Some folks like these stories, so here is a continuation, probably the last.
High School partner in trouble one summer acquired some 21,000 cherry bombs and M-80s for an (illegal) fireworks stand. He was able to sell most, but retained a good supply. We spent the next year disposing of them in inappropriate ways.
The local
town speed limit was 25 mph with a two mile long main drag. We found that a
cherry bomb lit by a cigarette lighter would explode when we were two blocks
away if we adhered to the speed limit. This made for many interesting
scenarios, usually with the town police behind us and a group of teens on the
sidewalk. Often, we would offer up a surprise for cars following us.
There was a
custom in the town of young couples parking outside the girl’s house for long
periods. Guess that kept the parents at least somewhat mollified. Using wrist
rockets, we would lob a cherry bomb under their car.
When things
got too hot in our hometown, we would move our act to one of the adjacent towns
for a few evenings.
It didn’t
take too long for the local officers to refine their suspicions, but they never
caught us. We seldom had more than three of four cherry bombs in our immediate
possession. We didn’t have others riding with us. Most important, we kept our
mouths shut. No boasting, always denying, not trying to make a name for
ourselves. We let the gossipers do our work for us. We always let the police
check our cars as there was nothing in them (again, three or four cherry bombs
at a time).
Careful
target selection helped. We restricted our targets to our own age group, at
least in our town. Since nearly every adult was armed with a least a rifle, we
felt bothering the adults was too dangerous. Also, the hue and cry might
intensify to the point the authorities would “do something”. Along that line of
reasoning, we restricted our activities to one or two nights a week. In fact, we enjoyed the planning almost as
much as the execution. Of course, we didn’t restrict our troublemaking to just
this one activity. Every watch a skier trying to remove tar from their skis?
I’ve written before about our garbage can campaign and how that caused a flood
during spring runoff. Do you know when the temperature is in the -20 degree
range, water poured around car tires freezes rapidly? The ice stuck on the
tires makes a startling sound when the vehicle drives off (if the vehicle will
move at all). Since few people bothered to lock their cars, we didn’t bother
spraying water into door locks.
What we did
was mild compared to a couple of cousins in Wyoming. They created scenarios
with a mannequin, usually some form of a traffic accident, and macabre “rescues”.
We couldn’t find a mannequin.
We didn’t
always elude the authorities. One night my partner forded a stream in his Jeep.
We had failed to engage the Warn hubs and bogged down mid stream. As we lay on
the hood reaching into the freezing water to lock the hubs, the kindly officers
on each bank shined their spotlights on the front wheels to assist us.
Three girls
in our class were far worse offenders than us. Very clever, and with spotless
reputations, they would pull stunts in ways blame would fall on the town boys. After all, the
class valedictorian, a teacher’s daughter, and Miss Nicest Girl would never do
anything like that. Ha!
My sister,
several years younger, often needed to point out, “I am NOT my brother”, in
later years.
Our most serious prank involved tying the fuses of several cherry bombs to a slow burning fuse, then putting them in the school duct work. The thirty minute fuse turned out to be a twenty minute fuse, and we were as startled as any of the other students. Many years accumulation of dust was stirred up and came pouring out the various heat registers. The school officials were “suspicious” but we were only two out of about ten students “interviewed”.
Occasionally we were the target of pranks. I carried extra coil wires and rotors in a box in my trunk along with my hubcaps. Useless to have hubcaps as weekly someone would put rocks in them. Finding discrete parking places for makeout sessions required extremely careful consideration. Among our peers, ambushing couples necking was quite popular. For inquiring minds, only once, and it was very embarrassing.
In later
years, my sister’s first car was a BMW Isetta. For those not familiar with one,
it is a basic box with four wheels and a motorcycle engine. The entire front of
the car swings open for entry. Light enough for high school boys to pick up and
set on top of a snow bank, which they did.
The one
thing we never did, and never would do, was damage anything with a firearm. We
had, and still have, nothing but contempt for yahoos who drive around shooting
road signs.
We weren't the first small town punks in that town, and most certainly not
the last, to include several members of winter Olympic teams. I do believe
we set a fairly high bar. No doubt folks in that town were happy to see the backs of us after graduation.
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