In particular, I had an opportunity to speak with Ralph Barone who not only worked on the chassis set up of the #39, but also on the Tom Carberry owned #47 driven by Dick Havens, along with the Fred Menschner owned/Ray Neary and Oliver Butler driven #21.  (In fact Fred took a moment during the holiday party to thank Ralph for the many hours he put in on the #21 back in the day.)

Ralph told us a story about how Bob Troutmen had the ride in the #39, but Budd Olsen was not too far away (just in case the seat opened up...) as he knew the potential that the car had.  One night at Flemington, Bob had a problem in the first turn fence, with the fence winning, and its said that when they towed the #39 back to the pits, Budd half jokingly told Bob that he "You need to remember to turn left when you get into one." 

A few week's later, Budd ended up getting the ride and not to long afterward, he had a very similar episode with the first turn wood at Flemington.. again the fence won.  Bob Troutmen (who was in the pits at the time and saw the accident) told Ralph, "Quick, take a walk with me..." 

The 2 walked out of the pits over to where the wrecker crew was trying to figure how to hook the busted up #39 to drag it back to the pits.

Bob walked up to Budd and said, "Hey Budd... You need to remember to turn left when you get into one."

There are a lot of great stories out there from the crews who called Morrisville, PA their home base back in the 60's and 70's.  (The Piscopo #39, the Carberry #47, the Menschner #21, the Taylor #93 and others...  and that's just of the PA side of the river!)  Maybe one day Fred Menschner will tell us about the time Dick Haven's told his crew that he must have a bad shock on the car because when he left the pits he had a bunch of cigars in his shirt pocket and when he came back after warm ups, most of them had bounced out.

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