The Retired Rambler: Pioneer Days Shows The Power of Faith

The Pioneer Days Parade is Ogden's chance to strut its stuff, and Union Station is a regular.

Why not? The Browning Kimball Car Museum has some of the coolest wheels on the planet, vintage "Made in the USA" cars that gleam and glint and sometimes even run pretty well. They are 70-plus years old, after all. Yes, when new, they were rated at 95 mph, but after a while the expectations have come down a bit.

How far down? If we all made it back to Union Station we'd consider the day a success.

So there we were, cruising the 'Vard in a way cool '31 Lincoln, waving to the crowd, kicking it in the sun. This car is amazing. Originally owned by the Dole Pineapple family in Hawaii, it was brought to the continental US, bought by the Browning family and, when they took their car collection elsewhere, donated to Ogden for permanent display at Union Station.

Theresa Grace, one of the volunteers, said this Lincoln has never broken down during a parade. She and Adrienne Zubiller got in the rumble seat. I got in with Steve Davies, who was driving. He turned the key, pulled out the ignition, pushed the starter button and away we went.

It was way cool. Take this thing cruising on a Saturday night, you are guaranteed to attract all the attention available. Things were going great. Steve was telling parade viewers to "EAT MORE PINEAPPLE!" and "VISIT UNION STATION!" I was smiling and practicing my parade wave (who invented that stunted wimpy little thing?) and good times were had by all.

Unfortunately, somewhere around 27th Street, the engine quit.

Steve Davies

Steve tried the starter, pulled the choke, pondered the wheel. Auto guru Steve Sherwood came over, fussed and pushed, finally got it going but 10 seconds later it quit again.

The other cars drove off, there we sat. One of them did have a tow strap, but it was way far ahead.

So, what? Call AAA?

Then a massive troop of LDS Missionaries came by. "Need a push?" several said. Steve was worried about damaging the car, but Theresa said it's made out of tougher stuff than cars today are, so four of them got behind.

Morgan Cowboy royalty lead the way

And that's how we finished the parade. Those guys pushed us all the way to 20th Street where the parade thinned and a parking lot at a title loan place beckoned.

Phone calls were made, Steve came back in a more modern vehicle, checked, decided we'd run out of gasoline and went off for more. The cars were supposed to have fuel, he said, but these things only got 6 to 8 mpg when they were new, cruising now in lower gears really eats up the fuel, and this one had just run out a bit too soon.

Two and a half gallons later, off we went home.

"I will say this," Theresa said. "We were the most well-seen car in the parade."

Pushed by missionaries? It was a great display of the power of faith.