Tuesday, April 9, 2013

Wordless Wednesday - Hometown News

These cute, joyful-looking boys are cousins who lived down the street from me when I was a child.  Their grandfather and my grandmother were siblings.  They're with a soapbox derby car here but they graduated to building go carts.  I was occasionally invited to ride/drive the go carts on the track behind their house.  Even then I loved speed and, aside from a car, those little go carts were probably the speediest thing I could ride and have the wind in my face.  (No helmets in those days.)  I didn't look for the results of the Soap Box Derby so I don't know who won.  Surprisingly (or maybe not so surprisingly), the boys' uncle, Jim Bickerstaff, was a stock car driver.

I happened onto this photo while searching for an obituary in paper copies of the Niles Daily Times at the Ohio Historical Society Archives.  (I found the obituary.)  Some of the newspapers in their collection have many issues bound into single large volumes.  Imagine my surprise when I turned the page and found this photo. It's hard to believe it wasn't in my mother's scrapbook.  She cut out and saved newspaper articles right and left.  Maybe she culled her collection later in life. 

If you'd like to read the article below the photo, click on the image.  It will open in a new window.  Click again and it will enlarge.

Google, hear my plea:  continue adding newspapers to your collection, please.  I hope that some day the Niles Daily Times will be available at google newspapers and I'll be able to get a good image of the photo and the obituary as well as perform word searches. 

I guess this was a not-so-wordless Wednesday.

--Nancy.

4 comments:

  1. That's about the slickest soapbox I've ever seen. I'm glad for the story of how you found a treasure you weren't even looking for.

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  2. Someone sent this picture to my dad (Jim Postlethwait) whos dad (Junior Postlethwait) owned Mineral Ridge Auto Service. Nobody in the family knew he had sponsored a soap box derby car and 4 of us grand kids race or have raced soap box derby. What a great find!

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  3. My dad (Jim Postlethwait) dads (Junior) owned Mineral Ridge Auto Service. Whats funny is nobody knew he had sponsored a soap box derby car. Now 4 of us grand kids race or have raced soap box derby. Would love to know if the car is still around or what the colors were as my sister still races and my dad would love to paint of her cars like this.

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    Replies
    1. Hi, Brooke. What fun that this image and the post reached you, and especially that you and other grandchildren race soap box derby. I suspect the car is gone. If you know the Bickerstaffs mentioned in the article, Dick and Jack, you may be able to contact them and ask them about it. It's possible they have some family photos of the car. I'd love to hear if you find anything helpful.

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