As long as I’ve been driving motor vehicles, I can probably count on one hand (maybe both) how many accidents I’ve been involved in where I was the driver. One of my earliest happened in my first few years behind the wheel. The date stamp on the edge of the three photographs reads May 68. The photos show the damage and towing of the vehicle I was driving.

My dad was a car fanatic. He loved trading cars. It was not unusual for him to leave for work with one car in the morning and come home with a different one after work. Dad had found a 1963 or ’64 Mercury sedan that had a sliding rear window that opened with a remote switch. It opened from the middle to the edges and was wide enough for an average sized person to fit through. It was a cool car and powerful. In those days, most cars had V-8 engines, which this one did.

I turned eighteen in 1968 and earned my driver’s license two years earlier. My friend and cousin, Michael, was sixteen that summer. We were good friends and spent many hours together. Before either of us could drive, we would play war with plastic toy soldiers or shoot pool above the fire station. My dad was a volunteer fire fighter, so we had “permission” to be up there.

On the day in question, we had grabbed either our BB guns or .22 rifles and driven into the country. I don’t recall if we just went for target practice or were hunting squirrels. I drove out in the country south of home to shoot our guns. We were obviously not in school but what day of the week it  was will remain an unknown.

We had our weapons in the car as I drove back into town on Highway 73. We were going north and approached the intersection with Highway 29. The main business district of our home town lie just ahead. At that time, Highway 29 was the main east-west route through town while 73 ran north-south. I believe it was late afterno

on. As a young driver with guns in the car, I kept to the speed limit of twenty-five miles an hour.

Before I or Michael knew what happened, a car came through a stop sign from the west on Highway 29. We hit that car solid as the Mercury side-swiped the other vehicle. I remember seeing a small, young boy in the other car’s front seat bouncing away from the impact. The other car spun around one hundred and eighty degrees before stopping on the east side of the intersection.

There were witnesses at the filling station on the southeast corner of the intersection…and probably others. Some people came out to see if everyone was okay. Mike and I were fine. The young boy looked shaken, but his father insisted he was okay, despite not being buckled up. The dad was mumbling and somewhat incoherent as I recall. There was glass and small car parts all over the intersection.  

The Mercury died on the spot. We did not move once we crashed into the other car. We sat stunned in the car, not sure what had happened. A county sheriff’s deputy shoto investigate the accident. Mike and I got out and looked at our car. All four headlights were smashed. Gone. I learned later was an anomaly in side swipe collisions. We had hit the other car squarely.

Our car was totalled. I made sure Mike was okay and found a phone to call my dad and tell him what happened. It can’t be driven, I told him. It had to be towed. He told me to have it towed to our house. I think it was so an insurance adjuster could look at it…and dad could see it, too. Dad was not happy about the car but pleased both Mike and I were okay.

The other car could be driven. We were not at fault, but he drove away while we had to get towed. No citations were issued despite the other driver being drunk behind the wheel and running a stop sign…with his son in the car. No breath test was taken because he knew and may have been a friend of the investigating officer. The other driver got no warning or anything else.

The touch of irony in the story is that dad loved that car so much he found one similar to replace it. It was the same make, model, and color, but either a year older or newer.

On reflection more than fifty years later, the accident could have been far worse had the drunk driver hit Mike and I head on. I thank God no one was hurt in what was an event that could have been fatal to all involved. Cars can be replaced, as dad told me. People are irreplaceable.

Not long after the accident, Mike and his family moved to south central Wisconsin and we became distant relatives. I went off to college that fall and graduated in 1972. Less than three years later, Michael was dead. And now, slightly more than fifty years later, I still miss Mike and wonder what his life might be like today. Who would he have married? How many children would he have? Grandchildren? He was only twenty-three years old at the time of his death.

I wonder what our relationship would have been like had he been able to enjoy a longer life in God’s Kingdom. I know we will be reunited in God’s Heavenly Kingdom when that day comes. Rest in peace, Mike!