MEMORIES of Garth Becker by Bob Healy
I was heart broken to learn of the passing of Garth, he was my best childhood friend and I will remember and miss him always.
In the spring of 1959 my sister Marg brought home this tall skinny curly blonde guy she had met outside school, Garth. All he talked about was cars. Wow, we became instant friends. Over the next two years we spent most free time together talking cars and souping up his dads 52 Pontiac with all sorts of speed equipment that we could scrounge up. Garth and Marg broke up but Garth and I stayed best buddies. In 1961 Garth was working for a local photo lab and he bought a 1958 Chev Biscane and at that time I bought a souped-up 52 Olds that spent most of its time being fixed rather than driven. That spring we planned a trip to the US, Great Fall MT. We each saved up a $100.00 for our trip costs and things we planned to buy for our cars. As the time came for our trip Garth’s mother made us a lunch, but didn’t understand where we were going. I took a couple of Dad’s beers and my parents thought I was staying over at Garths for the long weekend. We took off on our adventure, heading to the boarder, we never even had our lunch until we crossed the line because we were so nervous and left the beer in the trunk in case we were stopped. We got to Great Falls that night and stopped at a motel. It cost $ 20.00 and the motel held Garth’s gas card until checkout. We were a little scared by all of this, if we didn’t get the card back, how would we get home. In the morning we got the card and left to check out the town and visit the local speed shop. We spent most of our money, Garth got some chrome spinner hubcaps and chrome engine parts for the 58 Chev and I got a used duel carb manifold and chrome pipes for my car. What a day. In the speed shop we saw the poster for the drag race track and it said that Sat. time trials were free, Sunday racing was $ 5.00 per car at the gate. The guy at the speed shop said if you stay at the track on Sat. night we wouldn’t have to pay to get in on Sunday. So off we went. We saw some time trials racing, our first experience in drag racing, bought hamburgers and fries and went to the car and drank the hot beers we had brought. We slept in the car that night and the next morning we were up and ready to see some drag racing. As we sat in the stands and it began to rain, it just poured. We ran for the car, which was parked in the dirt field and we soon got stuck. I pushed and pushed in the pouring rain, until we were on the gravel road. At that point I stripped off my wet muddy shirt and pants as Garth laughed at my mess. Like good travelers we had packed a change of cloths. The rain poured down and we got lost. Stopping at a gas station they gave us directions to the Cdn border, we got gas, pop and candy bars, as that was the only things they sold and we needed to put it on the gas credit card as we only had $15.00 between us. We headed north following the directions we had been given at the gas station but it wasn’t the way we had come to Great Falls, the road took us to the west by Glacier Ntl. Park. It poured rain and the road was like a snake as night fell, we couldn’t see the road and we had to stop. We saw a motel and asked about a room, they wanted $10 but we told him we only had $5, he gave us the room. We finished off the bucket of chicken we had gotten earlier, it cost $4. The next morning we drove to Browning and had breakfast for $1.00 each and headed for the Cdn boarder. We crossed the line with $2 in our pockets. That was the first of many explorations of youth for Garth and me. I greatly admired Garth. He was my best friend.
In 1980 Garth changed his life, he married you, Lynn. You made his life better and I knew that for him to move on in his new life he would have to leave old friends and memories behind, that’s how you grow as an adult. I have missed him all these years and will treasure our years of friendship always.
Please say hello to Hilda for Anne and myself. Hilda and Jim were like family to us. I often think of the summer nights we sat in front of the campfire talking into the night.
Anne and I will be unable to make it to the service, Anne has MS plus other medical compilations and we have a scheduled medical review to discuss treatment options at 10:00 am
Our thoughts and prayers are with you,
Anne & Bob Healy
