Backwoods Blog

THE GREAT CAR CHASE

Backwoods Blog;

in the woods and on the road…

My family, on the Hutchinson side, have what we call our “Charlie and George stories.” They were the two oldest sons in a family of nine siblings that grew up in the early part of the 20th century on a small farm in Monticello Maine. Being the two oldest boys, I suppose, led to a natural competitive rivalry between the two, and although neither one of them ever got the upper hand, it did result in a generous collection of “Charlie and George stories.” This one is called  The Great Monticello Car Chase. One of the problems we’ve noticed with the ”Charlie and George stories” is that sometimes there are two versions of the same story; a Charlie version and a George version, depending on who is telling it. Since my father is George, I’ve always heard the George version. For the sake of accuracy I decided I had better give my cousin a call so I could cross-reference the Charlie version. When I called, I told my cousin I was working on a “Charlie and George story” and before I could say anything she asked, “Is it the one about the car race?” 

So after we compared some notes, here it is…

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The Great Monticello Car Chase

The old Hutchinson homestead was located on the north end of Monticello, a couple of miles due east on the Nichols Road (now called the Fullerton Road), a graveled side road that connects to US Route One. It was the late 1920s and the automobile was justing catching on in popularity, and of course, you didn’t even need a license in those days. Charlie and George were both single and still living at home. On this one particular day they had each taken a car to town and run some errands in neighboring Bridgewater. (In these stories, “going to town” could mean any one of four towns; Bridgewater, Mars Hill, Monticello or Houlton. Each were close enough to get there without too much trouble and each were viable retail and entertainment destinations. At one time downtown Monticello supported 18 businesses, the world’s largest starch factory and even boasted a fine hat shop. It’s hard to find a good hat shop anywhere these days…)

Well, Charlie and George were in Bridgewater, and once they finished their errands both ended up coming home at the same time. We’re not really sure how or exactly when the race began, as that part of the story didn’t seem to be important in the telling of it. Now I doubt there was much traffic on Route One in those days so it could have started just outside of town, but there are some mighty big hills between Bridgewater and the town line and those hills would have challenged the horse power of any vehicle in those days. But I bet by the time they made the turn onto the Nichols Road, knowing it was a straight-a-way stretch form there to the house, I bet the race was on! Again, we don’t have many details about the race itself (the miles-per-hour reached or remarkable driving maneuvers), all the details of this story come at the end. That’s when George, who had a slight edge on Charlie, and having inside position, made a hair-pin turn into the drive way. They had left the garage door open on the one-car garage so a car could drive right in upon its return. The first car back got to use the garage. This was my Dad’s plan all along – to be the first car back so he could park in the garage. He only had one more hard left turn to make, missing the tree in the front yard, and then slide into the garage to complete his impressive U-turn he had started just moments before. He made the hard left turn, he missed the tree, and he slid right into the garage, but he was going so darned fast when he did that he couldn’t stop and crashed into the back end of the garage! 

Back in those days everyone had what they called a “favorite by-word.” This is a phrase used to add color or place added emphasis to what you wanted to say. For example, you start out with the by-word and then follow it with your comment. The by-word can be used to fit almost any occasion and with proper inflection of the voice can be either tragic, humorous, outraged or situationally ironic. My grandfather’s favorite by-word was, “By the sweet and lovely…” Well, my grandfather came running out of the house to see what all the ruckus was about. He took one look at the pile-up in the driveway and the state of his garage and said, “By the sweet and lovely, if you boys don’t know how to drive, you’re not gonna drive…” I’m not sure how long the car curfew lasted, but it did slow them down for a little while or at least until they fixed the hole in the end of the garage. And that is the story about the most amazing car chase.

In the woods,

Dave

August 3, 2022

George and Charlie goofing around…