to be careful in the auto shop and use the hoists and jacks like the other kids. Sometimes it felt like a hassle to chain up an engine block when I could just as easily lift it with my bare hands in a fraction of the time. Along with other stupid stuff like over-torqueing nuts and bolts causing them to sheer off or strip. "A quarter turn past finger tight" is too much torque when I do it.

But I think my strength did save George Manson's life. It was after school hours and we were both working late on our projects.  He had his little mo-mo-mobile on ramps without chocking the wheels properly. He was under it on a creeper when it moved and pinned him under it. The oil pan square on his chest. Without thinking, I grabbed the front end of his car, lifted and I rolled the car back to free him. Calling out for help, the teacher came around and found me trying to revive George. I gave George artificial respiration while the teacher called an ambulance. The Emergency First Aid I learned in Physical Education Class paid off for George. He got off with a broken sternum, but thankfully no one saw me lift the car. I just said it came down and rolled back on it's own. 

For my automotive project, Dad and I pulled an antique tractor out of the mud at the farm and I rebuilt it from the ground up. A pretty little 1948 Massey Harris Pony.

A lot of the parts had rusted away or fallen off over the years and replacement parts are scarce so I spent much more time in the metal shop fabricating the pieces I needed. By then I had tried my hand at the Farrier's forge doing some Blacksmithing with Jake MacFarland up at the farm.

It took a bit of convincing but I got my shop teachers to allow me to build a forge just outside the auto shop where I wasn't likely to burn the school down. From heating and pounding steel I moved up to getting a crucible and started melting aluminium and pot metal so that I could cast odd shaped parts easier than I could have machined down from larger pieces.

I was so chuffed when I got that little ten horse powered engine to run. The transmission was more difficult because all the gears had to be rebuilt from scratch and cutting the teeth and precisely honing them took incredible accuracy so that they moved and engaged smoothly.

The funny thing about getting a driver's license is that you don't need one for farm equipment. You just have to be sixteen to drive on the road. 

To celebrate the end that school year I gave hay rides to the graduating class and all my friends up and down through the posh sections of Forest Hill. Many millionaires took umbrage that public school kids disturbed their tranquil domain.

I also drove it on the Toronto LGBTQ+ Pride Parade with the Congregation Youth Group.

Then I drove the tractor back to its home on the farm under its own power.