August 4: A cop story

A cold January night back in 1973. Just passed thru Colebrook, New Hampshire. A glance in my rearview and my heart sinks. I had been making great time cruising thru southern New Brunswick, into Maine and now crossing New Hampshire, just a half mile or so from the Vermont border. This Friday night in the dead of winter had found the roads to be clear and fast, at least for this young buck from Saint John, New Brunswick. Headed to Montreal for the weekend to show big brother my hot new car. Pushing the speed limit was easy in my high powered ride. Just a couple of hours from pulling into my bro's suburban driveway. Now those lights.......

A statie was behind me. Should I gas it and cross the border into Vermont? Would he follow? Am I an idiot? The answer being no to all of these, I pull over and take my medecine. Jail time or a fine?

Maybe I'd be given a ticket and told to mail in my fine? Sure thing, Barry. And maybe those fun loving state police would give me a high speed escort to the Canadian border. The live free or die folks of this White Mountain state were not about to do either of those things and never see or hear from this Canadian ever again. Not a chance. I had to follow the cruiser back into Colebrook and into the town hall parking lot.

Out of our cars and into the police station in the building's basement (this was a very small town). Here's the deal........they would set a court date and I could come back and argue my case (if I had one). But, and here is the big "but", I would have to post bail, which was probably the same price as the ticket. The process? Call the local judge (he was at a party) and wait for him to arrive, hopefully in a good mood. While waiting, the cop gave me the classic line....."If this had happened last year, you'd have trouble breathing about now." Good God, they used to hang speeders? Not so dramatic, there had been lots of rain and the basement had been flooded. Whew!

True story with one change, the model depicting my driver was not the car I had at that time, but another model the Car Modeling Cat and I have just finished, a '67 Dodge Coronet R/T. Want to see a real one?

 I'd humbly say, the CMC and I did a pretty good job of replicating this Hemi car in 1/25th scale. But as always, that is just our opinion (and a good one).

And of course, the bit player in this scenario, is the New Hampshire state police car, also faithfully replicated. Here is a newer version of that high powered state patroller, who lit me up just before the Vermont border and you can see it is also a good representation of that dreaded sight in the rearview.......

What a cat! Always working alongside me to make our scale cars, me bringing back my youth, her just enjoying herself, as she takes on another challenge. A challenge, you say? Just try to make a model when you have paws.......

There's a bit more to our New Hampshire story and probably the best part. Ask me next time we meet.

Until next time.......