The sputter of a motorcycle engine, the clatter of changing gears, the leap of a charging motor, a wild scramble to safety, and it was all over.
Thus is described the longest ride eve taken by Patrolman Victor Holdsbrooks of the Concord police department, over a course not more than 30 feet long.
The rotund officer started Friday afternoon to Corbin street to kill a dog, and desiring to reach his destination as soon as possible commandeered the police department motorcycle, which was standing in front of the city hall. Officer Holdbrooks is an efficient chauffeur but he also is particular about his dress, and being without leggings and knowing the tendency of he motorcycle to throw oil and grease as it bounds along, he sought a driver.
A man standing nearby told the officer he could manage the motorcycle. He assured the officer that he knew all there was to know about such machines.
The trouble lay in the fact that he knew motorcycles in general but not this one in particular. This machine has long done most valiant duty for the city and has so nearly run its course that a new one has been ordered to replace it. The steering apparatus is not all that is should be, the gas intake is peculiar in that it “opens up” with a ban, and the “get away” is a delight to those persons who want to be on the way right now. Holdsbrooks took the seat of honor in the sidecar, and with a gentle “pour it in her” set himself for a pleasant ride.
The motor of the machine sputtered madly as the volunteer chauffeur ramped on the starter, the gears slipped into place with a clatter and the machine made a wild dive for the curbing near the Sanitary Grocery Store.
No mention of worn-out brakes had been made to the impromptu driver, but in the short distance from in front of the city hall to the curbing he learned the fact. He applied every known remedy of machinery and when these failed three both feet to the ground and with the aid of several baskets of vegetables stopped the machine just as it started on a smashing trip through the big plate glass windows of the grocery store.
Patrolman Holdbrooks, in the meantime, was helpless to aid himself or the driver. When the machine hit the curbing with a thud that attracted many persons, he was thrown several feet in the air and though he used every trick known to an acrobat, he could land nowhere except in the seat of the cavorting cycle. When the motor was finally stopped the officer was the first to dismount. One glance at the smashed vegetable baskets, another look at the wild machine and the officer was away on foot to find the dog. He was in fine mood for a murder.
From page 2 of The Concord Daily Tribune, Feb. 13, 1926
newspapers.digitalnc.org/lccn/sn92073201/1926-02-13/ed-1/seq-2/
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