Our Trip to the 41st Annual Texas Tour

By Ken Bounds

After thinking about driving to the Texas Tour for several years, Carolyn and I decided to make it happen this year.  These folks have been doing this for over 40 years, so they must have something figured out, right?  The Texas Tour is a bit difficult for us because it is over 1,000 miles away and many years the weather is not even good enough at home to get an Early V-8 out that early in the year.

We intended this story to be about our 1,250-mile drive to Kerrville and our experiences on our inaugural Texas Tour.  Instead it has become all about the kindness and compassion of some incredible V-8 friends.

The story starts out innocently enough.  We had asked Stacey Brown’s daughter, Melissa to re-create for us some beautiful stained glass pieces she had made for the 2012 Central National Meet in Branson so we could raffle them at our group’s National Meet this summer.  She did so and took them to Bobby York so he could give them to us in Kerrville.  Sadly, days before the Tour Bobby was confronted with a medical emergency – a detached retina would cause him to miss the Tour for the first time.  But being the considerate person that he is, Bobby unselfishly thought of us and arranged for Jerry & Linda Kimbrell to pick up the stained glass items and deliver them to us in Kerrville.  For this, we are very grateful to Bobby, Jerry, and Linda.

We left for the Texas Tour on Wednesday, April 2.  The ‘50 Convertible was running great and we had a lot to talk about in preparing for the Central Meet, so we just kept driving.  We made it all the way to Wichita Falls, Texas, before we stopped for the night - 970 miles on the odometer.  On Thursday we arrived at our destination, Kerrville, Texas.  In addition to all the fun at the Tour, we spent a lot of time at the registration desk, handing out information about the Central Meet and selling 1939 World’s Fair commemorative gearshift knobs and raffle tickets.  Jimmy Gibson became our star salesman.

At the Texas Tour, everyone made us feel welcome.  We are fortunate to have so many V-8 friends in Texas and enjoyed a weekend of fellowship.  But even more acts of kindness were to come.  Coincidentally, at the Saturday Banquet, Carolyn and I sat next to Jimmy & Connie Gibson.  Jimmy wished us good luck on our drive home and said “If you have any problems, you call me.”

We left Kerrville early the morning of April 6.  Jimmy had warned us to watch for deer; it was a valid warning because we saw about 3 dozen.  Seriously.  We dodged all the deer, but we couldn’t dodge trouble.  About 200 miles into our trip, we had a fender-bender in the rain in Cisco, Texas.  There was fairly serious damage to the right front and the fender was bent against the tire.  Our car was not drivable.  As we worked through the options of what to do, I remembered Jimmy’s words from the night before, so we gave him a call.

We reached Jimmy and Connie on the road home near Comanche, about 45 miles from our location.  Jimmy said “Stay right where you are, I’m on my way.”  When they arrived, Jimmy already had two plans of action.  If the car was not drivable, we would get it towed to Bill Smith’s in Abilene and talk to Ken Lewis about getting it repaired.  If we could make it drivable, we could either continue on home or drive to Jimmy’s house and see about getting it repaired there.

In the pouring rain, Jimmy crawled under his Mercury to attach a tow strap.  We were able to pull the bent bumper out of the way.  A Good Samaritan happened to stop by with a truck full of metal.  He used a long bar and with a good deal of muscle power, was able to pry the fender off the tire.  I took the car for a little spin and determined it was drivable.  We decided not to drive home with a missing headlight and to follow Jimmy and Connie to Richardson.

At our first gas stop, Jimmy jumped out of the Merc and said “I got you a fender!”  Jimmy had been working the phone and tracked down a right-front ‘50 Ford fender from none other than Bobby York.  Jimmy said that he also had a place in Richardson that would fix the car.  Wow.

We continued on to Richarson and squeezed the convertible into the garage next to Alice Culhane’s T-Bird.  We didn’t scratch it Alice!  Now we had to determine what we really needed to get out of the car to take home.  All this was loaded into the Mercury and we were off to Blue Ridge.  But not before a stop for dinner at Furr’s.  I encountered Jimmy’s wrath when I attempted to pay for the meal.  “You know the rules!” Jimmy insisted.  We were his guests and our money was no good.

Arriving at the Gibson home in Blue Ridge, we transferred our belongings from the Merc into our “loaner” car – Jimmy and Connie’s 2002 Thunderbird!  They insisted that we drive it home, which we did.  However, they also encouraged us to spend the night with them and leave in the morning.  Since Carolyn had that “work thing” Tuesday, we politely declined and hit the road following a route carefully explained to us by Connie.

Let me tell you, we were nervous driving Jimmy’s classic in the rain.  We made it to Joplin that night and arrived safely home Monday afternoon.  The T-Bird has been locked in our garage ever since.  We intend to tell Jimmy that we have driven it to dozens of events, but that would not be true.

On Tuesday, Jimmy promptly delivered our convertible to John Mosty.  Unfortunately, John found more hidden damage than he could repair so he transferred the car next door to Premier Auto Sports.  We have heard good things about them.  Connie has stayed in touch with us and has sent some pictures of the progress on the car.  No, it is still not finished.

Our adventure is not quite over, but well under control.  We are grateful to have such wonderful friends in the V-8 Club.  We are sure that those of you who are fortunate enough to interact with Jimmy and Connie much more often than we do already know what we have learned about them.  They truly embody the V-8 Spirit.  Without the support of Jimmy and Connie, we would have been lost.  We didn’t know what to do, how to get home, how to approach getting the car repaired.  We are so happy that they were there when we needed them.