Susybelle really was a classy girl, this black four door 1940 Ford. When I was introduced to her, she’d already had plastic surgery having been fitted out with a supercharger. She was a souped-up kid.
This girl was lucky to be owned by Stanley. You see, he loved to drive. Give him any excuse and off he’d go, on errands, off to dinner, on trips to the desert and the mountains, anywhere so long as he and Susybelle could drive there. Distance wasn’t a consideration. Just to be driving was all that seemed important.
Unfortunately World War II escalated and gasoline was rationed. Since Stanley was an employee of Douglas Aircraft Company he received extra coupons for gas because he was essential to the war effort. So he was able to drive to work and back, but that’s all. The long drives that he loved were out of the question now. The answer to this problem was alternative fuel. After doing some research, he decided to invest in a system that used butane for fuel. This required the installation of a thirty-gallon, high-pressure tank in the trunk of the car and the addition of an extra carburetor as well as an extra foot throttle. So now Susybelle had two fuel tanks, the original gas tank to be filled only with the coupon gasoline for business and the new butane tank for pleasure trips.
After these changes, driving Susybelle became rather challenging. To start her going the original foot throttle was used because there was more immediate power from gasoline, remembering all the time you’re using rationed gasoline. Then when Susybelle got up to speed you switched to the butane foot throttle. Butane is a very smooth running fuel, soft to the touch but slow on the pickup.
At first butane was easy to find. We could just drive to downtown Los Angeles and get all the fuel we wanted. Now there was no stopping our driving. We could go anywhere. There were ski trips to Mammoth and Lake Tahoe, weekend trips to the desert and beaches, visits to Mexico—all this when we were at war and driving was limited.
PREVIOUS PAGE
