The following piece posted by Looney Duner be deserving Slappy's Best A Da Month Award for the month of April. Some good Glamis history in this piece. Great job Looney Duner.
Slap is going to need your info so he can send you a Slappy Package Looney Duner. E-mail it to slappymcduner@hotmail.com...
Posted by Looney Duner—4-2-2003
Hello Guessers,
Slap that was a mighty fine piece of G history! Alot of people dont know alot about the old G stuff, this will be a good little history lesson for newbies like WW999, and others . We started going to glamis in 71-72, camping in the area where the old abandoned sand drag track sits now behind the new store on the south side of 78, at that time there was nothing there, I was seven years old and rode a mean purple Taco 44model 5hp. mini bike, graduated to a Honda trail 70 a couple of years later. We moved our camping spot to the old store(north side78) around 74, at that time the owners name was Bill Smith, he rented us a camping spot for a minimal amount each year, this man was responsible for all of the upgrades in the old camping area behind the store, cabanas, pool,(a fricken pool in the middle of the desert, this was awesome!)bathrooms, etc..which my dad helped work on. Shortly after all of this work was completed a couple from Michigan came out on vacation to try the dunes of Glamis, their names were Bill & Judy Boyd, they had two little girls in tow, this was about 1976. Bill and Judy were duners frome the Great Lakes region, but when they saw Glamis they fell in love with her magical beauty, and decided to stay. They made on offer that Bill Smith couldnt refuse and were the proud new owners of the original Glamis Beach Store. Bill was a former fireman, and Paramedic, so he ended up doing alot of the medical calls (which I did alot of ride-alongs with him on, I was an ambulance chaser at an early age) in the desert until an ambulance could get there from Brawley. While camping behind the old store we met up with another group of duners, they were a dune buggy club called "The Looney Duners of Duarte" (hence my screen name). These people took us in and asked us to join their club. The Looney Duners also did alot of the search and rescue back in those days(before GPS), there was one other group that did alot of S&R also, I think their name was the LAS or LOST EXPLORERS from Brawley, they were more of a jeep club I believe. The year1979-80 is when the Gene LeBlanc era started, the way I heard it was that Gene stopped by the old Glamis Beach Store for some gas, these gas pumps were the old-fashioned hand crank pumps, and he ended up waiting for quite a while, got fed up and went in and chewed some a**, he basically told them if they couldnt run this place properly, they needed someone who could( not verbatim), soon after he bought the store from Bill & Judy. Gene was a shrewd business man, soon after his purchase he tried he attempted to raise our camping fees behind the store to an outrageous amount, and The Looney Duiners told him to take a hike. We moved our camping area once again, our new home in 1980 was Boardmanville. Chuck Boardman allowed us to build new Cabanas, and Bathrooms back a few hundred yards southeast of where the boardmanville store sits, we put in water storage tanks and we ran our water pumps, and water heaters for our bathrooms, and all of our lighting off of an old monster Army diesel generator. The Looney Duners camped in this location until around 92-93, at this time we started losing some people from the group, people started camping in different areas, and some people just started going their seperate ways. Jump to the future, I now have my two boys, and my lovely wife and we introduced our boys to the wonderful world of Glamis 3 Years ago. Needless to say these two little dune freaks will be doing this someday with their children, thats why we need to take care of this place, so the next generations can enjoy it people. This is not just a place you can go to for a few years tear it up and throw it away, there are alot of people who have spent quite a bit of time with the lovely MOTHER G! O.K. enough reminiscing, the answer to the old school question, The Looney Duners sponsored a race for quite a few years, it was held very near the vendors flats rollers. It was a time trial type race, on a twisting and turning closed course track, flagged and staked throughout the dunes, it was hugely successful, and very fun. There were different classes for types of vehicles, and ages, you raced against the clock for best e.t.s. This race was a huge fund raiser for Multiple Sclerosis, one of the members from the Looney Duners had this disease and thought this would be a good way to raise money for the M.S. Foundation. The race was called the, "M.S. SUPER TWIST" There thats the ANSWER. How about that SLAP WHEW!!!! I'm winded
_________________
Tim