HITCHING A RIDE

By GLENN SMITH

“Driving out of Abilene the other day, I saw a man waving a hand-lettered sign. "NEED A RIDE SOUTH," it said. I was doing 70; I didn't stop. Neither did other cars.

Got me thinking. I had driven the road from Ballinger to Abilene and back 78 times in the past 100 days. This was the first hitchhiker I'd seen in that time. Very different from 50 years ago. I wondered how many members of the class of ‘57 had used their thumbs to get rides.

JAMES HAYS and I caught three rides to Guadalupe Mountain in December 1956 (Reunion Handbook). That was my first experience hitchhiking. Eight months later, in the summer of '57, I hitched from Abilene to near Fort Worth to visit NYDAH ELLET whose mother and stepfather had recently moved there. Took five hours and three rides on a Saturday.

Another weekend guest at NYDAH's mother's house agreed to my request for a ride to Ballinger as he was headed there the next morning. He and his wife were from Ballinger. He had a Taylorcraft, a two place, side by side, high wing airplane. As dawn was breaking, he and I bounced down a grass runway on the south side of Arlington. Trouble was he hadn't slept for a couple of days. A few feet off the ground, climbing nicely, his eyes closed. His head hung loose as he went fast asleep. At first I felt panic but, as his hand slipped from the control yoke to his lap, I touched the wheel in front of me and knew I could fly the plane. I hadn't been in a Taylorcraft before, but I had logged nearly ten hours of flying time in similar planes. I spotted the road to Brownwood, decided 1500 feet above the ground was a good altitude, and actually enjoyed the flight. This was before I got lost flying from Brownwood to Ballinger nine weeks later (for those who remember that account in a previous blog entry.)

An hour and a half after takeoff, Bruce Field appeared. I felt sure I could land the plane, was nearing the turn on final approach to the runway, when I decided I ought to try waking him. His eyes opened during the second vigorous shake. He reached for the control wheel, said "looks like we're here," rolled into a left turn and executed a perfect landing. He taxied, parked, shut the engine down. "Guess I had too many beers last night." I didn't think he wanted me to agree, so I kept quiet.

That Taylorcraft trip was the only hitching I did by air. It taught me that when begging free rides the unexpected is usual.

During 1957 to 1959, JERRY EOFF and I hitched our way from Ballinger to Abilene (we both went to Abilene Christian) and back to Ballinger a number of times. Sometimes we joined each other but often it was a solo effort. I don't recall his parents or mine encouraging our thumbing rides, but I also don't remember that they objected.

One day we caught a ride that dropped us off south of Abilene. We stood for about ten minutes before a shiny Ford sedan stopped almost beside us. Usually by the time a driver saw us at highway speed, and took a long enough look to decide we were okay to stop for, the vehicle would be 20 to 40 yards past where we stood. Then we'd run toward it, hoping the driver wouldn't race away showering us with gravel. That happened only once, but it made a strong impression.

The gleaming Ford was immaculate. We both sat on the bench front seat with me in the middle. As the driver accelerated, I noticed that the speedometer went from 0 to 140. "Will it go that fast," I naively asked. "Don't know," he replied. "Picked it up from the dealer a few minutes ago." His foot went to the floorboard. "Let's see. It has the biggest engine Ford makes."

As the speedometer needle passed 126, the right front tire blew. Of course we didn't have seat belts fastened. The driver stayed cool, braked fairly gently and hauled it to a stop on the right edge of the pavement. We climbed out. He grabbed the jack, said we need not help, loosened lug nuts, bolted the spare on, threw the shredded wheel into the trunk, and took us out to the college. We waved and he waved as he rolled on toward were he was headed. We didn't ask. He didn't say. Probably going to see a cute woman I thought.

It was a felt rule, not written anywhere, that it wasn't polite to ask questions. The driver could ask. Others in the car could ask. The one seeking a ride should answer differentially and put up with whatever smells, noises, idiosyncrasies, and silences happened to be present.

I had fantasies of being picked up by a beautiful girl driving a fast car. It never happened. All the drivers from whom I got a lift turned out to be male. Just as well. I was too shy to know what to say to a glamorous woman anyway.

I never had any really bad experiences while hitchhiking, but there were two occasions that put me off. In 1959, late on a Friday, I was headed to Ballinger. I waited endlessly for someone to stop. Hardly anyone was on the road. Finally the worst looking auto I've ever seen outside a junk yard clanked and jangled and smoked its way to a stop. It had plenty of rust, a shredded rag top, torn seat covers--the old grey felt kind with springs sticking through--and four occupants dressed in rags. I failed to understand what the man driving or his spouse said to me, but I climbed into the back seat with two screaming kids. Took two and a half hours to get to Ballinger. Each of the four seemed to speak a different tongue from the others. In compensation for their seeming not to comprehend each other, they yelled nonstop. I swore I'd give up hitchhiking but two nights’ sleep and classes waiting to be finished at ACC had me back on the road the following Sunday afternoon. A pleasant man in a pickup took me the whole way.

The other off-putting experience happened in Patzcuaro, Mexico about fifteen years ago. I was there with my wife and her sister, both born Mexico. We needed a ride to the airport in Morelia an hour away. Cab drivers were on strike. On the town plaza, my sister-in-law talked to a group of men who had a truck and asked them to take us to the airport. I found myself feeling thoroughly uneasy. I kept thinking--you may find this odd but it is what I was thinking--"if only there could be an angel to show us what to do." Across the plaza, maybe 300 yards away, a woman walked rapidly toward me. "The men you see there," she said looking at the guys my sister-in-law had talked with, are known to be thieves. You must avoid them!" (She worked at a local cultural institute that owned a small bus which she offered.) She told the men they would not be needed for the airport trip. I thanked her, asked her name. "Angelica," she replied.

I have no idea, except for JERRY and JAMES, whether others in the class of '57 resorted to thumbing rides. I've picked up hitchhikers off and on across the years, but I didn't stop for the man headed south the other day. Something intuitive gets my foot on the brake--or not. I don't argue with that.”...GLENN

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EDITOR'S NOTE: I was never in a position to hitchhike when I was young, but I remember during World War II that every trip anyone in our family made to California or Missouri, no matter how crowded our car was (with gas rationing, you took as many folks as needed a ride) we always picked up any service man who was hitchhiking. Often they would drive while others slept. As a small child, I spent many a mile trying to sleep with my head on the hump in the back floorboard.

I also heard my mother tell how her mother hitchhiked home to Missouri taking my mother and her younger brother with her during the Depression.

And we think times are tough now!

Marilyn