Ron Hill
08-20-2006, 09:45 PM
I never knew you knew Hank Bowman. Do you have any magazines with his articles in them? Hank and my dad were great friends. His wife, her pen name, was Tracy Ogden, was also quite a writer. My dad was friends with Hank becasue my dad used it inspect at many Stock Nationals and he inspected several Winnebagoland Marathons for Mr. K.
If my mind has this right, Hank's wife choked to death at an Banquet in Florida, after Hank's death. In those days, restuaurants didn't know what to do, of even knew that diners could choke on meat. I never really heard the details, but was told they thought she had had a heart attack, but in fact had choked on a piece of steak.
Hank and Tracy had three kids, Shannon, Craig and Tracy....if I'm not mistaken. Craig builds Broccoli runabouts today, for Stock Outboards and Shannon builds Bezoats for Kneeldowners (Stocks and Mod)...
The last time I remember seeing Hank and Tracy was Seattle, in 1959. I ran pretty well in CSR and DSR and Hank was telling about all the wheel bearing trouble they had had getting to Seattle...I think, he wrote an article for Boat Sport about the 1959 Nationals...Hank had a great sense of humor, as did my dad...Hank and the Old Man seems to get along just great...throw in Dick O'Dea with those two and you had a three ring comedy hour...
THe Kill Switch Rule in OPC was put into the book because of Hanks's death...When I drove a 17' Glastron to win the Chicago to Milwaukee to Chicago Marathon... I figured nothing could hurt me.. My Glastron delaminated and the deck split from the bottom, in that race, I ended the race with the deck around my neck...but I did win, the first win for Evinrude in the modern era...I'd be sitting in the seat, hit a wave the deck with the steering wheel would go up, me, the bottom half of the boat, with seat and gas peddle would go down...the horizon would disappear...I could not see over the deck until I'd stop and deck would rejoin the boat, then, off I'd go....Only a "Dumb Jackass" would have kept racing....but I was leading and I wasn't letting those "DAMN Mercury's beat me."...
Stan Stoffer won FJ that year, in a Chritchfield...Quite a Wild One himself....Stan was killed in a Snowmobile accident about a year later...<!-- / message --><!-- sig -->
If my mind has this right, Hank's wife choked to death at an Banquet in Florida, after Hank's death. In those days, restuaurants didn't know what to do, of even knew that diners could choke on meat. I never really heard the details, but was told they thought she had had a heart attack, but in fact had choked on a piece of steak.
Hank and Tracy had three kids, Shannon, Craig and Tracy....if I'm not mistaken. Craig builds Broccoli runabouts today, for Stock Outboards and Shannon builds Bezoats for Kneeldowners (Stocks and Mod)...
The last time I remember seeing Hank and Tracy was Seattle, in 1959. I ran pretty well in CSR and DSR and Hank was telling about all the wheel bearing trouble they had had getting to Seattle...I think, he wrote an article for Boat Sport about the 1959 Nationals...Hank had a great sense of humor, as did my dad...Hank and the Old Man seems to get along just great...throw in Dick O'Dea with those two and you had a three ring comedy hour...
THe Kill Switch Rule in OPC was put into the book because of Hanks's death...When I drove a 17' Glastron to win the Chicago to Milwaukee to Chicago Marathon... I figured nothing could hurt me.. My Glastron delaminated and the deck split from the bottom, in that race, I ended the race with the deck around my neck...but I did win, the first win for Evinrude in the modern era...I'd be sitting in the seat, hit a wave the deck with the steering wheel would go up, me, the bottom half of the boat, with seat and gas peddle would go down...the horizon would disappear...I could not see over the deck until I'd stop and deck would rejoin the boat, then, off I'd go....Only a "Dumb Jackass" would have kept racing....but I was leading and I wasn't letting those "DAMN Mercury's beat me."...
Stan Stoffer won FJ that year, in a Chritchfield...Quite a Wild One himself....Stan was killed in a Snowmobile accident about a year later...<!-- / message --><!-- sig -->