Grandpa Ernie.
I was fortunate to be raised by an eccentric group of people. I was surrounded by mechanics, engineers, photographers, inventors, and artists working in all type of media and this wonderful group of people more than left their mark on me.
One of these people was my grandfather Ernie King. Ernie was the kind of man who could seemingly do anything he set out to do. It seemed he could make or fix most anything and he did it in such a way that made it feel matter of fact. He never bragged about the things he built, fixed, modified, or invented — these things were just there being used everyday with little fanfare. He was a photographer by profession but his real calling seemed to be that of a tinkerer or inventor. This is not to say that he photographic work wasn’t top shelf, it’s just that he wasn’t his job. He was so much more.
I loved making the trip to Frankfort, New York where he and my grandmother Margaret lived just so I could hang out with grandpa and see what he was working on. On one visit he took me with some excitement into his basement workshop (I loved it down there) and showed me his cigarette making machine. There it was sitting on its stand — there was one hopper that held the tobacco and another that held the rolled but empty papers. The papers would roll down into a catch and then a rod would stuff the tobacco into the paper. Now that the paper was full it was heavy enough to cause the lever it was on to pivot and swing down past a spinning sanding disc that would buff the end clean and then it would slide out of the lever and onto a ramp that would guide it into the waiting pack. Brilliant and simple. Admittedly it was a bit odd that I as a little kid was helping grandpa make cigarettes but it was a different time. He never allowed me to smoke them of course but the smoking of them hardly seemed the point. It was the making of them and watching the carefully orchestrated movements of the machine take place with no help needed from me except to keep the hoppers full of papers and dried leaves. It was as if Rube Goldberg was making his own smokes.
On another trip he was proud to show us his new lawn tractor. He built a small tractor from the frame up. The engine out of who knows what was cooled by a Cadillac radiator and all of this was set on a frame he’d made himself. This small tractor had attachments for mowing the lawn or plowing snow or even raking leaves. He gave me a ride on it and I was thrilled. What I didn’t understand then, as a young boy, was that very few other grandpas made their own tractors and attachments, but it all seemed so ‘normal’ to me.
Ernie was also a true pragmatist. I remember a family get together where grandma was cooking burgers on the grill. This was the era where you lit the charcoal and waited for it to get hot and then rushed to get everything cooked before the fire started to fade out. Well on this day there were lots of kids eating lots of burgers and the grill started to cool before all the food was cooked. So Ernie did what any sane person would do — he went into the shop and got his propane torch and started cooking the top side of the burgers with it while the grill took care of the underside. It made for quite a photo and I think he didn’t know why we were all smiling in such a funny way. Good burgers as I recall.
Ernie was also a fine artist who had his painting studio up in a loft looking out over the back yard, the fields beyond that and the railroad tracks still further back. There were lots of windows and great natural light for him to paint by. I remember talking in hushed tones while in that room. There was something special about it that just told you to be quiet and still and respectful. I loved that room and his art and I’m still the proud owner of a few of his paintings.
When I was a kid I rode what would become in time a ‘BMX’ bike. The BMX craze hadn’t started yet and we rode stingrays around and did wheelies on them and jumped them until they broke in two. I told Ernie about a bike I really wanted — a Yamaha Moto-bike. It was like a small dirt bike motorcycle sans the motor. It had front and rear suspension and looked so very cool. I must have bored him with the details countless times. At some point he called and told my mother to bring me out to Frankfort because there was a thrift shop that had what sounded like a Yamaha Moto-bike there for sale and he was going to take me there and buy it for me. I was over the top excited to have one. Ernie was not a rich man and I’m sure it wasn’t cheap but I guess it was something he really wanted me to have. We got to Frankfort and he took me in his car to see and buy the bike and when we got there it had been sold. I was disappointed but Ernie was crushed. He felt he’d let me down, which of course he hadn’t. We went back to his house empty handed and when we got back there he told me to cheer up because we’d make our own Moto-Bike together. What?! Can you do that? Yep. You can if you are Ernie.
My job was to find old junked frames to use as donors and then we would get together at grandpa’s and he’d cut them up and bend them and make my Moto-Bike. I found some old Rollfast 10 speeds as donors and loaded them in the car for the hour drive to Frankfort. Once we got there Ernie and I got to work. I was awestruck by the fact that he could cut the frames apart and braze them back together. Seeing him fire up the torch gave me even more respect for him. He made a rear swingarm for the suspension and a pivot that wrapped around the bottom bracket shell and then using threaded pipe and a spring from one of the hundred coffee cans full of stuff he made a rear shock. He brazed and bent and hammered and that afternoon it was done — my own personal custom Moto-bike. I couldn’t wait to get back home and hang parts on it and ride it. I was about 11 years old.
The next day the frame was married to the parts I’d set aside for it and I took it for a ride. I was by far the coolest kid on the block. I rode it everywhere and loved jumping it and the bouncy landing I got when I came down. I think I rode it most of a summer before it broke. I don’t recall what broke but I do remember thinking about how the next one could be better. But there was no ‘next one’. BMX had become ‘real’ and one could buy cool name brand bikes and being a kid I wanted the cool Mongoose and not the homemade, rattle can painted, bike that we might make together. Foolish. I wish now that I’d asked for his help in making another better version, but I never did.
What I will never forget about that was the feeling of making something, or at least of watching something being made. It was so basic as to be crude but it was beautiful too. There was a pride and dignity to it. I didn’t realize it then but this was one of the things that pushed me to make my own things and to eventually want to make things for a living. The funny thing was that Ernie always felt bad about that missed opportunity of buying me my dream bike. What he never knew was that he gave me a gift much more valuable. Ernie died while I was living in Saratoga Springs and working at Serotta and he knew what I was doing for a living but I didn’t know enough at that point to thank him. I hadn’t put 2 and 2 together and realized that without his starting push that it never would have happened.
So……….seeing as it’s better late than never. Thank you Grandpa Ernie. You did more than you ever knew.
Dave
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- Ernie (2nd from left) with his buddies and their plane.
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- Ernie with his MG TD.
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- Ernie in 1969
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5 responses to “Grandpa Ernie.”
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Hey Dave really cool story and thanks for sharing. I know that your mom’s an artist but who else in “the world of Kirk” is a creative who’s had an effect?
Touching story Dave. Thanks so much for sharing. This inspires me even more to get my kids out into the garage with me when I am tinkering around, and to encourage them to dream of things they would like to make. This story made my day man. Thanks. RB
Dave,
I had one of those Yamaha Moto-bikes. Several decades later, I love my JKS so much more. I just wish I still had the aerobic engine I had back then!!! You really found your calling in framebuilding.
Don
Awesome!
“he went into the shop and got his propane torch and started cooking the top side of the burgers with it while the grill took care of the underside.” = creme brulee.
Dave, The message I got from your post is that people who have the opportunity to earn money from the work that they love are truly blessed. Your Grandpa is an inventor and an artist and he live his life with passion in creating new things. I hope that I wil also have a chance to earn from the craft that i truly loved.