Cruising for Crotch

My time period on Douglas was a little later than most of the rest of the contributors. We were Draggin' Douglas starting in the summer of 1966 until January of 1971 when I was drafted. After I was discharged and returned to the States, known as "going back to the world" as we did not consider where we were to be part of the real world, I stopped regular cruising of Douglas. I was married while I was in the Army and we had considered it "uncool" for married couples to be cruising Douglas. My wife and I might take a pass once a month, if that often.

As my friends and I were very car oriented, nothing else mattered, other than girls. Going "downtown" was simply what you did if you had any cool at all. We called it "cruising for crotch" or "chasing pussy". I guess that we were not too politically correct then.

At a minimum, you had to be downtown Thursday, Friday and Saturday night and occasionally Sunday afternoon. Friday and Saturday night were often long nights as we might not head home until 03:00 or 04:00am. Weeknights we generally went home by 10:00 or 11:00pm as we had school or work the next day.

We primarily cruised a shorter run than some. We cruised from Sandy's west on Douglas to Main where we turned south on Main. Main was a one-way street south bound then but of course that was before Mayor Bob Knight decided to throw away more taxpayer money and build that piece of crap at about Main and Dewey that he declared to be the "Gateway to Wichita".

Gateway To Wichita

Gateway To Wichita

It was amusing that the "gateway" was on a one-way street that left downtown so you could only see the gateway in your rear view mirror as you left. - - - - - So, being the rocket scientist that he was, he had Main changed to two-way for the short distance between Kellogg to Douglas. That is why today if you are headed north on Main at Douglas you get to sit at the traffic light and look across Douglas at the cars that are headed directly at you pending the head-on collision. Hold on, I started to share my love for idiot Bob Knight, I will get back on topic. One last comment about the impressive gateway with its stainless steel sculptured bustedass windmill things or diseased horse heads or whatever it is that we taxpayers paid for. Since Kellogg is now elevated with the fly-over in the area you cannot even see the damn thing when you drive by on Kellogg as it is down below you.

Kellogg Flyover

Good job Bob that was certainly well thought out! Anyway, after heading south on Main we turned west on Williams and followed Century II Drive around until it intersected with Douglas where we turned back east on Douglas headed back to Sandy's. You need to remember that Douglas was 4 lanes all the way from Woodlawn to West Street. The two lane crap in the Delano area and around St. Francis was done to stop the cruising. Unfortunately that and other conditions worked.

We sometimes did a long cruise from Sandy's taking Douglas all the way to West Street and then north on West to Griff's Burger Bar. Griff's was a drive through similar to Sandy's where most of the West High kids hung out when they were not downtown. Occasionally but far less often we would take Douglas to Seneca and head south on Seneca to Pawnee to the McDonalds where all of the South High kids hung out. The long cruises were infrequent as the concentration of kids was less than in the downtown area and therefore they were far less productive in meeting "crotch". We stayed mainly downtown as fuel costs were always a concern. After all you could spend as much as $5.00 to fill that tank with Ethel and we still needed money for cokes and the important beer.

On our route Sandy's was the heart of it all. That is where all of the main action was and everywhere else was on a lower scale. The building that was Sandy's is currently located at Douglas and Grove with Grove on the west side of the building parking and Poplar on the east side of the parking as had been address by others. What has not been addressed is that Sandy's was not always on the corner of Grove and Douglas but it has always been on the corner of Douglas and Poplar. "Wait, what the hell is this guy talking about? How is that possible", you ask. Well, those of us that were there will remember that sometime in the late seventies to early eighties Grove was rerouted to the east which forced the demolition of the filling station that was located to the west of Sandy's.

Douglas at Grove Standard Station from Sandy's Parking lot

I do not remember for sure but it seems like it was a Standard or a Sinclair. If you look at a map or maybe Mapquest you will see a street named Grove Drive just west of Grove at Douglas. Grove Drive is the old Grove. If you imagine the current Grove was not where it is today but over on the current Grove Drive position it is easy to see that there was room for a nice full service station with a large drive for pumps. Grove was rerouted from Kellogg east to Central where it transitions back to the old Grove location between Central and Elm. This was done to allow more and improve parking for East High as well as to help traffic flow for the heavy traffic on Grove. "Wait once again, what was that last part? Heavy traffic on Grove? Where exactly would that be going to or coming from?" Hey, I didn't say that Wichita's traffic engineers and planners had their stuff anymore together then than they do today. Has anyone ever seen more than seven cars on north Grove at one time? Sorry, got carried away again.

There were places along Douglas that we would sometimes stop and park like the Quality Chevrolet lot that was east of the main building but west of the used car area that was on the corner of Hydraulic and Douglas.

Quality Chevrolet Parking Lot now Big Dogs

Another place that we would stop would be on the canal bridge on the east bound side of Douglas. The overhead I-135 "Canal Route" did not exist then and the Douglas Street Bridge was very wide there for some reason with about an extra lane and a half which allowed room to park on the bridge and not impede traffic. Of course you had to at least drive through Sandy's and usually stop and get a Coke and sometimes fries while scouting for girls and what new ride someone had.

At Canal Route Bridge Gas Station Parking Lot

When we pulled out of Sandy's we always turned to the east behind Sandy's to get onto Poplar where it was mandatory to see if you could light the tires all the way to corner of Poplar and Douglas. Usually the traffic would not allow that but that was always the goal. That way the tires were good and hot and sticky if you happened to catch the light at Grove with someone that you wanted to gas it with.

We were absolute clean freaks about our cars. We would not even think about going downtown without a clean car. When the streets were wet we would go off to a car wash on First Street and wash off the car and head back to Sandy's. That way you could cruise thru Sandy's with a clean ride when everyone else had a dirty car. There were times that we might wash off the car every hour or so. Of course that depended on how many girls were cruising that evening and if we thought we had a chance of impressing them.

Besides the normal being "cool" and talking to girls as you cruised we employed an unusual approach to meeting a car load of girls. We would get crazy and jump in their car. We would work through traffic and catch them at light and one of us, usually not the driver, would get out of our car and run up to the girls' car and open the passenger's door and sit down, close the door, the light would change and away we would go. There were even times when we were in the downtown area where there was an architectural dividing wall between east bound and west bound traffic that we would jump over the wall and get in a car load heading the other direction.

1963 Douglas Ariel View to East of Market Street of Serpentine Median

It was a lot of fun, always good for a laugh even when the girls turned out to not be as good looking as originally thought. I cannot remember even once where the girls really got mad or anything occurred other than a good laugh. Today a maneuver like that would get you shot or run over since the twit would be on her cell phone.

Douglas would go through a transition through the night. Early in the evening, 7:00pm or so things got busy with car loads of kids ages 15 to early 20s out cruising. Douglas was often bumper-to-bumper from Washington to Main. They were mainly out to see and be seen as George pointed out earlier. Around 8:30 or 9:00 things got more serious with looking for members of the opposite sex but everyone was still cruising and there might be a opportunity to "juice it" just a little bit with some guy in traffic. That whacking of the throttle was generally only a roll into first with a full power shift to second gear and then just click into fourth gear and as often was a prelude to festivities later in the night. Around 10:00 to 11:00 traffic reduced as the girls and younger guys that had curfews headed home leaving the older hard core types with Douglas.The cruising reduced at that time and more parking at strategic areas was normal. The focus changed to setting up a race or going to watch someone race. That guy that you juiced earlier might come looking for you or you might go looking for him. Sometimes it was just racing and other times there was a lot of money at stake. Most times it was just fun and hanging out.

The whole activity was very much as it was portrayed in "American Graffiti" so I guess that cruising was not unique to Douglas but a phenomenon of the times. We were cruising long before the movie was made and apparently so was other parts of the nation.

Mike Rickords