Los Angeles herald., 1909-09-19

is golden, and Gus should be very
wealthy man. Nothing disturbs Gloomy
Gus. 1t is believed that if Gus Sey-
fried tumbled down a thousand feet
and was able to move at the end OF
the fall his first question would be,
"Well, let's see how we are going TO
get her back" The fact that he had
fallen that distance would never strike
Seyfried's mind. Gus has been toppled
down embankmentS many time, put
Gloomy Gus still drives fast cars TO
successful conclusions. A. Forbes, the
Happy Hooligan" of this peculiar duo
of machine experts. is the opposite or
Seyfried in disposition. Happy" re-
ceived his appellation because he was
never known to do other than smile.
He is the mechanician for Gloomy
Gus" If anything was to happen 10
Mercury, and Happy still lived to look
at what had occurred, his race would
break into good-natured smiles ana inc,
possibly remark, "Well, I'll be burned!
And this big, husky man is a thorough
mechanic and knows the White from
tire to commutator as familiarly as he
knows his room.
Happy was transferred to "Black
Bess" for the return trip and The
Herald man given the comfortable
seat of the mechanician, which con-
sists of a black seat Gus hion about the
size and thickness of an ordinary pan
cake in a ten-cent restaurant There
is a little door handle to which you
cling If you desire to remain with the
car. There is no comfortable, easy,
upholstered leather chair in which to
lounge. for the racing car is stripped
of every ounce of material that can
be taken from it, and the seat is on
the running board.
Down the mountain side which had
lust been climbed the car coasts for
seven miles, never using power
Gloomy Gus seems Indifferent to the
sharp curves or the fact that 1t Is
thirty-five hundred feet from the edge
of the narrow seat, where two BABY
carriages could not pass each other
and where the slightest error in steer
ing would hurl car and occupants to
an awful death. Reaching the foot or
the steepest decline, power Is given
the car, and with a chug-chug she is
away at a forty-mile gait through
mesquite and sagebrush. What mat
ters it that there are ruts and holes,
humps and rocks in the wayE Never
paying more attention to them than
were they beneath the smoothest bou-
le~ards, on, on goes the white Mer-
curry until the main road is reached.
Here Gloomy Gus turns her loose,
and at mile a minute clip this power
car leaps into space, bouncing and
many times on two wheels, until the
marvel is that human ingenuity and
skill could build a piece of machinery
that is capable of standing the awful
racking and bumps received on the
dreadfully cut up and lily maintained
roads that lead to and from Baldy.
None but the person who has par
ticipated in such drive has any con-
ception of the terrific endurance re-
uuired of a driver and of a car MAX
ing better than mile a minute over
heavy roads, full of cuts and holes.
They are to be seen ahead, but before
you have the time to thlpk you are
hitting them. There is but one way
to do and that is to keep forcing the
car into and over them. Smash goes
her wheels as she crosses a rip in the
road. until one would think she would
shake the very engines out of their
case No matter about that The
schedule calls for time to be made and
the chances must be taken. Part of
the time the car is travelling on the
two rear wheels alone. Part of the
time she is travelling on but the wheels
of one side. Everything is wired fast
TO the car. The mechanician sits and
pumps oil into the hungry valves, but
ever at the merciless gait the car
speeds on. Skillfully the driver guides
the monster, but at times the impact
with some obstacle occurs and IN a
moment the car is skidding across the
road, with the danger of tipping over.
Great clouds of dust travel. in the
wake of the fast running car, cutting
the rear from view for five miles at
at times. Supposing some part of the
machine should give way under the
terrible strain, what chance have
the occupants of that moving cyclone
tearing through space at railroad