MEANWHILE, BACK AT THE ASYLUM…
Wildwood, MO Karl Strauch (stlmadmen@aol.com) 17 Dec 2004
To quote Stan Laurel’s famous
phrase, "This is another fine mess you’ve gotten us into, Ollie."
I feel like Jake and Elwood on a mission from God to get the Blues Brothers Band
back together again. So much for "retirement" ...
It all started when we moved to St. Louis from Massachusetts in 1987. One
of our new neighbors saw the movers roll our 3 Minis out of their big moving van
and into our 2-car garage. Shortly afterwards, we heard a knock on our
door. "Pardon me, do you have any little British cars here?"
Would you believe that one of his friends also had 3 Minis? Don’t ever
look to the Witness Protection Program to help you if insist on keeping your
Minis. Anyway, before we had finished unpacking boxes, we suddenly were
members of the "Gateway Mini Enthusiasts", a small merry band of 6
Miniacs who had become addicted to Minis. Having bought our first Mini in
1978 and acquired two more along the way, we’d become incurably addicted to
Minis, too.
Lee and I both come from very nomadic families. This is the 19th place
I’ve lived so far and she has lived in many more than I have. We both
learned long ago to adapt to the ways of the natives, rather than try to change
them. It bothered me, though, that hardly anyone outside this area knew
where "Gateway" was, so I suggested that we try to think a bit farther
out, like say the "Intergalactic Mini Enthusiasts". Well, that
was a bit too far out for them to grasp so I suggested the "Mid-America
Diehard Mini Enthusiasts’ Network" and painted MADMEN in bold letters on
both sides of my GT-5 race Mini. That Mini broke in my first race outing,
but the "MADMEN" name has kept going ever since.
Bruce Kennedy started doing newsletters to keep us all informed and to exchange
with other Mini clubs in hopes that they would think we were a real Mini club.
Several years later, his employer moved him to Texas and Bruce deviously left
the dreaded Editor-In-A-Box Kit on my doorstep just as he headed out of town.
I was then Editor for 7 years before "retiring" in December 1999 (just
before the Y2K bug bit) to devote more time to caring for our elderly Minis.
At that time, we’d grown to be the largest Mini club in the New World (North +
South America). Not quite Intergalactic, but a bit farther out than we’d
been as "Gateway Mini Enthusiasts", eh.
I’m really grateful to all of the MADMEN for all of the many fond memories of
things that happened while I was Editor. I wish I had room here to list
all of them. One was having Bill Cox loan me his "Blue Goose"
Mini for my son Kraig and I to make a 6,396-mile 18-day drive up to Alaska and
back in 1998 to celebrate the 10th year of MADMEN. Jake and Jeff Grebe,
local Mini drivability specialists, made sure that we’d make the drive without
"failing to proceed".
Another fond memory was touring the Longbridge factory as editor of our
newsletter in 1999, while I was over there to celebrate the 40th birthday of the
Mini, and being able to take photographs and interview a number of people at
that plant. All of them were very enthused about the new MINI that was in
the works.
Perhaps the most breathtaking memory of all, though, was being presented a check
for $2,000+ at Spring Thing Five in Florida in 2000, thanks to the generosity of
MADMEN all over the world who had anonymously donated that money to help me put
"Humpty Dumpty", my ‘60 Morris 850 Mini back together again.
WOW !!
Things have changed quite a bit in the past 5 years. Frank Grover has done
a great job in taking over after me, but he soon saw our membership decrease as
we morphed along with many others into an Internet-based group.
The biggest change of all has been the arrival of the new MINIs here in the
Americas a couple of years ago. Real happiness is having a diverse group
of fascinating, thoughtful Mini friends and having a local MINI dealer that
understands our passion and addiction to Minis and MINIs of all ages.
Co-hosting WEST MEETS EAST MINI MEET 2004 with many of my friends from Minis In
Northern Illinois, celebrating the 45th birthday of the Mini, fulfilled a dream
I’d had for a long time. We had 274 classic Minis and new MINIs
register, the largest turnout by far for any Meet since the first one was held
in Reno in 1974.
What next? I’ll mail out 6 newsletters a year to anyone who is crazy
enough to donate $10/year to become one of the certifiable MADMEN and I’ll do
it until the Winter Solstice in 2012 when the Mayan calendar runs out ...
LONG LIVE MINIS - especially yours !!
Karl Strauch STLMADMEN@aol.com
MADMEN, PO Box 520, Grover, MO 63040
Long Live Minis – especially yours !! Karl