Name-Dropping for Fun...

[Zeke]

I guess I had forgotten about my little trip as a crew on a F5000 car. While in St. Jovite at the post race party I and the others drank Molsens and ate corn on the cobb out of a big vat with Dick Smothers and James Garner from the celebrity side. It was 1968 and the drivers like Posey and Hobbs were just... drivers. A2Z (Adamowicz) was there somewhere along with most of the SCCA gang of the period.

[Shaun @ Tru6]

Originally Posted by Nostril Cheese

minor hijack, but this is entertaining.

that was good, thanks.

[RANDY P]

Originally Posted by slakjaw

And I met red beard. So in your faces. Yo.

mee too.

[MDH]

Summer 1966, Green Bay Packer training camp, my brother, my cousins and I got to meet Vince Lombardi, Bart Starr, and most of the Super Bowl 1 Championship team.
My uncle was on the Packers board of directors......
As an 11 year old kid I was in awe........and Lombardi was actually a nice guy.

[rattlsnak]

I flew private jet charter for 8 years. I've met just about everybody who is somebody.

[porsche4life]

And I met red beard. So in your faces. Yo.

He helped me move into my apartment... So in your face!

[john70t]

Yeah, but does he clean windows?

[Don Ro]

You guys, I can't tell you how much I enjoy reading all of your stories.
I hope this thread goes on and on.
.
.
One more from me...not all that exciting:
One of my clients (Prop. Mng't) for 4 years (years ago) was a financial guru who was in on the ground floor of Apple.
Name withheld.
I have no idea about his $$$$$$$$$ worth, but his multi-stall garage on his estate had a new mega-buck auto about every 6 mo.s.
He also had a twin eng. something or other airplane.
His wife drove either her Bently Convert., her Snow White Land Rover, a Turbo VW Baby Blue Bug Convertible, or her black MB SUV.
She was/is a cutie and looked good in anything.
Both were as sweet as could be and would say to me, "Don, whatever it cost, just bill us."
Anyway, being around them presented me w/plenty of opportunities to process/mature through envy.
.

[Don Ro]

OK, that wasn't so hot...tennis bums, listen-up.
.
A hundred yrs. ago, I played USTA tournament tennis and through various introductions I met and hit with Hank Pfister several times.
He was ranked #10 World at the time.
Two things I took away from that acquaintance:
- He lost to Borg at the US Open but took a set off the champ.
Pfister said that how Borg's game would dishearten most players was that no matter how penetrating your shot was, Borg would be there waiting for the ball.
- I couldn't believe how much better I played as a result of hitting w/Pfister's level of skill.
Forever grateful, I was (am).

[LWJ]

I interacted with Abbie Hoffman in about 1986. Perhaps the most poisoned soul I have ever met.

[daepp]

I met Carrol O'Connor at LAX maybe 20 years ago. He was over the top gracious!
Hung out with Crosby and Nash at a Neil Young concert at the Greek
I see David Lindley around Claremont a couple of time a month
I've met Mark Steyn a couple of times - he even call my wife and I on our 25th anniversary
I have met John Voight at a couple speeches/luncheons
I met Andrew Breitbart two times. Watched part of a football game with him in a bar. That guy had energy. RIP Andrew
Sat down with Robert Earl Keen after a show late one night in SLO. Half an hour q&a about his music. VERY down to earth guy.
Probably others but they have all been good sports and have made my life just a tad bit richer.

[john70t]

Saw Saddat speak in Egypt a year before he was assassinated. Plate glass a foot thick.

I hacky-sacked with governor moonbeam at a redwoods logging protest in Ukiah, Ca.
He walked by and joined in for a second. Wasn't bad for a beginner.

Campaigned for Galvin Newsome(San Francisco mayor) for a friend and shook his hand.
Slick Willie Brown spoke at our University in a small room with 15 people.

I met David Crosby getting off a plane. Actually some large person was blocking the aircraft doorway. I looked up, stammered, and went by.
I saw Susan Lucchi in a LaGuardia gift shop on another occasion.

[Zeke]

Well, if it's just sightings and casual encounters, I saw Rod Serling speak at a university. It was far out.

[Heel n Toe]

My first wife worked in the Columbia office of Senator Strom Thurmond for a few years and once in awhile one of his kids would come to the office and play on her typewriter. That's really nothing, but...

As a perk of her working there, she and I got to go to the premiere of The Great Santini and met and talked with Robert Duvall afterwards. Very personable and accessible guy.

Casual encounter; my bud Brian and I were walking out the back gate of the paddock while at an IMSA GTP race weekend at Charlotte Motor Speedway in the mid 80's and Al Holbert, Jr. was coming in the gate. We just did the acknowledgement nod with a "hello" and he returned the same.

Because of being on a listserv of Creedence fans, our whole family was treated to tickets for a Creedence Clearwater Revisited concert and aftershow passes at Chastain Park in Atlanta in '97, so we got to meet Doug Clifford and Stu Cook, the original Creedence rhythm section. Oh yeah, it drizzled during most of the concert, so the rain songs were especially fun. Elliot Easton (ex Cars guitarist) was lead guitarist for them at that time, but he didn't come to the aftershow thing. I got to meet him later when I went to one of their concerts in Peachtree City. He was not a very chatty guy, but you should hear some of his work while he was with them.

Also because of being on that listserv, my oldest son and I got in for afternoon soundcheck and were able to meet John Fogerty afterwards at an indoor venue in Charlotte a year or two later. We went to the concert that night, but John C. Fogerty doesn't give away concert tickets to commoners.

Again, with the CCR fan listserv, both my sons and I were guests of Creedence Revisted for the pre- and post-race concerts and IRL race in Charlotte in '99 when that crash debris went up in the stands and killed three people. Tragic and scary... it happened several hundred yards from us. The race was black flagged and the post-race concert cancelled.

My current wife taught John Mellencamp's daughter Justice in middle school in Hilton Head when she lived there in the late 90's.

[Zeke]

This thread is fun because I am now remembering some encounters. I've run into a lot of famous people at car races. One of those was Dan Blocker from Bonanza fame. We were at the Can Am somewhere in the 60's at Riverside. We decide to get some tickets in the esses grandstands after coming in the gate. Turns out Blocker is up on the top row with several seats in the next row also reserved for his coolers and grill as well as his entourage.

So we're up there trying to watch the race with the big man looming above. He offers a few dogs to us which we devoured. He probably thought we were drinking a bit much and the food would help.

Not that he didn't have a few.

Harry Conick Sr. parked his Ferrari below the stands in T6.

I stood and watched Paul Newman discuss the track with Peter Brock in the pits.

What can I say? All I've ever done had to do with racing and building things house related. Never met one famous soul doing the houses.

[Flieger]

Well if we are going to include racing drivers, I've met Brian Redman, Patrick Long, Joerg Bergmeister, Wolf Henzler. Also met Norbert Singer at Rennsport Reunion 4.

Porsche famous: met Rob from Singer when they were testing the prototype at Willow Springs.I knew his old hot rod from my PCA region when he would autocross it. The first Singer copied the look.

I've hung out with Chad McQueen several times- with Magnus and Dave from TRE.

Seen Jay Leno several times.

Met Tony Adamowicz, Craig Watkins when he was Chief Engineer for Flying Lizards.

Met Hans Stuck when I was just a wee young'un.

[pete3799]

My wife and i stopped at a truck stop in Virginia. There sat a tour bus at the fuel island.
We both wondered who it might be.
We sat in the restaurant and figured the 5 or 6 guys at the table in the corner must be them.
Didn't ring any bells.
Our check came and these guys are ahead of us at the cashier.
This place had (it's a discount fuel/fast food place now) signed pictures of a bunch of country western stars on the walls and a few of the guys were checking them out so my wife asked if any of them were up there. Guy says "don't think they'd like our kind of music".
We head back to our rig and do some paperwork then head out. The bus is gone when we round the fuel island.
About a half hour south on 81 and there's the bus on the shoulder with the rear engine lid up and two guys looking in scratching their heads.
So i slam on the binders and pull in behind them, get out, and ask whats up as he's wiping the dip stick with what looks like a brand new T-shirt.
Motor won't even turn over so i ask if can give them a ride to the next truck stop (this is before cell phones) so the one guy says yeah let me grab my briefcase.
So in he climbs (my wife sat in the sleeper) and i've got the brakes released waiting for a break in traffic so i can pull out when another bus pulls off on the shoulder behind me.
I tell the guy and he looks in the mirror and says that must be Huey (still no bells going off) so we get out and discover that it's Huey Lewis and the fellows in the broke down bus are the Tower of Power horns. Got free tickets to the show in Roanoke,VA but i had to pass as my load had to be delivered the next morning in Memphis,TN.
My wife is still pi$$ed.

[kach22i]

I shook hands with "Denny" McLain while he was manning a table for some charity work near the entrance of the Lugnuts baseball stadium in Lansing last Saturday.

Denny McLain - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Dennis Dale "Denny" McLain (born March 29, 1944) is an American former professional baseball player.[1] He played as a pitcher in Major League Baseball for ten seasons, most notably for the Detroit Tigers. In 1968, McLain became the last pitcher in Major League Baseball to win 30 or more games during a season (31–6)— a feat accomplished by only eleven players in the 20th century.[2][3]

Large hands, still happy to meet people and be recognized.

[Don Ro]

Didn't he have a wicked fast ball?
I recall something about him having the fastest fast ball in his day.

[Robert Coats]

As a six-month old infant, I was bounced on the knee of German rocket scientist and Saturn V chief engineer, Wernher von Braun.