'Dog leg' graph takes us racing...

This is what is sometimes referred to as a ‘dog-leg’ graph – meaning the ‘leg’ is crooked. Million Dollar speedway recounts an earlier era, one centering on 1980. If you were in Kansas City then you’ll remember the summer of 1979 for its insufferable heat and July 1981 for the Hiatt-Regency collapse.

My Million Dollar Speedway tale sits right in the middle This curve highlights what occurred with children’s blood lead levels across the same span. Nope – nothing’s done – but the ‘dog leg’ is dropping. Prof Brooklyn, Andy and l Otis’ are head to the Olympic Speedway on Truman road for some blue collar fun. Let’s tag along and see how the race goes.

CHAPTER 10 TRACK WENT SILENT May 1979 Little Otis loved the Olympic races, sharing race fan status with his papa. Otis had been held back following the first grade, a similar double circuit applying to the second. Each September he raced through early review of A-B-C’s before stumbling over anything more involved. Even with prompting, Otis could not read aloud at the full sentence level, loudly phonating through a word or two before giggling. By each fall term’s sixth week Olive anticipated the same disappointing call. “Otis needs to be set back a year, maybe two.”

His limitations came as a surprise to parents who insisted he had been an explorative little boy prior to his third birthday.

Andy and Olive shared with relatives that Otis’ problems had originated with a pesky flu bug. Olive related that three-year old version of Otis had been a handful, recalling occasions she had found him hiding under the kitchen sink, another time losing him altogether until she noticed scraping noises originating below the floor, Otis-the-crawler.

Andy and Olive’s relatives numbered among Missouri’s country people, the sole exception being a well-educated, although troublesome female cousin, a degreed psychologist who infected every family gathering with unwanted assessments of incontinent aunts and lecherous uncles. Curiously, she also rejected their assertion that Otis’ three seizures and mental slowness had originated in flu.

When Andy became distant during pregnancy, Olive gorged on gritty cereals and pastes. Otherwise a neat, non-drinker, one day she questioned their pediatrician regarding wallpaper paste’s

toxicity. Quicker with the word than his pen, the pediatrician phonated through a four-letter condition termed P-I-C-A. Pica is fortunately rare, defined by craving and chewing nonfood items. While traceable to the ancients, its origins remain elusive. Twice Olive had discovered Otis using his tiny finger nails to scrape dust from a window sash. She never shared with Andy, certainly not with his cousin, that she had tasted a paint chip-ortwo herself.

School administrators waving Sunny Pines and Quiet Waters brochures created phony bladder wall contractions, launching Olive into ladies’ room privacy. Sweltering August school sign-ups saw her at the head of the line, believing currently enrolled lessened Otis’ chances being institutionalized. His school supplies benefitted from a similar efforts: Pencils (2) , Eberhard-Faber eraser (1), Ink pen, non-fountain type (1).

School worries hardly clouded opening night. Andy and Otis rode the city’s No. 15 bus, joined by an unlikely tag-along. Having peeked at Andy’s calendar, Prof Brooklyn asked to join them.

Olive packed a PB&J sandwich for Otis, waxed paper securing its sticky contents, reminding Andy to remove the tooth pick before passing the snack to Otis. Andy had asked borrowed Prof Mel’s binoculars and Mel had only reluctantly lent them, adding lens cleaning paper and a note emphasizing its importance.

Traveling east on Truman road, Brooklyn noted a shift in recreational choices, explaining a man-of-war encounter he had endured near 12th street’s Kitty Kat lounge. By self-admission, he acknowledged joining a belly dancer’s tassel routine there to be a mistake. “But how was I supposed to know he was her husband?”

Past that Brooklyn’s week hardly improved. While his care givers stressed medication adherence, he strayed far afield of prescribed regimens. Favoring lead toxicity as a lead-in, he also tried to divert each patient visit to a discussion of lead contamination.

Dissatisfied with medical advice, Brooklyn consulted stuffy textbooks, ones describing alarming features attending Graves’ disease, noting symptoms such as racing heartbeats, failed hearts and high fevers.

On his post-Kitty Kat Wednesday, Brooklyn prowled the college library, researching Graves’ disease. Spotting a newsletter that had originated with the Mallinckrodt General Clinical Research Center, he noted it to be a Harvard research arm and the site of early lead toxicity studies. Brooklyn weirdly reconfigured these incidental findings as proof that he had been misdiagnosed with Graves,’ choosing instead to believe he had been lead poisoned at Big River.

The G-C-R-C receptionist taking his call failed to understand how it originated in Missouri given the caller’s unmistakable New York City accent. The internist she paged required almost no time to recognize his caller had been diverting laboratory reagents for risky self-medication purposes, forcibly steering the conversation past contamination toward the inadvisability of self-medication. It is hard to say who first hung up.

Midget racing teased multiple senses, eyes, ears and noses were ramped full-on. Following the evening race card, racers and their crews appeared beat. Not unlike the Cook Painters, midget racers worked day-jobs before competing at a high level. The following evening some would transition to a full-chassis contest held at Odessa, Missouri, more suitable for pilfered octane boosters.

Relieving himself at a waterfall-style urinal, Brooklyn reviewed an eye-level placard. Midgets and sprint cars will be inspected for sound muffling devices on opening day - 1981.

Lines of confused pigeons circled roosts, perhaps anticipating an end to the noise. Birds and race fans would require nearly twelve quiet hours to reset delicate inner ear mechanisms. The track went silent at eleven, one hour past the city’s newly-enacted, although unenforceable quiet hour.

Road guards waved fans’ automobiles onto Truman Road, swinging red-shielded flashlights as if batons, drivers gunning engines as blue-collar salutes to Vito and his contemporaries. Otis walked beside his father and their professor friend, his small left hand linked to Andy’s right.

Last to depart was a cavalcade of trucks and race trailers. The final entry was driven by that angular crew chief who paused to

provide the challenged boy and his two adult companions a ride home.

Racing’s legendary bad boy, bootlegger roots prompted mixed responses. How much longer could a family-owned enterprise offer accessible, yet noisy entertainment near Kansas City’s core. While its noise, speed and risk attributes didn’t attract everyone , those Friday nights at the Olympic Speedway were loud, frenetic and so much fun.