The History of & The Inspiration for The GetWell GrasssRoots Victory Wagon
On the preceeding page," I share with you the story of "The Victory Wagon Vision" I was given back in 1976 and how it materialized in 1990 and came to be painted October of '92. Keep in mind, Dear GetWellHFriends, I have managed all of this since 1986 with a bank balance average of seldom more than $1,000, virtually single-handedly, with no steady employees until 1991 and then for only 2 years. Had I known what I was getting myself into and the expense it would entail when I first innocently and unsuspectingly wrote my first 2 little books, I'm sure I would have stuck with teaching! Well, maybe not.
Let me take a moment to share with you... "More of The GetWell GrassRoots Victory Wagon Story!" As you know, I was raised a mechanic's daughter. I was driving flatbed trucks at age 10 and driving a tow truck at age 16. Victor always had a penchant for recycling before the word "recycle" was in vogue. His homemade wreckers were comical compared to commercial tow trucks! One vehicle in his sentimental collection was a '48 Chev flatbed truck. During one of my last years of teaching, when school districts still depended on levies for funds instead of gambling, the Sedro Woolley School District was in dire need, having seen 2 levies in a row fail. The prospects for this year's third were doomed. In a spirit of "We Can Just Do It!" I gathered together a crew of happy students; and we showed up at The Barn to spend an entire 12 hour night sanding down and then painting up that '48 Chevy flatbed in you guessed it red, white, and blue! We painted sideboards that cried out: "Your kids need you NOW!" And the huge, homemade front bumper demanded: "VOTE!" We sprinkled on some stars. And spread out a few bales of hay on the bed. We named it... you guessed it "The Victory Vote Truck!" For the next 2 weeks, crews of students with musical instruments, pom-poms, flags, and strong vocal cords rode intoxicated for education with me, from dawn to dusk and during school lunch breaks in The Glorious Victory Vote Truck. We sang and chanted, pleaded and cried for the community members to "VOTE YES!" You guessed it, again we passed that levy, the word was, by 3 votes! But that is not the amazing part of the story, in terms of The GetWellHGrassRoots Victory Wagon Campaign! For not only were we featured on the front page of Sedro Woolley's newspaper. But we were featured on the front page of all the surrounding school districts' newspapers, as well! WE WERE HOT NEWS even in other communities!!! I never forgot the wallop that Vote Truck packed on the people as we passed them we woke them up! Our spirit was contagious!
The other experience that has inspired The GetWellHGrassRoots Victory Wagon hit in 1967 during my last year of college before I began teaching. Married at the time, my husband and I lived in a little $65 a month house. (Actually, my mother Marie had been born in that house!) It was during the 60s. And "Turn On, Tune In & Drop Out" was in vogue. I remember looking out the open door one afternoon and seeing something so bizarre pass by that it put me in an altered state of consciousness for minutes, although it took only a few seconds for it to pass by the open door! Time just stood still for several minutes while my brain tried desperately to process what had just passed! Needing to get back to studying, I remember clearly deciding the merry, recycled, old bus that had just passed must have belonged to a circus and that some fun-loving, absolutely outrageous carnival must be "a happening" at the college. It was you from the 60s have guessed it! Timothy Leary's bus! By 1967, we were used to Volkswagon vans being painted up with murals, for sure!
But never, ever, had I seen an entire, mind-stopping bus painted up in full glory go past my open door! I always remembered that consciousness-grabbing experience and thought what fun it would be to use such a vehicle to grab the attention of The American People for a good cause!In closing, let me tell you that I have on the highways but a few days - and The Victory Wagon goes so far beyond The Vote Truck and Leary's bus that that - well, it's - you guessed it! It's just ...AWESOME! Just ..."Jump on The Victory Wagon" with me!
