In this collection of 46 essays, many of which were previously published in Old Cars Weekly and Goodguys Gazette, Drake examines a boy's desire to be mobile. He takes the two great themes of the 20th Century, motion and competition, motivation of the great builders of the Industrial Age, and brings it to a personal level. These essays, some memoir, some lyrical, start with the chemicals that imprinted brains -- gasoline, hydraulic brake fluid, exhaust -- and caused young men to wrap their lives around machines as surely as any drug. Next comes the Wheel: the baby carriage, the scooter, the...
In this collection of 46 essays, many of which were previously published in Old Cars Weekly and Goodguys Gazette, Drake examines a boy's desire to be ...
"One Summer" is a semi-autobiographical novel that evokes the sights, sounds and smells of small-town Lents through the eyes of an adolescent boy growing up on the edge of 1940's Portland, Oregon. Drawing from personal experience, as well as historical events of Portland, Drake weaves the story of a teen reaching adulthood in the summer of 1948 that is simultaneously nostalgic and honest. Chris and his friends read Real Clue and Detective Comics at the Mt Scott drugstore, hang out at the movies at a time when John Garfield was starring in "They Made Me A Criminal," and listen to "I Love A...
"One Summer" is a semi-autobiographical novel that evokes the sights, sounds and smells of small-town Lents through the eyes of an adolescent boy grow...
Mill Sederstrom steps into a time warp when he returns from college to the small house where he grew up. But the world has changed, and Mill learns that one can't go home again-- not easily, nor completely anyway. Family pressures mount as his parents urge him to find the Big Job. He meets his younger brother, Tonto, and his gang--the "pavement dancers," a lethal group. A woman takes him to a roadhouse called "The Place," but it is not his place, the gangster who owns it tells him. The tension between brothers grows when Mill becomes involved with Tonto's girl friend. The uncomplicated life...
Mill Sederstrom steps into a time warp when he returns from college to the small house where he grew up. But the world has changed, and Mill learns th...
"They drove in silence, the shadows already beginning to flatten, and soon the knife disappeared; the Indian sat back and sighed deeply, as if he was exhausted by simply driving. Chris suddenly found himself less worried about their being found murdered beside the road, and more concerned about the rumbling in his stomach. He dreamed of home, the cool shade of his back yard where he could be right now eating peanut butter sandwiches and reading comic books. When he left home, he had thought he would be right back, and how it looked as though he would be in Celilo tonight, hungry, fighting the...
"They drove in silence, the shadows already beginning to flatten, and soon the knife disappeared; the Indian sat back and sighed deeply, as if he was ...
First-hand accounts of riding & racing motorcycles in the 1950s. "Sometimes, on certain mornings in early fall, when there is a light fog and the air holds a hint of moisture, I can recall so clearly the sound of a single's exhaust." Thus begins this journey into memory, back to a time that has to be called the Golden Age of Motorcycles. British bikes--BSA, Triumph, AJS, Matchless, Norton, Velocette--had invaded roads and race tracks previously dominated by Harley-Davidson and Indian. In the open land surrounding cities bikers were blazing trails, making Hare and Hound courses. If there was a...
First-hand accounts of riding & racing motorcycles in the 1950s. "Sometimes, on certain mornings in early fall, when there is a light fog and the air ...