1974-1975

Phil had recently begun work at a Texaco garage located on Granville Street & 64th Ave.
His boss had a friend who operated another Texaco at Oak & 67th. He was looking for staff and

Phil came through for me with a tip to get down there asap.
I was back to driving Mum's '71 Toyota and headed down there after school one day to find an impressive looking garage with big service area and neat overall appearance.
I met Walt Kelley the very serious owner and was put to work and shown
the ropes by another young fellow who I would work many shifts with in the coming weeks.
I remember really liking the look of the green coveralls we were given several pairs of each.

The shifts were only four hours for me to cover the rush hours from 4-7 three days a week with a full shift on Sundays.
I found the place quite refreshing as there were usually three guys on duty at a time to allow me to stay at a particular task such as cleaning the large three bay two car deep shop where brake jobs were a specialty.

On the front-end at rush hours it was very busy due to its Oak Street location.
There were also 3 dump trucks kept on the lot which we fueled and washed several times each week.

The garage was quite a drive from home for me through heavy afternoon traffic and I wasn't getting as many hours as I wanted so I began looking elsewhere.

I didn't have to wait long before an ad appeared in the Vancouver Sun for attendants at various Home Service stations in the city, one near my home located at West 16th and Arbutus. This was the very garage I had longed to work at as a boy of 14.
I showed up on the stated date for interviews and found quite a few candidates milling around in the office area of the immaculately maintained facility.
As I waited I glanced into the three bay shop to see even the shop floor shone with black wax.
I was interviewed by the gruff and burly owner-manager, Don Brown who seemed pleased with my application.

I was notified a few days later to appear at 7 a.m. Saturday for my training shift.
(The station in the photo at left is identical even in pump location to the Arbutus& 16th operation.)

This garage was even better staffed than Kelly's Texaco with at least two on duty at all times and three or four during busy periods.

We had ample time to keep the premises spotless and took pride in the place's appearance.
One of the two mechanics was Australian and proved as all of the Aussies I have yet known to be a friendly and good humoured guy. He brought in some Australian Hot Rod magazines to show me the very different types of cars they had over there.

I absorbed as much as I could from the boys in the shop and assisted wherever I could, carrying out routine tire and maintenance jobs and holding parts being welded or bolted in place.

Early in 1975 the operation was sold to John Barton, the former owner of the UBC Home Service which was being closed down and there was a surplus of bodies on hand.
Several of the guys were let go to make room for the new owner's crew including two mechanics to replace the existing duo.

I recall we then had three guys named "Bruce" on staff as well as two "Daves", three"Johns" including the boss and myself as well as a few others making a quite large roster for an operation of its size.

John was the best boss I had yet known and was very friendly and encouraging.
we received raises soon after he took over and were frequently praised for work well done.
The shop had its own service truck painted in company colours with tow truck style front push bumper and revolving amber roof light.
We used the truck to carry garbage cans down to the dumpster in the back alley as well as to go out on the odd service call.

I once carried out my own call to help a stranded lady and pushed her car about a mile to the garage with her at the wheel of her car, me pushing it with no mishaps through courtesy intersections.

John also allowed me use of the truck to pick up a couple of Mopar big block V8s Phil and I bought from Ralph's Auto Supply.

The new mechanics were a couple of characters.
Bob "Penny" Pentecost was reportedly an ex con and sported jailhouse-style home done ink tattoos on his arms and normally had a hand rolled smoke poking from between his thin lips.

Ted Slater was reminiscent of the Wolf man with wild long black hair, bushy eye brows and beard along with wild, darting eyes.
Both were pleasant to work with and assist in the shop and were full of stories that fascinated me.

I remember Ted once calling to Bob "Pass me the gasket cement that smells like a woman's vagina!"

I was now driving my '64 Mercury Marauder which is one of my all time favourites of the many cars I have owned.

It was heavily damaged one night when I lent it to a co-worker who crashed it in a courtesy intersection and did not pay for the damage.

I could not afford to fix it and had to scavenge the nearly new engine and transmission which I transplanted into a '64 Galaxy exactly as shown.
Luckily the car only cost $300.00 as it had blown head gaskets.
The car was not as perfect as the Marauder, but looked pretty tough and had no problems once the swap was done.

The old car had been sitting possibly for several years,piles of rust covered the ground around it,  but us young fellows had so much faith in our abilities to fix anything we dived into the job once Phil learned it was his for fifty bucks.

The first good news was that we had it running in no time and although the lifters ticked like a diesel engine, the old slant six ran remarkably well after its years of sitting.

We pumped up the tires got it mobile and home to Phil's place without mishap.

Phil's Dad took an interest in it as he had owned one in its day. He insisted on driving it as he worried it was too dilapidated to be safe.

One evening off we went, Mr. Read wearing his slouch hat and grinning at the evident memory of his original Dodge as he rowed the three-speed column shift through the gears and hung on to the oddly shaped steering wheel.
The clutch slipped badly as we ascended Arbutus Street up to West Boulevard and we planned to replace it right away.
Once the new clutch was in the old car was very reliable and we drove it many miles during that summer.

One interesting occurrence happened one day when the Dodge was parked in front of Phil's house on West King Edward and Phil saw a police car pull up and the officer nose around the car.
Thinking the worst Phil went out only to be asked questions about the car on behalf of a movie production company looking for a 1960 Dodge to be used in the movie "Russian Roulette" with George Segal.

For some reason it had to be a '60 Dodge even though when we saw the movie that took place in present day 1975, the car used was an old beater and one year wouldn't have made any difference.

I was finally finished with high school that June and remember the relief at walking out the door-free at last.
I didn't want anything more to do with it and worked my grad night covering for some of the other guys who wanted to attend their ceremonies.

That October after working full time at the garage and on urging of my Mum I signed up at Professional Drivers Centre at the old Boundary Bay Airport for a class 3 drivers course with air brake training.