There are very few personal possessions as treasured and loved as one’s vehicle. Whether it be a brand new Porsche you just had delivered to your from California, a classic Model A Ford you purchased on line from a Michigan antique automobile dealer, a souped up Corvette you worked on yourself, or even a beat up rusty old pick up truck that has an enormous amount of sentimental value, a vehicle can be like part of the family.
Many people have heard stories about an owner’s dog saving his life by pulling him out of a burning house, or an owner’s horse saving his life by carrying him home after a serious injury. However, there are also many stories about an owner’s car saving his life that not to many people hear about. One such story is as follows:
Brian Michael James was your typical sixteen year old teenager. He was into sports, girls and cars, and just happened to have been given a classic 1965 Ford Mustang when he completed his driver education class and received his first ever California state driver’s license. The Mustang was Brian’s baby and he spent more time with that car then he did with his own friends or family.
When Brian would get depressed he would climb into his baby, which is what Brian referred to his Mustang as, and go for a slow drive through the mountains. When he would get excited, he would take off in his baby and drive quite a bit faster then he should along the main drag in town. When he was bored and wanted something to do, Brian would go outside and wash his baby, dry his baby and wax his baby.
One day Brian was a bit excited and upset all at the same time. He had failed his college prep algebra class and learned that his father was going to take away his auto privileges for one full month. Brian decided he simply couldn’t let that happen and foolishly jumped in his Mustang and took off on a cross country trip to his Grandmother’s farm in Maine.
Brian and his baby had quite a time speeding through California and past the Joshua Tree National Park, through Arizona and sunny Phoenix, through the sparsely populated towns in New Mexico and Texas, through the seemingly chilly states of Arkansas, Tennessee and Kentucky, past the Appalachian mountains of West Virginia and Pennsylvania, into cold as can be Upstate New York, past Mount Washington in beautiful Vermont, on into Maine, where his dear Grandmother lived on a farm in Houlton, near the border to New Brunswick, Canada. However, as Brian sped past Mount Katahdin he lost control of the wheel while about a quarter mile from the train tracks. He looked wildly to his left and saw that a train was indeed coming and as he pumped his breaks he realized that they were not working. Brian punched the gas and prayed that he would make it over the tracks before the train smashed into him.
In just about any other automobile, especially the old station wagon his mother wanted him to drive when he received his license or the old pick up truck his uncle jack had offered him when he completed drivers training, Brian would undoubtedly have been hit by the oncoming train, however in this 1965 Mustang he sped across the tracks to safety, whereby he slid across the road and hit a telephone pole.
The 1965 Mustang, Brian’s baby was badly damaged, but miraculously Brian had barely a scratch on him. Not only had his baby saved his life once by being fast enough to clear the tracks but it had saved his life a second time by being made of metal and sheltering him from the impact of the telephone pole.
Brian called his Grandmother, mother and father and told them all what happened. His mother wanted him to fly home immediately and to forget about the car, however Brian pleaded for his baby to be shipped back to California where it could be fixed. Brian’s father, who owned one of the top auto shipping companies in Central California understood how Brian felt and immediately called one of his best auto shippers in CA and told him, “Pete, get your gloves and earmuffs buddy, you’re going to Maine. You’re my best auto shipper in California and I need you to pick up my boy’s Mustang and bring it back here to California; that car saved my boy’s life twice today!”
Today Brian can be found driving his restored 1965 Mustang around central California and today Brian’s baby even transports Brian’s baby girl Melanie back and forth to preschool, and occasionally to his Grandmother’s farm in Maine … slowly of course.
