Chapter 26

If I'd thought I'd run myself ragged getting the old Bradford Speedway set up back in the spring, I didn't know what ragged was. The only thing that allowed me to get everything done was that I had a light driver's ed schedule that week and the other instructor, Bob Seeburger, agreed to take some more of the remaining load off of me. As it was, I had a heck of a lot to do, and a lot of it I wanted to keep quiet until I made the announcement of what was happening with the track. I decided I wanted to keep it quiet until I could present it the right way, but that didn't mean that I couldn't get some ground work done.

One of the first things I had to do was to talk with Art about taking back some of the lease of the alfalfa field. He was easy about it, which was a relief. I was glad I'd caught him when I did, because he had been getting set to plow it up and plant wheat in the next month or so. That would have made things a whole lot worse, if not downright impossible. The root structure of that alfalfa meant that we could have reasonable parking for the temporary track in the fall. I made a lot of phone calls, getting estimates and finding out who was available to do what.

The next evening, the four of us were again out in the alfalfa field, this time carrying things like stakes, hammers, string, and clip boards. We spent some time laying out the temporary track, where we were going to have to concentrate our effort if we weren't going to screw the rest of the season up too badly. We laid out a small track, a little closer to a fifth of a mile than a quarter, but it fit in the area we needed it to without having to be messed up by hills and gullies. We figured out where the bleachers and concession stand were going to have to go, and fences and access and other things.

Then, as the evening wore on, we headed up over the hill to get some measurements of the area that would be useful in planning the new track, which would include a track for karts in the infield, using the start/finish line of the main track. The karters had been good to me, and I'd promised them a paved track sometime in the future, and the future was going to be sooner than any of us had thought.

When Saturday rolled around it was hard to keep my mouth shut around the kart crowd about what was going to happen, but I managed it. At the driver's meeting, I stood up and said, "Tomorrow at one, I'm going to be making a big announcement about the track. Before you get all hot and bothered about it, while there's good news and bad news, it's mostly good news. I'd just as soon announce it all at once and not let the rumor mill get too heated up, so I'd appreciate it if you could be here at one, even if you don't stay for the races." Of course I had a lot of people ask me what it was all about, but I just had to put them off and tell them to be there the next day.

I hadn't yet told Frank about the change in plans, mostly because I wanted to tell him face to face. When he showed up, I got him in my old gray pickup truck and drove up to the farm, telling him about selling the track along the way. "Yeah," he said when I summed up what was riding on the sale. "A situation like that, you about had to do it, I don't blame you. You're saying you want to give me my money back?"

"Maybe not," I smiled. "I haven't told you the rest of the story, yet." I pulled into the alfalfa field, where the temporary track had been marked out. "I at least plan on finishing out the season. We've got some work to do and I'm planning on losing next weekend, but if everything goes right we should be set up here the weekend after that. It won't be as nice a facility as we have down there, but it ought to do for a few weeks."

"Yeah, we raced on worse," he agreed. "A lot worse. And you've got two weeks to build something. Hell, sometimes we raced at places that hadn't been thought of as race tracks two days ahead of time."

"Boy, is that ever true," I agreed. "But you haven't seen the best part yet." I drove on up over the hill, and came to a stop right in the middle of what we'd marked out as a grandstand area. "Now, think of us as being on the lower part of the stands," I said. "Turns one and two are over that way," I pointed to the right. "Turns three and four are off to our left someplace, we haven't worked out where yet, but wherever it takes to make a three-eighths mile paved oval out of it."

"Jeez, Mel," he smiled. "You're thinking big! That could be a heck of a track! You got anything else in mind?"

I explained about the kart track in the infield, and he thought it was a good idea, but added, "You had any thoughts about a road course? Dewey has been bitching about it again. Turns out one of the places they've been racing is going to close after this season."

"Yep," I said. "I thought about it. The pit area will be on top of that next hill and behind it. I figure we need a paved access road to the pits. There's no reason I can't have the pit road paved wide enough for the sporty car types to use."

"Mel," he shook his head. "You have a hell of a facility in mind here. Are you going to be able to pay for it all out of what you're making on the sale of the old track?"

"Probably not," I said. "But this is a little different. A few months ago I was poking my toe in the water hoping something was there. Now I know there is, and I figure I've got money enough to get a good start, even though I don't have any idea what it's all going to cost yet. I've only thrown this together in the past couple days, so I don't have anything like the estimates I showed you for the old track last spring. I figure we'll get the track and some of the stands in for next year, maybe some more of the paving, but put other improvements off until I start bringing in some money. If we do improvements a little at a time, we ought to have a pretty decent facility here in another few years."

"Or, you could have a more decent facility sooner with a little more money," he said, understanding me fully. "So, no idea how much it's going to cost?"

"Not really," I sighed. "I know some pieces but not the whole puzzle. However, I think I've at least got a notion of how bad the biggest pieces are going to be. This time, I'm not asking for a loan or a handout, Frank. The last one you gave me came back like the Biblical bread cast upon the waters, and sooner than I ever could have dreamed. I'm looking for an investor, although I don't even have an idea how we're going to set things up yet."

"All right," he smiled. "I'm in. Damn, this could be a nice facility."

"That's my plan," I said. "Dirt is fun, but dirt is dirty and hard on the spectators. I'm thinking this ought to be pretty neat by comparison."

"I think you'll make out," he said. "Look, first thing, get yourself a good lawyer to work out how you want to set the corporation up. They're expensive now but cheap in the long run when you do something like this. You may run into more problems that'll make you glad that you had a good mouthpiece on the line."

"Been talking to one already," I said. "A guy I know over in Hawthorne, who turns out to be a bit of a racing fan. We haven't got down to the details yet, because right now the most important thing is to get the temporary track going so I don't lose my racer supporters. This track is next year and right at the moment this year is more important."

"Yeah, I can see that," he said. "You're making the announcement on this today?"

"I about have to, I can't keep it under my hat much longer."

We drove back down to the old track – I was already thinking of it that way – and got down to business. People were showing up by then, unloading cars and getting them ready to race. Of course, the word had come down that I was making some kind of announcement, and everybody and their brother wanted to know what was coming off. "I can't just tell you a piece of the story, guys," I told everybody. "Like I told the karters yesterday, while there's some bad news it's mostly good news."

The bleachers were pretty full at one o'clock, when I got up to make the announcement. "All right, everybody," I said. "First, I want to praise everybody for their determination about trying to weasel what's happening out of me. I have heard some of the damndest excuses, but I think I've been able to keep everyone in suspense.

"Now, I told everybody that there was going to be bad news, but mostly good news. The bad news is that this is going to be the last day racing at this facility." There was a round of groans and general unhappy remarks. "Hey, it's not all bad," I went on. "You didn't hear the good news. The rest of the bad news is that we won't be racing next weekend. But, if everything goes halfway right, we'll be racing the weekend after that at the new track two miles up the road."

"Mel," someone yelled. "What brought this on?"

"I'm getting to that," I said. "Don't get ants in your pants. The simple thing is that someone came along with an offer and a reason to buy this place that's too good to refuse. I don't know if I should say this, but I will. I've agreed to sell this property to General Hardware Retailers, who have already bought up much of the surrounding land or have options on it. Within a month, they're going to be starting construction of a new regional distribution facility. I don't know much about it, except that it's going to be huge. It's supposed to bring about 200 to 300 jobs to start with, with more in the future. That means that there's good news in the bad news of the track being sold. At least it's being sold to good purpose."

"Mel!" Lloyd Weber yelled out. "Are you sure?"

"I could have show you the check I got, but it's already in the bank," I told him. "I've told everyone most of what I know about them. If you want an official statement, I've got a phone number you can call."

"Good God," Lloyd said. "This could be the biggest thing to ever come to Bradford."

"I knew that," I told him, and everyone else. "I just couldn't make myself stand in the way of something like that, track or no track. Anyway, the good-good news you've already heard a piece of. I'm going to be throwing together a temporary track on the alfalfa field east of my house. This isn't going to be a volunteer deal, and I'm going to need help. I'm going to ask any of my auto shop students and any other students who would like a summer job for a while to see me later today, and we'll get going tomorrow here at eight. We're going to salvage what we can from this place to get the new temporary track going. Now, I say temporary, because up over the hill from the temporary track there's some stakes driven that roughly mark out a new three-eighths mile oval track. That'll be a pavement track, and there'll be a paved kart track in the infield. I'm sorry, I can't show you much more than that because this has only come together in the past couple days. I'm hoping the paved track can be ready for the season opener next spring, but I can't guarantee it. But we'll have a place to race, no matter how it works out."