I bought a small wooden boat and engine while in Jacksonville, Florida during the early 1960s. It was all painted up a pretty white, with bright red trim, and I was sort of proud to own such a fine example of prestige. It wasn’t everybody that had their very own boat, no matter how small it may have been.
I decided to drop it into the beautiful water of the St. John’s River one bright summer evening. Towing it down the road on its trailer, we were in a long string of cars. One stopped for a red light, causing the entire string behind it to stop, except for the guy behind me. He only stopped after hitting the engine of my boat. Although I wasn’t happy, to say the least, I found no damage so we each continued on our separate ways.
I got the boat into the water, and Nora and I climbed aboard, off to explore the nooks and crannies of the river’s edges. We were moseying along about as fast as it would go, which wasn’t all that fast, when with no warning the boat did a square 90 degree turn to the left. Nora and I managed to stay in it, but just barely. We were probably a half mile from the boat ramp, but unexpectedly friends of ours, Al Vredenberg and his wife, happened upon us. I lay on the front of my boat and held on to the rear of his while he towed us back to our starting point. Let me tell you that was a long way, hanging on to each boat with my hands. People were not meant to be tow ropes.
It seemed that the lower part of my boat engine was separated from the boat attachment by several rubber mounts to decrease engine vibration to the boat. Apparently when the car hit me previously, it either broke some of them, or weakened them to the point they separated while going down the river. This allowed the engine to turn sideways all by itself, and caused the boat to go into the uncontrolled turn.
I bought new parts, installed them, and sold the entire rig. I decided boating was not my thing, so I bought a motorcycle to play with.
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