Larry Olson's a dirt track dad, heart attack survivor

Greetings from Larry Olson, the good looking one. (I’m sure that “Lawrence”, the other Larry Olson, might properly argue. He's the one in the blog Archives with Connie Volden.)

Well it all comes full circle! I thought I’d never come back to Alex after high school. Now I’m retired and living here and loving it! It’s still hard to believe how much Alex has grown! I remember when they put in “New 29” and the freeway. Now when you mention “new 29” everyone looks at you funny. That’s progress. I used to live by the “Coke Plant” which was nearly the end of town. Now that’s not there anymore and town goes a lot further south. We were fierce rivals of Glenwood in sports, now we’re not even in the same conference.

Trailboss, you wanted some history, so here goes. I graduated in the upper part of the lower quarter of our class. Hey, that was an accomplishment, considering what I put into it.
Put 3 years, 8 months and 5 days into the Navy during the nasty little war over there in SE Asia. (Got an early out of the total 4 years, whoopee.) Did have fun though, got to see the world, didn’t catch a communicable disease and managed not to get shot. In retrospect, I did grow up a lot and utilized the GI bill to get back into school.

Dinked around at the U of M for a year, didn’t like that and then went to electronics school at Wadena Tech. Really enjoyed that and met a wonderful woman there who agreed to marry me. We will be celebrating 33 years together this October and that IS an accomplishment ... mostly on her part though because I certainly wouldn’t put up with me that long! We had two boys, David and Grant, now 26 and 24. No grandchildren yet, but David will be married this summer and we’re hoping. We put on a new addition to accommodate them.

Land on Latoka
I tell everyone with kids at home to enjoy them while you’ve got them. When they’re gone, they’re gone! We sure enjoyed ours. They spent their grade school in Moorhead. The kids went to Catholic School, we all had a ball and we all keep in close touch with friends we made there. I had some land on Latoka that beckoned so we built a house and moved to Alex in 1992. Both boys went to junior high and graduated from Jefferson in 1997 and '98.

David was my race car driver. We had him in go kart racing for 5 years and when he turned 16 got him into a dirt track modified for another 5 years. We had a wonderful racing partnership with the whole family with a lot of great memories and did very well, mostly racing here at the Viking Speedway. David went off to school in Mankato, met a wonderful gal and now we’ve lost him. Not really, but it’s tough not having him around. Besides, I lost my driver and mom won’t let me drive anymore.

My youngest son, Grant, was the jock. Ran track, on the individual 400 and 4 X 4 team, that went to state every year. Played basketball up through 11th grade as point guard. He was very fast but not tall which hurt in the end. Grant excelled in football and I have to always commend the football program at Jefferson. They played the kids that paid their dues. As starting cornerback his team went to state in 11th grade where he played the championship game at the Minneapolis Metrodome against Eden Prairie, where they got waxed. (But, hey, they got there!)
They both went to college. David graduated with an engineering degree and Grant has a year left that he’ll finish up this and next year at St. Thomas – I hope!! Both are doing very well, my wife and I are pretty proud of them.

Hopeless
I was on the road for 28 years selling medical equipment in the Dakota’s and western Minnesota. I sold anesthesia equipment, monitoring, infant care equipment etc. etc. for the same company all but 4 years of that time. The first four years I was an electronic technician and serviced all the equipment until they decided I was hopeless and made me a salesman. My company was bought out by another and merged two sales forces together. As one of the older guys, I was given an opportunity to retire. It was such a great deal that I took the money and ran.

That was the end of 2000 at which time our two boys were just leaving home, which left my wife home alone so it worked out real well to retire. We sold the house on Latoka and are now swamp dwellers. Well, kinda anyway, we moved out southeast of Forada by the “Forada Swamp”. We have a nice little, and little is nice when it comes to upkeep. The first year I did some traveling with a race team all over the country. A local racer put together a Winston Cup race car that we ran 10 races in the ARCA Series in 2001. We would race on Saturdays just before the Winston Cup would race on Sundays at the big tracks in Charlotte, Atlanta, Chicago, Kansas City, Michigan. We did well enough on our small budget that we finished in the top ten and on the top lap in the last three races. Not many people can say they were there inside the racetrack with some of the big Nascar names. I had a ball but we ran out of money and had to quit. But, hey, he gave it a shot, not many racers can say they actually tried to go to the big time.

Now I’m at the local Ford and Chrylser dealership, Juettner Motors, as the Internet Sales Manager. Mama told me to get my fat butt out of the house, I knew one of the owners there and that’s where I’m at now. I’m having a ball and reacquainting myself with a lot of our fellow classmates. Instead of being a competitor at the Viking Speedway here in Alex, now I’m on the board of directors and help run the place.

Wife is the smart one
The major love of my life is the smart one in this family. Karen is a broker at Merrill Lynch in Alex and really enjoys her career. It is different now, not being the main bread winner in the family.

I’ve got four years until 62 at which time I’ll fully retire and pursue another hobby that I’m working on. But Karen has another 10 years and then we’ll see. It’s been interesting these last years, having survived a heart attack and getting back into a shape that is not round. It is amazing the old classmates I run into and are talking health aspects. It was always the old folks that drove me nuts talking about their operations but now I’m an “old folk”!! Go figure.

I’ll do some checking on the missing names and then look forward to meeting everyone again. I’m sure no one will recognize me as back then I was a skinny 125 pounds and now, well let’s just say I’m almost twice the guy I was then, no more hair and a lot more life lines around the eyes. I will send off my $25 check for ma and me and will "be there or be square." Yes, square dancing might carry the western theme too far!!

With Best Regards, Larry Olson