November 11-13, 2016 by Tom Oncken
On one Sunday sometime back in 1993, several Texas Chapter members got together at Louis Rothermel’s shop by chance. If I recall correctly, it all started with John Hoyler who had just moved down to Texas from Michigan, and John was totally infected with the antique outboard motor collecting bug. During one workweek, John touched base with Louis, and the two of them decided to invite me and a few others to meet at Luther’s Bar-B-Q for lunch on the following Sunday. After the meal, we traveled over to Louis’ shop to look at some of his old outboards. As a rookie in the club, I felt like I had entered a museum. There were strange motors there that I had never seen before. The next thing you know, a barrel was filled with water and we began tinkering with a motor. Imagine my surprise that the old “piece of junk” actually ran.
This particular gathering was nothing formal and it was never written about in the Texas Chapter newsletter; however, it did inspire Louis to invite the entire Texas Chapter membership to a meet at his shop on November 20, 1994. Billed as the “Houston Tech/Swap Dry Meet”, 13 individuals attended including Roy Bailey, Don Carmichael, Tony Cloud, John Hoyler, John Long, Brenden Macaluso, Robert Macaluso, Jerry Martin, Mike Oncken, Tom Oncken, Louis Rothermel, Phil Siegel, and Frank Simon. That meet’s success marked the official start of the Houston Swap Meet that has occurred every year since. In the past 23 years, the meet has grown and now starts on Friday while ending on Sunday.
Our 23rd annual Houston Swap Meet was once again a great success. Attendance was down a little from prior years; however, 42 individuals came to the meet over the three day period. Those who attended included Louis Rothermel (Host), Tom Oncken (Co-Host), Tom Ashe, Jerry Ball, Darrell Beaulier, Mark Betner, Alan Bischof, Tony Cloud, David Coffey, Jr., David Coffey, Sr., Louis Dement, Dave DeMoia, Tim Dugan, Weldon Eklund, Adam Finn, E. J. Fournet, John Graf, Bruce Henderson, Di Johnson, Gary Keeney, Morten Lovstad, Bob Macaluso, Brenden Macaluso, Joe McCauley, Harold McGuire, Scott Pearse, John Plato and grandson Jack Toole, Chip Rathbun, Rich Reich, Joe Rome, Howard Sandoz, Mark Schmidt, Pete Schultz, John Slator, “Scott-Atwater Al” Smith, Glenn Seureau, Royce Strickland, Leonard Sturm, Ray and Dot Watson, and Bob Witt.
Activity started out a little slow on Friday morning, but quickly picked up by midday. Several of our members soon began the wheeling and dealing of their outboard motors and parts. Around noon, Louis Rothermel took up a collection for lunch and bought some fantastic hamburgers from Pete’s Finer Meats nearby. Pete’s burgers make MacDonald’s quarter pounder look more like a kid’s happy meal. After an afternoon of visiting and trading, Adam Finn and a couple of others decided to take their usual trip to the Jax Grill.
Saturday morning started out a lot busier than Friday did. Louis had the coffee and donuts ready and it was not long until motors and parts were set out for sale and motors were being run in the test barrel. Several members commented that there were not quite as many motors for sale or trade this year as in previous years.
Louis Rothermel and Tom Oncken took up the lunchtime collection just after noon and made the trip to Pappas Bar-B-Q for the buffet-style meal for which this meet has become famous. Lunch was $10 per person for all-you-can-eat brisket, sausage, potato salad, coleslaw, pinto beans, and other condiments supplied by Pappas. If anyone left hungry, it was their own fault.
An Elto Ace was donated by Vin McMaster of Dallas and an Evinrude Speeditwin was donated by Chip Rathbun to be raffled after lunch. We asked for volunteers from the gallery to draw the winning tickets for the two motors. Louis Rothermel was the proud recipient of the Elto Ace and David Coffey, Jr. became the new owner of the Evinrude Speeditwin. Proceeds of the raffle sales were given to Chip Rathbun for the chapter bank account after completion of the meet.
Although activities were not scheduled to end until 6:00pm on Saturday, most of the attendees took off early this year and only a few remained after 2:30pm. Regardless, the few of us that stayed enjoyed a quiet afternoon of visiting and playing with motors.
Sunday was our day to work on motors and we had the usual amount of people show up. John Graf had a Martin 20 that he needed to work on. It turned out to be stuck and needed additional time for the penetrating oil to work. I checked Jerry Ball’s Sea King in his absence to see if it had spark. It did. Glenn Seureau had a stubborn Mercury water pump issue to figure out. Last, but never least, Louis had to reassemble a 1946 Mercury that he had taken apart at his last meet in 2015. We all worked on motors, ate leftover Bar-B-Q, and then picked up the meet site and returned it to a normal shop again. We left about 6:00pm as originally designed.
Louis and I talked a little while at this past meet and have decided that we are going to attempt to host the Houston Swap Meet at least through its 25th anniversary if both of us remain in good health. So if you have any recommendations for any changes to the format, please let us know so we can prepare for the future.
More pictures from this event can be viewed in the photo gallery at: http://www.texaschapteraomci.com/?post_type=gallery&p=5499&preview=true