This is my 200th blog entry… I get alot of compliments on the blog – and it’s VERY satisfying – Thank You!
The blog is alot of work – a typical blog takes about 2 hours to write, but that doesn’t count all the added time to take the photos while you’re working on the cars… I know that the blog provides alot of info about the cars to alot of people – maybe even too much sometimes. I used to worry about giving too much away in the blog and losing business, but now I’m feeling more confident that I’ll always have plenty of work if I just keep doing it as best I can and stay honest about what I do and who I am: I’m just a guy who loves E-Types, loves working on their bodies, and let’s face it – loves talking about it… I sat down one Friday afternoon years ago and decided that if I could do ANYTHING for a living, this would be it. And then, I just kind of “did it”…
The thing is, I’ve started to realize that people read the blog regularly, and alot of guys are reading it more to “share the adventure” than to gain the metalworking knowledge or see another E-Type shell restored. And so as time has gone by, I’ve added more and more stories about the road trips, etc. – because that is ALL part of it! Which brings me to the point of this blog entry…
I have lots of great stories about E-Types – but the BEST story I have happened 25 years ago – and maybe it’s time to start telling it. The thing is – it’s LONG…
On a Tuesday night in the first week of May, 1986, a rollback pulled up in front of my parents house and dropped off the tired and incomplete rolling chassis of a 1963 Jaguar E-Type roadster. I was a freshman in high school, and it was the first E-Type I had ever seen in my life. I was 14 years old…
In the first week of December, 1994, I was driving down a back road in Hockessin, DE when a valve retainer broke and dropped a valve into a cylinder. What followed was a catastrophic engine explosion that locked the rear wheels and laid down an oil slick 50 yards long. My E-Type coasted to a stop and while it’s only about 50 feet or so away from me at this moment, it never ran again… I was 23 years old…
People are always telling me that I’m “living the dream” – and I feel that way too, but in the 8 years and 7 months between those 2 milestone days, THAT was living the E-Type dream…
- I completely restored the car and finally got it on the road 2 weeks before my Senior year of high school started – almost exactly on my 17th birthday…
- I drove it to high school every day that year, had a steady girlfriend, and we went everywhere in it, every day – rain, shine, sleet or snow – as fast as it would go… I had just turned 17 – she was 15…
- I wrecked it 5 times – and went through 4 bonnets – the first of which was the original bonnet from Terry Lippincott’s first E-Type…
- I blew 4 clutches, 1 transmission, and 2 engines…
- I had 3 major electrical fires – 2 of them in the rain…
- I drove the car to 2 proms, high school AND college graduation…
- I drove it to Boy Scouts every Thursday night, and eventually drove it to my Eagle Scout ceremony…
- Janie and I went on our first date in it, and I fell in love with her one night while she was sitting on the bonnet, drinking a beer…
- I worked at a combination E-Type parts store, repair shop, and junkyard for 7 years – disassembling at least 20 E-Types – working on twice that many – and spending days, months, years on the phone, selling new and used E-type parts out of ads we had in the back of Hemmings Motor News…
- I pit crewed for Bill and Trent Terry at 5 vintage races – including the Bahamas in 1990, where “I survived the Grand Bahama Motorsports Club ‘fall-down’ party” – I still have the T-shirt (and I did pretty much fall down – it was a WILD weekend!)…
- I spent countless nights with my best friend Greg, drinking beer and trying to figure out the mysteries of life (and especially women), while blasting down back country roads at night with the top down…
- I lost my virginity at the beach one night – pretty much as a direct result of owning “The Jag” as we called it back then…
- I started the adventure as a boy – barely out of middle school – living with my parents, and ended it as a man – graduated from college – living on my own…
- In conclusion, I grew up in a really uncomfortable seat, about 12 inches behind a wood and aluminum circle that said “E-Type” in the middle of it. It was where I laughed and cried, tried to figure out who I was – and who I wanted to be, and where many of the greatest people I ever met entered my life through a tiny little door on my right…
THAT is why I do this… THAT is why I use grey primer – because my car was in grey primer for 2 years before I had a license, and the promise of where it might take me was overwhelming at that age – and still is… THAT is why I’m so good at hammering out bonnets, why I know all about the racing upgrades, why I know every part of every Series – I must have taken apart 100 of them! THAT is why I keep rebuilding this same car over and over and over – it just NEVER gets old – when I’m crammed deep inside an E-Type shell, in the middle of the night, trying to hit a deadline, covered in metal dust and molten weld splatter – I’m 15 again…
And so, THOSE are the stories I want to tell you, and I feel like they just might be the ones you REALLY want to hear! And it’s only recently that I’ve been able to grasp the rarity of driving an E-Type every day in high school – there can’t be more that a dozen or so people that have done it – for one thing, it HAD to be done in the 70’s or 80’s, when they weren’t really worth much yet…
And so I think I’m going to start telling THOSE stories along with the metalwork and the current adventures. The racing stories – the crazy shop customers – the wrecks, the dates with girls gone wrong (and right…) – ALL of it…
So what do you guys think about that? I know there are at least a couple dozen of you that follow this almost every day, so do me a favor and take a moment to drop me a line and let me know if there’s ANYONE out there that wants to hear it – because I really can’t decide if this is one of my best – or one of my stupidest – ideas…
I don’t have very many photos of those times, but trust me, I can paint you a VERY vivid picture of what went down! It was great – all of it – and I knew it at the time, cherished it, and remember it all like it was yesterday – because deep down inside, I’m still just an overly enthusiastic kid, trying to get his E-Type back on the road… – Chuck
May, 1986 - the first and only E-Type I had ever laid eyes on. I had NO idea how it worked, I just KNEW with every fiber of my being that I would figure it out, rebuild it, and drive it before high school was over - and I did.
Here's the proof - May, 1989 - "Chuck Hadley - best car" - just finishing up Senior year, 17 years old.
