The Car

Memories of vacations past

Barbara Rose Rust is a Cape Girardeau native writing vignettes about her childhood for her children and grandchildren, considering her growing up was very different from theirs. Extended by popular demand, this is the fifth in a five-part series in which she shares these anecdotes with TBY readers, too.

A 1936 Ford Sedan provided transportation for our family of four. It was black and named Old Betsy. Betsy spent a lot of time at home in the garage because walking to work, school or the grocery store was the general means of transportation. Betsy would go to church and night meetings and provide transportation in cold or inclement weather, but otherwise, she remained parked in the small garage. The family generally used foot power for transportation.

With the exception of a family trip, she didn’t put on many miles in a given year. Betsy was so sturdy and well taken care of that she served the family quite well until after WWII when she was replaced by a light blue Ford station wagon. Blue was the favorite color of the Rose family inside the house, on clothing and for cars. Strange it wasn’t rose.

There were several reasons the car was not used frequently. In the first place, in 1936, the effects of the Depression were still in place. There just wasn’t a lot of extra money to spend. With a new house, two children and student loans from the University of Wisconsin to pay off, money was tight. These were frugal times. Also, WWII was looming on the horizon, and things had to last. Cars, tires, gasoline and many other things would be rationed, and parts were almost impossible to get since car manufacturers were re-tooling for the war effort. Besides, everyone walked or rode the bus for a nickel. It was what most people did because almost everything was within a mile or so of 383 North Park. Why get the car out for that distance?

When the car was used for vacation, the interior was revamped to accommodate the girls in the back seat. Dad made a platform to cover the leg space in the back seat and padded it with some old quilts. This created a wide, sturdy play and sleeping area for us. Extra storage space was provided beneath the platform for odds and ends, including the child-sized toilet seat carried in a tapestry bag with wooden handles. This was a necessary piece of equipment as there were no rest stops for the “necessaries” while traveling but only gas stations that provided restrooms, and they were often foul. There were no separate bathrooms for men and women. The toilet facilities were generally dirty and stinky. The child-sized portable potty seat fit over the existing toilet seat on four little rubber legs, keeping us out of the “yuck.” There always was a roll of toilet paper stashed in the bottom of the tapestry bag — just in case. It was used more often than not.

Gas stations were chosen as much by the look of the place because the price of gas was about the same at every station. If it looked well-maintained, neat and tidy with paint and surroundings in order, it became a candidate for a fill-up. Mother would compliment the owner if the restroom was nice. If it wasn’t, Dad would ask him, “Do you know how filthy your restroom is? Would you want your children to use it?” Unfortunately, the compliments were few and far between.

Our family traveled with a cooler of breakfast and lunch “fixins.” Breakfast was cold cereal, juice and fruit in the motel room, and lunch was on the roadside. It was expensive to eat out — almost $5 for four people — and restaurants could be iffy (but not as iffy as service stations). The family always ate out for dinner, following the recommendations of the AAA book for eating places, which they also followed for choosing overnight accommodations.

Dad had already studied the historical places we would see along the way and would regale us with stories. This not only made the time pass faster but gave us an education both in geography and history in a painless manner. However, it didn’t stop the question, “Are we there yet?”

One of the more memorable trips was a long one, all the way from Cape Girardeau to Estes Park, Colorado. In 1944, cars were not air conditioned and neither were the AAA “tourist courts.” Motels hadn’t been invented yet. There were hotels, but usually they were off the interstate (which was only two lanes) and in the middle of a town. A tourist court was usually on the outskirts of town and consisted of individual cottages for overnight stays. These tourist courts were freestanding little houses that consisted of one room with a double bed and a bathroom. They were about the size of the average bedroom and had a bathroom connected. My parents slept in the double bed, and my sister and I slept in a roll-a-way. A roll-a-way bed was much smaller than you find in today’s motels. It was more the dimensions of a cot, and sometimes, it was a cot. However, kids can sleep anywhere on anything, I have found.

Old Betsy the 1936 Ford was entering her retirement years. Apparently, she had a tendency to overheat. (Maybe she was going through menopause; after all, she was entering the last years of her faithful service to the Rose family.) The drive through Kansas in August was as dull then as it is today and just as hot. A canvas bag filled with water hung off the hood in front of the car radiator. The evaporation, as we sped along through the dry Kansas climate, cooled the water in the bag and perhaps the radiator. When the temperature gauge in the car would climb, Dad would get out and pour some of the water from the bag into the radiator. This would necessitate a lengthy stop because removing the radiator cap too soon could result in getting burned by the steam pouring out of the vent. However, it had a plus side: we could run around and play, letting off our “steam” so we would (hopefully) take a nap when the trip resumed. Naps were more for the sanity of our parents than anything else. When asleep, we could not ask every five minutes in a whiney voice, “How much farther do we have to go? I’m tired of riding.”

In August, we always went someplace for two weeks. Generally, our trips were to see something historical. Occasionally, we would go to Florida just for beach fun. My sister and I followed our route on a map, and as we approached the border of Florida, the questions would start. “How much longer till we cross into Florida?” “Do they still have the orange juice stands?” “Can we please, please, please stop at Stuckey’s?”

Crossing the Florida border meant stopping at the Florida Visitors Center or at Stuckey’s. At either place, we could get a cup of fresh-squeezed orange juice — for free! (And they didn’t mind if you asked for seconds, either.) At either place, you could count on clean restroom facilities; however, the farther south we went, the worse the public restrooms were, and if it wasn’t listed in the AAA book, forget it. One of the worst places I remember was an AAA-rated motel infested with cockroaches. We did not see them checking in. They did not appear until the lights were out. Cockroaches then and now are a “southern” problem, and that night, I was miserable with the thought of one crawling on me. The cockroaches were big and made a scurrying sound on the ceiling. Kids will sleep through anything, though. Even years later when my parents talked about “that place,” it would make me shudder.