Austin Cars and Teachers

I was going through my photos of my favorite subjects, abandoned and rusty cars, trucks and machines in the forest. This old Austin, left in the bush above Redroofs Road and below Highway 101 somehow...left me to thinking about one of my high-school teachers. That led to further ponderings about the other teachers in my life.

My shop teacher in high-school was a tall thin Englishman, who had the unfortunate luck of trying to teach us undisciplined little bastards, basic machine shop skills. We were country boy teenagers that had experience with chain-saws and pick-up trucks at age twelve. Our teacher was an old school gentleman and spoke with a proper English accent. To maintain basic decorum and sanity on some days, he would abandon the course material and tell stories about his life. To this day, I can still recall his tales and voice regaling us heathens with stories of driving his "Ow-stin" A-99  ( Austin car, model A-99 ) around the West Coast town of Tahsis, BC. He told stories of odd ball British car parts and pieces, band-aid repairs in the wilderness....and bless the old guy...tried to impress us with stories of how powerful the Ow-stin A-99 truly was. We were all hot -rod V-8 fanatics, ready to be impressed by  Hemi motors and big-block Chevys...but if his talking meant less school lectures, then by all means...talk on brother, talk on.
 Back in those prehistoric days, a British TV comedy show "On the Buses" was popular. We would use lines from the TV show, in horrible mock English accents to answer questions in class, or to comment on lecture material. "Oh, Butler, that's a good one" in a Cockney accent flew out at least ten times a day. Our teacher took it all in stride and in good humor.

Now believe it or don't....but on extra-special days, and by our request....our ever patient and tolerant teacher would bring his bag-pipes to class. ( if you live on the Coast, you know that this can only be one guy ...John Webb ) We would all sit quietly in our chairs ( instead of throwing them at one another) and listen to "Amazing Grace", various marches and anthems. The principle of the school would come into the room to see what all the racket was about, and see that we were somehow miraculously under control. I suppose that he thought the noise of the bagpipes was better than burning the place down....which is exactly what one of my classmates did a few years previous. One of the biggest fires in the town of Gibsons history and pretty much did the whole place in. 
 My old shop teacher is still alive and well last I heard. After retiring from teaching, he spent a few years driving a school bus to supplement his income...so yes...he was "On the Buses"... Whenever I see him, I always make time to talk and catch up on things in his life. He stills plays the bagpipes and drives funky old cars. I told him that I was amazed that he just didn't haul off and beat us to a pulp on some days. He admitted that the thought had crossed his mind, but used the bagpipes as his weapon of choice instead.

to be continued with   Emotional rescue
                                 Chalk brush throwing best friend/teacher
                                 fixing fences and cutting roof shakes for school credit
                                 thing I didn't know about sex in grade 8