Perusing my daily Newspaper sources; Yep! I'm
'Ol School, albeit I have mine read via my NFB Newsline For the Blind telephone
service... Thus, I was caught off guard Monday morning; Err afternoon when
learning via the Minneapolis
Star of the
totally unexpected death of Gary Bettenhausen, who died suddenly at the age of
72.
And I know it's a tad bit maudlin, but, I
find it weird that I've now got the autograph of a dead person in my mushrooming collection of racing
driver's "John Hancock's." As although I didn't personally meet him
'Wayback in 'Twenty-eleven, nevertheless I did S-E-E him as he was totally
outgoing and polite enough to sign my program after that year's World's Largest
Autograph session had ended at Mother Speedway. (IMS) As my personal escort
'CARPETS said; do you want Gary Bettenhausen's autograph?
Thus I just stood there watching Dave; Dave's
NOT Here; Hya! ('CARPETS) mosey over to Gary who was more than willing to stop
on his way out of the festivities and sign my program cheerfully, as this has
to be one of the hardest hit Open Wheel Racing families I know of...
And I'm sure it came as a shock to 'R, aka
Robin Miller who Gary was part of his weekly Rat Pack luncheon crew, as
Miller's obituary shows us a brief glimpse at the human side of what made Gary
his own man instead of just another of the multitudes of cookie-cutter Sponsors
R-US corporate Pitchman of today's racing elite...