Written by Gerry and Julie Goulet

What a beautiful day!! Could this have actually been a running of the Cape Codders Courageous? We cannot recall the weather ever being quite so cooperative. For the 28 teams that completed the course, it was a day to remember. We paid tribute to Cape Cod Kettle Cooked Potato Chips and unveiled our first ever use of what we have labeled “the nesting doll clue”. Since this is the last time we will be addressing you all in the role of rallymasters, we thought we would consider a few highlights of past years, both rally-related and not.

The first Cape Codders Courageous rally was held on March 17, 1951. It started from the Red Coach Grill in Middleboro, Massachusetts (burned down in late 1960) at a totally reasonable time of 1:30 PM . The seventh and final control was at the Southward Inn in Orleans (torn down after several name changes in 1977). Not quite a TSD event at that point, extra points were awarded to genuine sports cars, and additional points were awarded to genuine sports cars in “stark condition”. Participants also received extra points if they ran with the top down in March. The winning score for this first event was 882- the GREATEST number of points. First prize was a piece of driftwood, finely lacquered and polished and mounted on an exquisite black lacquered base. The first three teams were also awarded gift certificates for whatever Snap-On Tools would best serve their needs.

And the cars in those early days! This year, we had a couple of Corvettes, one vintage and one nearly new. In 1977, we had a Morgan and a Ferrari. But, the variety of classics from the first 24 years was something else, e. g., Duesenberg, Riley Roadster, Rolls Royce Phantom, Singer Roadster, M.G. Tourers, Jaguar XK 120, Aston Martin, Packard Convertible, Sunbeam Talbot, Healey Silverstone, Mercedes Benz 220 and 300.

In the early years of the CCC, racers, flaggers and other racing support people drove their race cars down to Provincetown each spring. The rally was part of a Cape Codders weekend that usually included a concours followed by an autocross or gymkhana. But, gradually, as the sport evolved, the event fell into the hands of the rally specialists and became a high pressure TSD “Trap and Loop” type event.

This was the case in 1975 on the occasion of the 25th running of the CCC. One hundred twenty cars participated in the TSD and the host, South County Motor Sports Club, brought together 50 volunteer workers from its own ranks and those of other clubs in order to assure the event’s success. One of those workers was Omer Norton, father of perennial OTR winner Cindy Rummel and grandfather of past OTR winner Damon Rummel. The TSD route ran 180 miles from the Howard Johnson’s in Bridgewater, Mass. (long gone) and ended at the Carlton House Royal Coachman in Provincetown (torched by an arsonist only 2 years later and now known as the Sandcastle Resort). Sophisticated for its time, the rally included 106 average speed changes and 18 lettered route instructions. Following the route involved finding 121 separate quoted signs while pausing or gaining certain amounts of time whenever the route crossed one of 9 different town lines. All the while, rallyists were attempting to stay out of various main road traps, “onto” traps and misquoted sign traps.

In contrast, the simultaneously run first “Old Timers” event was a cakewalk. It started in Bourne and ended in Provincetown and covered only 105 miles. Sherwood and Gina Martin finished in first place. They had won the 1956 and 1960 Cape Codders and Sherwood had been navigator
for the first car overall in 1973. Pres Bagley -father of two of this year’s competitors, Janet Foley and Barbara Chartier– finished in 4th place. This is also when we met region legends, Britt and Posie Ragsdale. Britt had participated in each of the first 24 Cape Codders, while Posie had missed just one. A class act, they made a great impression on us “kids” (hard to believe we were only 30 in 1978). They continued their string for a few more years, participating in all but one Old Timers event between 1975 and 1980.

According to our records of the first eleven years of the TSD, Pres went on to participate in all 11, garnering first place no fewer than 5 times, before going on to be an oftentimes rallymaster. Omer Norton ran in 9 of the 11, finishing in the top three on four occasions. Of this year’s entrants, Joe Caselli was the first to make an appearance, in 1981. He was joined in 1983 by Tracy Tupper and Bill Jecusco. Mark Williams then came along in 1984. The four of them, along with at least two others, were called the “Knights” and arrived at the event sporting jackets emblazoned with that name. Since then, we are pretty sure that Joe, Tracy, Bill and Mark have been perennials. Tracy, Bill and Mark have often served as rallymasters and unless we are wrong, Bill has had a hand in every Old Timers event since his rookie year of 1983. 1984 was the year Barbara Chartier made her first appearance. In 1985, Barbara, Pres and Janet each entered a car, finishing third, fourth and fifth respectively. Barbara and Janet have also served
as rallymasters several times over the years.

While the structure of the OTR has undergone very little change since 1975, a few other things
have changed. First, the OTR is no longer run concurrently with the TSD. We believe the last
CCC TSD was run in 1993. Second, the cost has seemed to change as well, but not as
appreciably as the absolute numbers would have us believe. We won’t mention this year’s gas
prices, which we hope are a short term aberration, but other costs, although they have
increased, are still reasonably comparable when inflation over 50 years is considered. For
example, in 1976, the OTR registration fee was $4 for members, $5 for non-members (around
$30 in current dollars) and buffet dinners were $7 each (around $41 in current dollars). Rooms
at the Sheraton in Hyannis ranged from $19 per night single occupancy to $32 per night quad
occupancy, comparable to $110-186 in current dollars. Third, the OTR was more laid back
during that first decade. As an example, in 1982, we listed the start time as, “9:00 A.M. (GIVE
US 15 MINUTES-WE’RE NOTORIOUS FOR NOT BEING ON TIME). Our reputation did not
improve appreciably in subsequent years. In 1984 and 1985, we were actually asking entrants
to give us 30 minutes! Then, there was the penalty for missing a location. It changed often
during the first 11 years. It was 100 points in 1975 and 1985 but varied between 20 and 50
during the intervening years. It was not until 1990 that 30 points became the standard penalty
observed for all future OTRs. Lastly, technology has had its own impact. The advent of the
camera phone has resulted in the demise of the post-finish question. No longer can a
rallymaster ask contestants to view a monument on a rock, hoping to stump them later with a
question about the number of rivets holding the monument to the rock.

Another difference was in the world of potato chips. As you all noted, this year each team was presented with a bag of Cape Cod Chips at the start, with instructions to forward a picture of the team’s designated captain holding the chip bag against a backdrop of the Cape Cod factory at the front end of the event and the Nauset Light near the event’s end. The key point is that the lifespan of the Cape Codders Courageous nearly doubles that of one of Cape Cod’s most well known manufactured products.

In 1975, Cape Cod Potato Chips did not exist nor did any company making kettle-cooked chips. But, on July 4, 1980, a new business with that name was established in a storefront in Hyannis and reintroduced kettle-cooked chips to the American market. This was the way potato chips had been made prior to 1920. The company produced about 200 bags of chips each day during its early, lean years. The original bag featured a generic red and white lighthouse and a boat with a red and white striped sail. In 1985, the company began its factory operations and the tours that were a feature for Cape visitors, including rally participants, for the next 40 years. In 1996, the bags first began to feature the Nauset Light, which became, and continues to be, the company logo although the chips are no longer manufactured on Cape Cod.

Time to get back to the rally!

Our original plan was to replicate to a certain extent the courses used in the first eleven years of the Old Timers. In those days, largely because we were attempting to mirror the simultaneously run TSD event, the Old Timers often ran from Bourne, or places west of the Cape, to Provincetown. Unfortunately, the logistics of doing so now with nice accommodations at each end proved prohibitively costly. So, we moved the start further east, with a start in Hyannis and a finish in Eastham. As is the case every year, a number of our planned locations had to be changed. This year the main culprit was ongoing sewer construction south of Route 28 in Barnstable, Yarmouth and Dennis. Nevertheless, the design that resulted was actually super! From our perspective as organizers, we wanted very much to get away from the circle/figure 8 patterns that characterize events that start and stop in the same locale. And we were very pleased, but totally surprised, by the resulting impact on courses chosen by rally participants. Twenty eight cars completed the rally. Seventeen of those cars visited every location. Astonishingly, those 17 cars chose 14 different ways of getting to each location. And not one car chose the route we had used in checking the event. We had not expected anything like that amount of variation!

Although past participants had visited some of the locations on earlier rallies, none of the questions had ever been used by us in the years that we served as organizers and, to the best of our knowledge, they had not been used by other rallymasters. So, that was a plus as well. In the end, the rally was even easier than last year. Once again, the first contestant to check in, with all questions answered correctly, did so before 3:30 PM. Moreover, sixteen cars went to every location and eight did so while answering all of the questions correctly. (Twice as many as last year!). Only one car did not finish and all others arrived before 6 PM. The biggest difference between those who finished in the top 75% of the standings and those who finished in the bottom quarter appeared to relate to time, or lack thereof. None of the latter made it to the upper Cape above Eastham. Yet, no one among the top 17 missed more than 2 questions. Everyone managed to locate the Cape Cod Chip Factory and the Sheep Pond Woodlands. At the other
end of the spectrum, Wellfleet turned out to be the venue for the two most difficult locations. Eleven cars failed to find the answer to the question at Indian Neck Beach (or Breakwater Beach, as it was identified on the map). The other tricky one was at Gull Pond Landing (Gull Point on the map). While five cars never got there at all, five others did but failed to find, or properly identify, one of the two signs at that location.

The sequence chosen by three cars, including the team with the lowest mileage, was the
Osterville Country Store, the Cape Cod Chip Factory, Millway Beach and Grays Beach (this
nesting doll clue fooled a few as it required one to note a key difference between one of several
vaguely identified signs at the first beach and its counterpart at a second beach several miles
away), the Peter Homer Memorial Park on Old Town House Road, the Fish House Redemption
in Harwich, the Worden Farm, the Sheep Pond Woodlands, the Atwood Museum, The Catch,
The Piping Plover at Eastham’s Coast Guard Beach, the upside-down bather at Nauset Light,
Indian Neck Beach, Gull Pond Landing, the Pamet Harbor Landing, Pond Village, the van Gogh
quote at Head of the Meadow Beach (these last three were all located in Truro), the
Provincetown Alignment sign and the Four Points by Sheraton in Eastham.

As always, the event could not have succeeded without the help of a number of individuals who
we can never thank enough. Once again, Mountain Man Hal Denham (who was co-chair of the
31st CCC and our boss for the 7th OTR) sacrificed the front end of his day to run the ODO
check in the morning and returned as Dapper Hal in the evening to check you all in between
3:30 and 6 PM. The only blessing he received (a significant one at that) was the gorgeous
weather. Jon Lamkins remains the liaison par excellence with the region and SCCA and our go
to for help with all of the administrative details. Tracy Tupper presented the Colbert Cup. The
Four Points by Sheraton in Eastham provided a wonderful stay and dinner at the Brickhouse
Restaurant was delicious and well received.

Finally, in addition to participating as rallyists on countless occasions, we have organized this event for 21 of its 51 years. Having that responsibility has been an enormous privilege and we have always looked forward to seeing you all year after year, especially those teenagers we met forty some years ago, the progress of whose children and grandchildren we now eagerly follow. We thank you all for letting us share in a little piece of your lives. We wish you health and happiness in the years to come. You have always made our efforts feel appreciated and for that we are forever grateful.