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The best route led past a police station. With the caps off and a roar that could be heard for miles, I would get up a good 'head of steam' as they used to say, 'shut down' the engine and coast by the station as quiet as a ghost in falling snow -- then restart after I got by. The owner of the A and W was a 'goody two shoes' who would call the cops if I came in with the plugs off. Had to again get up speed, enough so I could shut off the engine before I reached the stand, and coast in with enough momentum that I would make it up the incline into the parking spot. When I left I just started it right there -- bum, bum, bum, and roared out, knowing that I 'was gone' before the cops could ever get there.
The thrill was the acceleration. You could floor it in first at 30 Mph and it would 'fish tale' from the spin of the rear wheels. And whenever you floored it, the front end would lift up and the rear dip down, the differential being from one to two feet. Never raced it though, for the simple reason that I was always afraid of embarrassing myself. It was a matter of 'getting off the line' from the start, the art of the clutch, as in 'come thru in the clutch'. Never was confident I could do it. People who saw and heard it 'slam through the gears' didn't want to race it anyway. However my brother used to race it after I went in the Army. Said he used to go into Chicago to Skips, a famous drive-in where probably some of the fastest cars in the country hung out.
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