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Meet Your President-early years
by Charlie Lipscomb © 2009
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By way of background, I was born in El Dorado, Kansas and grew up a small town boy.
My father was in the oil industry and was promoted to a store manager. The promotion
required the family to relocate to Medicine Lodge, Kansas, where I spent my formative
years. I have an older brother, Gary, and a younger sister, Carol.
My dad always
had a love affair with cars and when I was fourteen years old he purchased a
1929 Model A. Dad and I worked on that car night and day. Dad was the mechanic
and I was the student. Mom did the sewing for the interior from original Model A
material, which was purchased from Chicago, Illinois. You can see that my own
passion for cars started at a very young age and has only grown throughout my
life.
My father was not considered a “hot rodder” when I was growing up but I
heard through the grapevine that he was always racing his car around town. In
his later years, he talked about racing through Augusta, Kansas, so you could
say that it is in my genes to race cars. Gary, my older brother, was also an
influence in my life as he always had a fast car and loud mufflers. My Uncle
Verne was a huge influence in my life, not only because he bought a 1957 fuel
injected Corvette in 1959, but because my brother and I were his constant
companions. My Aunt and Uncle did not have any kids of their own, so we were
considered his “adopted” children. Needless to say, that was my first
introduction to Corvettes and I was hooked but unfortunately had no money of my
own to buy one. 
Not yet at least.
My first car was a 1940 Ford with a flat head. It was soon converted into a hot
rod with an Oldsmobile engine. My brother owned a 1952 Oldsmobile and went off
to the Navy shortly after I bought the ’40 Ford. His engine worked quite well
in the old ’40. I owned several cars throughout high school but my favorite was
definitely my 1956 Ford. I drove this car through my senior year and had,
you could say, a memorable time in it prior to blowing up the engine. I started
purchasing new cams, pistons and so on but my mom said it was time to “grow up”
and go to college. I had to leave my beloved 1956 behind and went to school in a
1951 Ford that I bought from a friend for $40.00. Yes, you could buy cars for
that price in 1965.
I met the love of my
life, Carol, back in Medicine Lodge, Kansas, when my mom took me to lunch at the
Brown Derby. Yes, we had a Brown Derby in Medicine Lodge, Kansas, complete with
curb hops. One of the curb hops was the most beautiful girl I had ever laid eyes
on and she was luckily in my own home town. I asked my mom “who is that girl”
and she laughed and said “that is your next door neighbor”. Well, Carol did not
exactly live next door, but she was close enough, just across the street and
down one block. We dated and eventually were married in 1966. Yes, she is a
lucky woman. I told Carol that I would not stay in this “little” town for very
long, and believe you me, she liked the sound of that.
We moved six months after
we were married to Wichita, Kansas, where I purchased my first Corvette, a 1962.
We still own the ’62 today. We moved to St. Louis, Missouri, in 1968, where I
got my first company car. The result was a lot of hard work and no spare time
for the ’62. We moved to our first new house in 1973.
More to follow in part two....
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