[Healeys] Healey Memories---more about the kindness of bygone days

[RCobb]

This is auto-related, but my AH didn't arrive in my life for another 15 
years:

The Time: Midnight, Dec. 28, 1968

The Place: Woodland, CA, USA  (aka..."The Twilight Zone")

The scene: A rural highway stop light, waiting for it to turn green in 
order to complete the final 100 miles returning to my parents' home 
following a several-hundred-mile jaunt to visit a college friend over 
Christmas break.  Driving a borrowed '66 Mustang.

Action: In the midst of heavy Central CA tule fog, while at the stop 
light, billowing steam begins coming from under the hood.

I turned at the traffic light and ended up on the main drag of 
Woodland.  There was only one gas station open, with one employee 
present.  He was an over-the-road trucker, taking a week or two off, 
during the holidays.

Being on the main drag, and being the only gas station open, cruisers 
were very visible in the street, making U-turns through the station, to 
head back up the street.  This of course, caused the gong to sound, each 
time a car passed over the pneumatic hoses laid-out to notify staff that 
a customer had pulled-in.

At that point in my life, the most I had ever done, auto-mechanics-wise 
was change the oil in a car, so I was no help in diagnosing or 
correcting the problem, which most of you recognize as a bad water pump.

The mechanic, being the only one on duty was having to divide his time 
between pumping gas and working on the Mustang...which seriously 
prolonged the experience.

By this time it was at least 1 am.  Fortunately, for me, the mechanic 
knew how to reach the parts manager for the local Ford dealership and 
called him.  He came down to the dealership, picked up the water pump 
and delivered it to us!

Within about another hour, I was on my way, marveling that a water pump 
was as readily available in this small town...in the middle of the night.