This Happened To Me Collection

This page of Rust In Peace is dedicated to anyone that wants to interact and share a story with the world that happened to them in their lifetime that may have changed or affected your life in any way. Only factual stories that relate to early automotive or farming will be posted. I cannot guarantee all stories will be posted, depending on content and volume of stories I receive at any given time. These stories could include any thing that may have happened around any type of automotive or farming situations that could range from funny to tragic to the unbelievable, or just plain inspirational. Rust In Peace will then post your story if the content fits this site. Some stories may be altered by the Author Kevin Houtwed due to length or content when chosen. It is my guarantee that all the facts, verbiage and photos that needs to be in your story will be posted. Kevin’s Rust In Peace will not be help responsible or liable for any story you submit to be posted on this site for enjoyment or entertainment. Remember, this portion of the site is for pure enjoyment of the members to get involved and share their life along with mine.

Please submit photos and stories to : kevrip.com

A while back I decided to get the 34 Ford out and give it a good bath, as we had drove it out on the town a few times and it needed a good clean up. 
As I was scrubbing the white walls, I was thinking that you just do not see these original 34 Fords around anymore and do the young people even care anyway?
We all know it seems the only way we can talk to our kids or any young people today is with our thumbs. 
Are we heading for a time that if you want to shut a person up, we wrap a towel around their hand and tie it tight? 
When I was a kid, we were told to put a sock in it, or if you said something that crossed the white line, then it was the, you want a bar of soap in your mouth?
I really do not remember ever getting a bar of soap in my mouth, but I remember the threats. 
With that said, do not laugh, there may come a day when the person trying to get your attention will carry a glove that will have all fingers sewn together in a way that would make impossible to text using your fingers. A combination on the wrist that would only be known by the person that put it on and decides when it comes off. You read it here first, so send royalties my direction. Well, enough on the future. 
Just as I was in all this deep thought about the younger generations not caring about this all original 34 Ford, I heard a Jeep coming down the street with what every Jeep has in it. 
A beautiful young girl driving with a friend riding along enjoying the day with the driver in blue jeans shorts with one leg propped up on the outside door jam listening to the very same song on their radio that I was enjoying on the stereo in my shop. 
I instantly thought to myself as I listened to the tunes coming at me from both directions, music really has no age, maybe music is what keeps all ages connected?
Maybe these 2 kids really just got back from California and they stayed in that hotel the Eagles were singing about to my generation and theirs, for that moment on the radio? 
At any cost they both gave me a thumbs up and for a split second, I realized what does age or generation gaps have to do with anything? 
I would not trade that old original 34 Ford for anything, nor that moment when someone that is half your age and 10 times better looking realizes that the music that was recorded when their mother was 4 is just as cool today as it was then. 
I have always said that music does 2 things very well. It momentarily makes you remember everything or it can make you forget everything. 
But the best thing it really does is keeps us all connected at any age. RIP 

1959 Cadillac Limo ( Stanley Hotel, Estes Park, Co. )

Since we have been talking about the Stanley Hotel in Estes Park, Colorado and being a chaffier driver, I will tell you about the owner of the Hotel, this 1959 Cadillac Limo and 100 hamburgers at the McDonalds down the hill from the Stanley. 
It all started when I had introduced myself to Frank Normally, the owner of the hotel. 
We hit it off right away and as we walked around a few hours before the Bond wedding, he asked if I would go down to the carriage house you see in the background and get his own limo and brink it up to the hotel and pick him up. 
Why sure, who would not do something like that? 
I was thinking some late model caddy would be waiting on the back side of those early American swing open wooden carriage doors. 
To my surprise, I swung those old doors open to find this awesome 59 stretch Caddy. 
He had told me where the key was hidden before I went down there.
I jumped in it and turned the key to find it was dead as piano shoved off the tenth floor.  
I instantly had one option, turn McGiver and take control of this situation. 
I took a battery out of a late model Suburban that was also in the garage and got it running. 
Off to the front door of the Stanley, I am not kidding when I say the people there could not believe the cars I kept pulling up, in front of that hotel with. 
Frank came bouncing down the big steps on the front of the building and was pleased to seat himself in the rear of this car as I opened the door for him and closed it after he crawled in. 
He then told me to head down the hill to McDonalds and go through the drive through. 
At this point I am thinking, are you kidding me?
He proceeded to tell me to order 100 hamburgers, 1 with cheese. At the moment I pulled this 59 Caddy up to the drive up order speaker and said what I needed, the next comment was, who is this?
I told the girl, Frank Normally's driver and I was not joking. 
You see Frank wanted 1 with cheese for himself. The rest were to be given out around the grounds at the hotel for the wedding party as a thank you from the Stanley Hotel. 
They immediately knew who we were and the order soon became a reality. ( surprising, it only took about 7-8 minutes to get that many burgers.) Franks special cheese burger was in its own sack that said Mr. Normally on it. 
We headed back up the hill and as we drove up to the front of the hotel, Frank leaned forward, tapped me on the shoulder and said, your a very good driver, I knew I could trust you with my personal car, walk around and give out hamburgers and tell everyone you hand one to, Thank you from Frank and the Stanley Hotel. 
With great pride I did so and returned this Caddy back to its stall in that 100 year old carriage house, put the battery back in the suburban, where I got it and hurried to get cleaned up and take my position in that 1934 Packard limo you see me in below, to do my best job ever as a driver for a very special Bride and Groom , Kevin and Stacey Unger. 
Experiences like this are almost impossible to tell how it really was that day as for the most part it all seemed like a dream a few weeks later. Like I said, defiantly a top ten day in the life and times of me. RIP.

1934 Packard Limo along with 2 1934 Packard roadsters, hand built by Dwight Bond in Gibbon Nebraska.

This same day we were at the Stanley Hotel in Estes Park there was an event going on in Fort Collins called Dan’s Bake Sale. This was an event to raise money for a man that had called into a radio talk show that at that point I had never heard of. The idea was to see how many people a man called Rush Limbaugh could get to come to Fort Collins to raise money for Dan and a project he had going on. There was literally hundreds of thousands that came to Fort Collins for the picnic for Dan. As I drove this very limo down the street that evening to a dance hall where the reception was at with the Bride and Groom in the back there was hundreds of people running beside me along the street and at one point a guy tried to get on the running board to get a glimpse at Rush for the first time. Little did they know, I had no idea who this Rush guy was and all I wanted to do was drive the Newlyweds around town and make sure their night was the best it could be. I soon found out who Rush was and also how much fun you could have being a limo driver for very special people. The new couple riding with me and the one guy I never met. RIP

A friend of mine stopped by my office today and reminded me of the day I took this 1969 SSRS 396 4 speed Camaro that I owned to Nelson Nebraska to get my drivers license when I turned 16.
You are asking, why did you have that when you were 16? The truth is, I bought it when I was 14 and then completely restored it, or should we say fixed it up. When I got done with it, I was only 15 and driving it all over the place.
Let me tell you, it did not look like this the day I bought it, in fact the photo of when I first brought it home is the top one taken with a polaroid camera.
Here is the deal, when I turned 16, I needed to get a drivers license and make it legal. 
I drove over to Nelson to get my license in this very car and took the test. I kind of rushed through it and missed 4 questions, you know back then, I knew it all and did not need to study for something so easy to ace.
To get a license you could only miss 3 questions, and I missed 4. The drivers test guy that was normally there was not that day, so a lady from I think Clay Center was subbing for him, She looked at me and said you did not pass your test.
I said really, then what? About that time Sheriff Squires walked by where were standing. Him and her spoke to each other and he asked me how I got there, I told him, I drove here in that green and white Camaro out in the lot. 
He then asked me if I had a plan to get home, since I did not have a drivers license. I told him, I am going to go out and get in that Camaro and drive it home, just like I got here.
He looked at me and grinned, lets go outside and talk about what we need to do to get you to pass this test.
We went over to my car and he said, lets go for a ride, so we got in and I started it up, and with a very rough idling cam, I put in 1st gear and we headed out of the parking lot.
We drove through a few blocks until we came to the west edge of town. I turned left, and with a twist both ways from the officer, he said, this thing really gets with it, doesn't it?
I could see the skin on his face was trying to keep the muscles of responsibility, in his mouth from saying, hit it son, and right then I rolled that pavement pounding 396 up to about 4,000 rpm and with the lope of the cam smoothed out and the headers screaming trouble, we went sideways in the street and as 2nd gear came upon me, I looked over to see a man that for a moment decided to live a little.
And then it came, he yelled, for christ's sake I need to keep my job. 
That 396 with the 411 posi had no mercy for those N50-15 BFG radial tires, I mean they did not squeal, they sang like Maria Carrie when you got on it.
I reeled my foot, back out of that Holley 650 double pumper carburetor, and calmed it down, headed around over by the courthouse, where he told me to we need to go back inside.
We sat by the front end of that Camaro and that man told me, Kevin, I am pretty sure you know how to drive, now lets talk about a few of those questions you missed while we are walking back in. 
We walked down the hall of that 100 year old, varathane lacquer smelling rock on the hill building and in to his room. 
He said to me, Thats the most fun I have ever had on a test ride, and then he said, I do not need you telling everyone in the county, I was with you. 
I told him, we are good, did I pass? He laughed, and as 30 years of sitting in complete boredom left his face, he said with a big smile, with flying colors.  
I was for sure that day would become a legal holiday for the whole world getting a drivers license, after I lit those tires up and mentally reminded that guy it was alright to bend the rules once in a while and think outside the dotted lines, but it never did.
He is long gone now, and I am sure it is safe to share this story with the rest of the world while Don Squires lays' out on that hill west of town not far from the street that not only changed his life for a few quick blocks, but made me aware of the fact that he was more than the local Sherif, he was a man that I became friends with, and never gave me a single problem, as the years went by. RIP

We have a complete model T Ford Touring car down in the dirt in our front yard that I put there when we built our home in 2000.
Almost weekly, someone stops by to use it for backdrop for pictures, for all types of occasions.
I was out mowing the front yard least night when a professional photographer pulled into the drive and asked if he could use our rusty old car as his prop for the girl you see in these pictures.
I said sure, like we always do, the man pulled his SUV ahead to park it out of the way, and then to my surprise, the rear door opened up, this lady crawled out with the help of her mother, and I am not kidding there was traffic stopping in the street to see what was going on.
I have seen wedding parties to graduation kids to you name it, use our place for pictures, but I have to be honest when I say, this girl did not even look real. 
She is turning 15 and getting ready for her celebration the Spanish do for the girls her age called Quinceanera.
When they were done with the photo shoot, she personally invited my wife and I to her celebration that is taking place in a few weeks. She reached out to shake my hand and I was almost afraid to shake her hand back for fear it would break, as she really looked like a porcelain doll. 
I really feel honored every time someone stops to use our old rusty model T Ford in their photo's that will be displayed in their home for lifetimes for so many to enjoy.
I would bet the farm that this car never had a picture taken of it for most of its life if ever, until we planted it in our front yard back in 2000.
I would bet not only the farm, but my first born and a limb, that the day this car rolled out of Detroit, that not one man that had any part of assembling it right down to the truck driver or train engineer that delivered it across the country, that a beautiful young lady like this would be standing in my front yard in Hall county Nebraska 96 years later, making memories to last her lifetime and stopping traffic while doing so. 
As perfect as this young lady is, I still think it was that old rusty car that was making the traffic stand still. RIP

1937 Ford 2 door sedan

This is me getting ready to unearth a 1937 Ford 2 door sedan near Deshler, Nebraska in the spring of 1995 that I was sure would never see the light of day. 
This car was setting on a farmyard near the area I grew up in and was never for sale, I mean never.
Guess what, I finally talked the owner into selling it to me after they had used it for a junk windbreak catch all for for about 40 years.
It took myself and my friend Dwight about 3 hours to release it from its, you will never be worth anything, I could care less about you prison, and get it loaded on a trailer.
We had to cut down trees, move lots of old machinery and a bunch of wind blown irrigation pipe to get to it.
The car had been owned and driven by the family that still owned it, so it really was pretty complete. 
We got it home, put good tires on the rims and sold it to a man who completely resto rodded it to perfection, using a new drivetrain, with all the goodies.
For what we had to do to save it, I am pretty sure a lot of people would have passed on it, but that is not me.
If I can make one like this become another on the list of sheet metal survivors, it is always worth the effort it takes to see it roll down the road again. RIP

A man from my hometown of Ruskin, Nebraska tells the story of when 2 friends and himself were headed to Colorado Springs to get to the military base there they hit a nasty blizzard in western Kansas. They had to stop along the road somewhere around Colby, Kansas, simply because the snow was to bad to drive in.
As they sat there over night, they realized the snow was covering the car with drifting like nothing they had ever seen. By morning the car was completely covered and they were not able to open the doors or do anything.
Luckily, they had stopped a few towns back and purchased some refreshments, so they had drinks, until someone came along to dig out the world they were caught in.
They literally sat in that car until late in the afternoon of that day, when they heard a very load vibration and terrible grinding noise coming from behind them. Keep in mind they were barely off the edge of the road when they got stopped. 
As the vibration from the iron snow plow skipping on the pavement got closer, they were sure the plow would hit them and turn that fox hole Ford into tin foil.
As they were all hugging the passengers side of the cars interior, the vibration was of such from the snow plow pushing its way through the drift that they were for certain that this was there last few moments on this great earth.
Remember, they could not see out and the guy running the snow plow had no idea there was a car buried in that drift. 
As the snow plow and its cigar chewing driver blasted right by them, they all took a deep breath and felt like they had just been saved, but yet they still could not see out. 
The driver went to push his door open and guess what? There was about a 4" shaved wall right beside the car after the plow busted the drift. They all crawled out of the car to see the rear of the snow plow pushing its way forward down the road. 
Talk about a close call. Could you imagine if that guy in the plow would have had a way to look back and see those guys pilling out of the wall of that snow drift like people coming up out of a storm cellar after the tornado passed? I bet the road worker never knew they were ever there. 
What do you learn from this true story? Check the weather before heading across western Kansas in a snowstorm, and for sure do not do it in a 49 Ford car, but if you must, take plenty of refreshments with, just in case. ( You may want to leave the wife at home by the fireplace )
Being able to tell a story like this really makes a huge difference if you can laugh about it with a few buddies over the years instead of trying to explain to your buddies back home why she left me after that trip.
Remember, always keep your ears open around the older people telling the stories and never think, that did not happen, weather it is 100% true or not, the stories are always worth sharing as we go through life and look back at where we all have been. RIP

Author, Kevin Houtwed left with Bill Smith

It seems like a million years ago when Bill Smith shown with me in this picture made this wooden cane for me by using hot welding rods to burn the designs in the wood you see on this cane. Actually it kind of was since I was 5 years old when he made it for me. This would have been in 1967. Why did this man make this for a 5 year old kid and why do I still have it today you ask? The truth is, Bill was a salesman for Century Welders here in Nebraska. He had a big booth every year at the Nebraska State Fair and when I was 5 my dad bought a new welder from him. Bill had a cane like this he had made for himself to show his talents with the welder and me being the inquisitive person I have always been I was asking him about it the day my dad purchased his welder. Bill pulled out a tape measure and said you are going to need one about this tall and I am going to make sure you have one right here next year when you come back with your dad. I remember little about the whole conversation, but I do remember saying that is way to tall and Bill laughed and said by the time you will need this young man it will fit just right. The very next year we walked into The Century booth at the fair and there stood Bill Smith with this very cane, handed it to me and said take care of that one son I put a lot of extra work in it. We thanked him over and over, my dad even tried to pay him something for it, but he would not hear of it. Fast forward to this photo here taken around 1996 in Hastings Nebraska when I was about 34 years old and Bill Smith was the State Baseball Commissioner and even had the big ball fields in Hastings named after him. They were having a huge tournament there when they were giving him some kind of an award for all his hard work for the sport of baseball. I walked up to him with this cane in my hand, he looked at me and then down at the cane. Kevin, he said with a slight slip in his throat, you did take care of that one. With a stroke of his hand across his late 70’s eyes he told me this was the nicest one he ever made and he really hoped that I would take care of it. He also told me that he only made mine and 4 others since they were very time consuming and he figured most people would not take care of them anyway. Keep in mind he had not seen me since that day in 1967 when he gave it to me and it was almost as tall as me at the time. I asked him if he really remembered my name or if he saw it on the cane as I walked up to him? As he gripped my hand as you see in the picture, he said to me, I knew you were the kind of kid that would grow up to appreciate this cane and that is why we meet again all these years later. It was a very special day for Bill and myself that I will never forget as we stood and swapped stories about the State Fair, my Father and why two grown men were wiping back tears at a baseball game over a piece of burnt to hell wood. I have that cane on display in my office here in Grand Island and think about everything that piece of wood represents every time I look at it. RIP