Randy Breckenridge

Posted 2/1/10. The world’s greatest car and plane bookstore is located at 3524 West Magnolia Boulevard in Burbank in the heart of San Fernando Valley car country, not far from Warner Bros. studios and the Big Dog Garage, where Jay Leno houses his spectacular private collection of classic cars and motorcycles. Leno, who frequently shows up at car shows in the valley and who can be seen driving an antique steamer or some other rare and expensive vehicle of his around town, often drops in at Autobooks-Aerobooks to pick up a technical manual for an Olds Toronado with 1,000 horsepower or a Mercedes SLR McClaren or some other car that he and his staff of mechanics are working on.

Autobooks-Aerobooks, owned by the husband and wife team of Tina Van Curen and Chuck Forward, is the biggest and oldest (founded in 1951) car bookstore in the United States, and it draws car buffs from around the state, country and world. As such I felt a little sheepish driving up to my signing on Saturday, seeing a bunch of guys standing outside the store talking and showing off their rides in the rear parking lot. Feeling that my road-weary 11-year-old Toyota Camry might not be the most impressive set of wheels for a car author to roll up in, I discretely parked out of view on a side street and walked in the front door. 

Not that anyone would have cared; nobody really showed up to see me except for my longtime friend and former UCLA roustabout Gary Grillo and his daughters Maddy and Kate (pictured between Chuck Forward, left, and Gary on the right). Also making the scene was another ex-Bruin, Al Stamler, whom I had not seen in decades. Here’s a story of how the Internet can make connections: One day last month Al, wondering whatever happened to a mutual friend of ours, Randy Breckenridge, googled his name. Up popped a blog I had written about Randy, recalling our adventures on the Colorado River and the fact that he had died.

Randy was another UCLA pal; that was where we met. He lived on the same dorm floor as Gary, Al and me. After (and during) college Randy and I rafted rivers and climbed mountains and kicked around Yosemite together, and I dedicated Wheels of Change to his memory. The book, sadly, is filled with the stories of daring young men who, like Randy, died too young. (Though he did not die in a car accident, but other circumstances.) Al, who lives in the San Fernando Valley (and is pictured here), had lost touch with Randy over the years and was shocked to read what happened to him in my blog. He dropped me an email, I told him about my signing at Autobooks-Aerobooks, and he swung by the store a few minutes before noon. After concluding my authorial duties we stepped down the block to Porto’s for lunch, catching up with each other and agreeing that yes, life can be a tough proposition at times, and—to borrow the line of playwright and raconteur Wilson Mizner—"the first hundred years are the hardest.”