The My Uncle Norm’s Car Story

                                                    The My Uncle Norm’s Car Story 1958 A true story about my fixing Uncle Normans car Written 2011 and rewritten 05/11/2016 Re-written 1/2019 Howard Yasgar In 1957, I was eighteen 18 years old, living in Westville Connecticut, Westville was a suburb of New Haven, Connecticut. Every afternoon after school, I was working part time at a Gulf gas station that was on the corner of Whalley Avenue and Emerson Street. The Gulf gas station I was working at, was a typical, two bay station that was owned by the Gulf Oil Co, the Oil Company then leased the gas station to a local manager. A gas stations main business besides from selling gas, was greasing cars, changing oil, fixing flat tires, and doing other minor mechanical things. Since I had always wanted to learn to be a mechanic, I enjoyed doing all these different things. Unfortunately, even with doing these things, it never added up to making any real money for the station manager. That meant whoever was leasing the Gulf gas station at the time was always trying to make a extra dollar any way they could, but they had to do it without the Gulf Oil representative catching them doing it. So after I had been working at the station for several years, I watched as the different managers tried every trick in the book to make some extra money. Because you couldn’t make any money just selling gas, I saw that Gulf gas station change hands two times. Both of the managers being local New Haven guys. One was a short thin fellow named Tony, he was a former Korean War vet. Then there was Scotty, he was a fellow that looked like a typical Italian movie mobster. The constant changing of managers didn’t seem 0to bother the Gulf Oil Co, as they always seemed to find another unskilled New Haven guy to take their place. As for me, working for these different managers was a good learning experience, as watching them taught me a lot of things that I shouldn’t do in the future. The second manager at that Gulf station was Scotty. As a boss, Scotty was a pretty nice guy, and he always treated me pretty good, which was surprising because he uttered plenty of harsh words towards others. Scotty was a good guy, however I found that his business ethics were far from desirable, also every afternoon Scotty would disappear for a couple of hours, and he would return smelling like beer. One day, Scotty told me he wasn’t making any money with the gas station. He said too many of the local neighborhood customers came in and bought their gasoline on credit, and since there were no credit cards back then, many of them never came back to pay their gas bill. So Scotty told me to write each deadbeats name in big letters on the front window of the gas station, using white car polish. Then Scotty instructed me to put next to the name how much money they owed him. Scotty then walked way out to the curb in front of the station to look at it. I had written about ten names big enough for anyone passing by to see. I don’t think Scotty collected any of the money, but he was still was very pleased, he said, that as far as those ten customers were concerned, they could never drive by his gas station, as their name and how much they owed was on our front window. One day, Scotty told me that he was not going to renew the lease with Gulf Oil Company, he had enough. He said he was looking to move into a small, no brand gas station that was available for rent at the end of Legion Avenue in New Haven. I knew exactly the place he was talking about, it was a tiny gas station with two gas pumps, and it had a small office big enough for one desk, and a single inside bathroom. Also the tiny gas station only had one bay with a car lift in it. I knew why Scotty took over the place. It was because the rent was cheap and he lived right near there. Also with the station only having two gas pumps, that meant Scotty had little in the way of work to do, so when I came to work every afternoon, Scotty could take off. I knew that he was visiting his friends at the local tavern. When Scotty came back he would sit at the desk with his feet up and tell me how his wife was going to yell at him when he came home drunk. Once I asked him why he didn’t just sober up before going home. Scotty replied, “My father taught me, why build a fire if you are going to put it out.” One afternoon, while Scotty was out with his buddies drinking, I heard a loud grinding noise outside the gas station office. It was a noise that I was somewhat familiar with, it was the noise a car made when its front wheel bearing was burned out. I looked out the office window, and I saw it was my Uncle Norman. He was driving a 1949 Chevrolet, and he was pulling right into Scotty’s little gas station. I already knew from listening to the terrible noise his car was making that a front wheel bearing on his car was burned out. Now my Uncle Norman was about as nice a mild mannered guy as you would ever meet. He was married to my mom’s younger sister Lillian. So I went out to say hello to my uncle as he got out of his car. I saw that my uncle Norman had a broad smile on his face, and he said, “It sounds like something in front of my car is making a noise.” Yes, I replied, it sounds like your right front wheel bearing is burned out. “Can you fix it?” Norman asked,. Sure, I said, I was very anxious to show my uncle Norman that at 18 years old I was a good mechanic, and besides that, I knew that fixing a wheel bearing was not too difficult, but that depended on how much damage had already been done to the car’s spindle. So I put a rolling jack under the right front wheel, and I lifted the car, then took off the hub cap and with a hammer. Once I removed the tire, wheel and brake drum it exposed the burned out ball bearings that were making the loud noise. Once I did this, all the burned out little steel balls from the ball bearings fell out and on to the pavement. I could see the balls from the bearings were already so burned out that they were blue in color with some already starting to melt from the heat. Then I saw that not only were the bearings burned out, but they had also worn out the car’s front spindle. It appeared to me that my Uncle Norman had been driving around and not paying attention to the noise of the bearings grinding up the spindle. I told Norman that just replacing the bearings would not fix his problem, the car’s front wheel spindle was worn out and needed to be replaced. Norman was looking over my shoulder, as I spoke, he could clearly see that everything was worn out, and that what I was telling him was true. I told uncle Norman he needed a new spindle and new inner and outer ball bearings, to fix the car. “And how much will that cost?” Norm asked me in a very negative tone of voice. I said, well, we can buy a used spindle from a junk yard for about thirty five dollars, and I can install it on your car for free as long as Scotty didn’t come back and catch us doing it. I could see my Uncle Norman was pondering the situation in his mind. Then he said, “Can you put it all back together, I am going to wait before fixing it.” When I heard that, I had to stop and gather my thoughts, what my uncle was asking me to do, was almost an impossible task, as all the burned out balls from the bearings were already laying everywhere on the pavement. Norm, I said, I don’t think I can put it back together, as all the bearings are broken and burned out. Norman’s reply to me was now very stern, he said “I drove in here before you touched it, didn’t I”. So I went into the station and got a hand full of thick lubricating grease and a couple of wiper rags, then picked up each individual burned out ball from the ground, and wiped the dirt off, then I used the thick grease to hold the ball bearings on the spindle, and I carefully replaced the brake drum and tire. Without saying another word to me Uncle Norman backed out of the gas station and went on his way. I never asked Uncle Norman how far he got, before the bearing fell apart again, and he never said anything to me about it ever.