Raising three sons, I have had ample opportunity to make or at least assist in the making of plenty of Pinewood Derby and Royal Ambassador race cars. But the first derby racer I ever made was my own, back in 1961 when I had just turned 9-years old. I was a first year Cub Scout and had not had my uniform and pocketknife for very long, so, I was chomping at the bit for any opportunity to carve something…anything. I just wanted to cut up a piece of wood that Mama and Daddy hadn’t paid good money for. A guy can get into deep trouble whittling on a table leg or the headboard.
The annual Pinewood Derby was the high point of my Cub Scout career. I found the anticipation of making the car as thrilling as the race itself. Finally, I would have purpose for that shiny jackknife which I wore proudly and dutifully on the belt of my uniform.
In my hometown of Wilson, North Carolina, the annual Pinewood Derby was held at the Center Brick
Warehouse No. 3, a tobacco warehouse located adjacent to the Starlight Drive-In Theater. Because my daddy drove a truck throughout North America with the occasional trip into Mexico, he was usually away for weeks at a time. So, if I was going to have a car to race, I would have to do build it myself. I had no plan for this project, but I knew what race cars looked like and I was too anxious to begin paring pine to take the time to draw up a plan. So, with Daddy out of town and Mama working, under the non-existent supervision of my older sister, I sat down with my knife and began whittling away on the block of wood I had gotten from den mother, Wretha White. My design was simple; I would make the car to resemble that of my Brickyard hero, A.J. Foyt-winner of the 1961 Indianapolis 500. The design was fast enough to win at Indy so surely mine will be the fastest car at the Center Brick.
I whittled away for hours and found it particularly satisfying to see that block of wood slowly take shape.
It wasn’t long before it actually began to look like a race car. While slicing away on that chunk of wood, I also sliced my left middle finger leaving the tip dangling by a thread of skin. I quickly slid the nearly severed pad back into position, wrapped it with gauze and got back to my whittling trying this time to cut more wood and less finger. When the bleeding finally stopped, I replaced the gauze bandage with a Band-Aid in an effort to hide my cut finger as best I could from Mama. My logic was, she would be less inquisitive about a Band-Aid than a large wad of blood-soaked gauze and, therefore, less likely to question the severity of my wound. I was afraid if she found out I had nearly severed my arm, she would take my knife away. But I had contrived my argument in the event that should happen, and I was ready. I figured if she found out and tried to take my knife, I could reason with her by asking how I was supposed to learn how to be safe if I wasn’t allowed to use my knife. Pretty good logic for a fourth grader, huh? In addition to my first lesson in first aid, I had also learned a valuable lesson in knife safety, I would argue: Keep your fingers behind the blade!
My block of wood continued to transform and soon looked more like a race car than a piece of kindling. I attached the axles and wheels and voila, I had a racecar! I looked at my creation with pride but realized it was in desperate need of a coat of paint-if for no other reason but to hide the blood stains left behind from my near appendectomy.
We had a detached garage behind the house. It was a garage only in the sense it was a building large enough to house a car with a large opening at the front. We never parked a car in it, so it only served as a large, empty wood structure in which daddy kept his toolbox. I went into the garage to see if I could find any paint. Daddy didn’t do much painting so the hope of finding anything I could use to beautify my car was slim. I managed to find a small can that resembled a paint can which had been left there by previous residents. The rusty can was so old, what little printing there was remaining on the label was mostly illegible, but I made the assumption there was paint inside.
I opened the can only to find most of the contents had dried up. There was enough liquid, however, to get a single coat of paint on my car. There was only one problem; the paint was a pale shade of pink! But since that was all I could find, it would have to do. I wasn’t able to find a paint brush, so I just wiped the paint on with a clean dishcloth. Here again, I failed to plan ahead. How was I going to clean Mama’s dishcloth? We had no paint thinner, no turpentine, no nothing that I could use to clean her cloth, so, I just dug about halfway down into the trash can and hid it there.
My car was now complete. A.J. Foyt himself would have been proud to drive that car, but only if his major sponsor was Mary Kay Cosmetics. (I know, Mary Kay wasn’t founded until two years later but no one under the age of 60 remembers Avon.)
In spite of its hideous color, I was proud of my car because it was something I had made on my own. The car represented a number of firsts for me. It was my first attempt at woodcarving. My first attempt at painting. It was my first solo project in wood. I had built plastic model cars and planes, but this was different. It would be my first time racing in the Pinewood Derby. It was also my first time performing minor surgery.
At the warehouse on race day, in addition to the race, there were several other events, games and free hot dogs to any scout in uniform. The race format was simple: two gravity-powered cars race head-to-head down the two-lane track. You win, you advance. You lose, you go grab a hot dog-you’re done. My car ran one race and lost. I prefer to say I came in second in my heat. Regardless, the loss marked the end of my day as well as my Pinewood Derby career. That was the last car I built for about twenty-five years when I would help my first-born, Brian, build his first racer and later, Eric and Mark.
The ”Pink Prowler” may not have been the prettiest girl at the dance but I was proud because I had made her myself and sixty-three years later, still have the scars to prove it. And one thing I never forgot- fingers behind the blade!
Writings and Musings by Bill Taylor 
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