Since I am going to be writing to you, the readers of the magazine, I figured id give you guys and gals a little insight on myself. I can remember the first mini I ever saw. I was 8 years old and I used to go with my father to his shop in the summer every morning and help him open it up and make some money to put in the bank. He always had trouble finding people to work at the station because there was so many within a small vicinity so most mornings I would help him pump gas and vacuum cars that he worked on. I remember looking out the bay window and I saw a purple Mazda B2200 that was slammed pulling into the lot. I ran through the office and yelled to my father “I’ll get this one” and headed out to the pumps. As I walked up I could see that he had clear taillights, shaved door handles, blacked out windows, chrome mirrors (old school), and chrome wipers. As I walked up he got out and before he shut the door I caught a quick glimpse of the inside, which consisted of a lot of painted pieces, and a chain link steering wheel. The kid headed inside the shop and I remember walking around the truck thinking how “How does this thing get around?” I had never seen anything that low, from what I can remember this truck was the first real mini truck I had ever seen with any modifications done to it. As I ran inside to collect the money I learned that the kid applied for a job and would be starting the following week. I worked almost every day that this kid worked. I would head into work in the morning with my dad and hang out until he came in and I would help him pump gas. He gave me a lot of insight into the scene, and introduced me to a lot of people with customized trucks that I had never even noticed before. If I had to pick a time, Id say this is the first point in my life that I showed a lot of interest in the scene.
I used to walk up to the corner market every day at lunch and look at the magazines, and one day there was this magazine on the shelf called “Scrape” which was filled with low riders, and west coast style rides. Right behind it was a Mini Truckin, which I had never even noticed before. I bought both the magazines and was on my way to learning more about the scene, and customized vehicles. Soon after that I was introduced to a mechanic whom I over heard talking about a bagged Nissan Hardbody. I had never seen a bagged truck before so I asked him if I could take a look at it. Later that day I saw a red Nissan pulling in to the lot, as I watched it roll by I heard the “pssssst” of the valves opening and the truck was instantly on the ground. He was showing me around the truck, which was real clean. It had a dump bed, 4x4 fenders, 16” chrome wheels, chrome fender flares, mirrors, wipers, and a chrome front bumper. Seeing this truck made me that much more interested in the scene. 		Years later I was driving down the road with some friends when I saw two bagged trucks sitting in a local car wash. As we pulled in they where just finishing up and we stopped and talked with them. They told us there where a bunch of other bagged trucks out by where they lived, and that there best friends was a photographer for Tailgate. I had only picked up Tailgate Magazine a few times but I figured it would be cool to meet some new people. We followed them for about 20 minutes and ended up in the parking lot of an Ames where there were a bunch of customized trucks sitting in the parking lot. Out from one of the trucks came this kid cracking jokes on everybody’s rides, and I just knew for some reason that his was the kid. I was introduced to him, and within the next 15 minutes we had talked about everything from car shows, bagged trucks, clubs, and magazines.
Through the years following that I attended many shows with these guys including Low Rollers End of Summer Bash, Carlisle All Truck Nats, Garden State Nats, Magnetic Minis Bash, and many others. I’d say I was instantly hooked. I picked up my first truck for $5000 cash (all the money I had saved from working with my father, and shoveling snow) when I was 16, which was a slightly modified Sonoma. The truck was already lowered and whoever had lowered it did a hack of a job. The pinion angle was off on it and the yoke shredded up and shot shards of metal into the trans blowing the trans. We had to take out the whole rear suspension and figure out why it was off (needed shims) and upon discovering the problem it was fixed. I also swapped out the front suspension and bolted up a new exhaust because the old one was rotted out. That truck was the first mini I ever owned.
I never really got to do much to it, because on my 17th birthday I was headed to the mall to get my hair cut and a girl driving her parents car cut me off and I t-boned her car. After that I fixed the truck, and months later got into another accident where somebody blindsided my truck. I sold the truck to a kid who had seen it driving around and wanted to use it as a parts truck for his s-10. Next would be the Civic, which is still my project car.
I had a knack for talking pictures of everything; friends trucks, working on rides, car shows, and everything else. I came across Street Source in 1999 (when it was still Street Scene) after hearing about it from a few kids at a car show I attended. I remember putting it in my favorites and would check back a few times a week to see all the owner profiles, and some of the magazine coverage just to see what’s going on in the scene.