Curse of the Cone Johnson
In March of ‘69, after countless trips to Bruce Wiggins’ Sports Shop and months of studying ads in Surfer magazine, I bought my first surfboard. The beautiful 9’ 8”, psychedelic foam spray, Greg Noll Stemwinder started my transition from button-down Gants and wing-tips to Birdwell Baggies and sandals.
By June, along with my best buddies Tommy and Terry, we had surfed every spot between High Island and Surfside. We quickly learned that the dawn patrol offered the best shot at uncrowded lineups and coveted glassy conditions.
The night before the first trip of the summer, I set my alarm for 4:00 but didn't need it, and by 4:15, I had finished loading my Delta Green '68 Volkswagen. The early morning was still and damp, and the air was scented with mimosa and wet tallow leaves. I took a dishrag from the kitchen and wiped the dew off my windshield, tossed it in the floorboard, cinched the Stemwinder tight on the surf rack, cranked the Beetle and headed down 29th street toward Terry's. I made the turn at Ave. H and then into his driveway. Too early to honk or knock, my arrival was announced with the crunch and pop of clam shells beneath the VW's tires. Molly, his Golden Retriever, bounced off the porch to greet me. Terry followed her down the steps, and we stowed his gear, strapped his board on top of the Stemwinder, hugged Molly and let her back in the house. In less than 5 minutes, we were on our way across town to Tommy's Franklin Avenue garage apartment.
His porch light was on, and as we pulled up, I could see the big Bing noserider propped against the railing at the bottom of the stairs. I loaded it on the passenger side of the rack as Tommy appeared, Thermos of coffee in hand and a tightly rolled and tucked towel under his arm. He wore a pair of orange Birdwell Beach Britches, a long-sleeved Gordon & Smith Surfboards T-shirt, and leather thong sandals. He called shotgun; Terry crawled in the backseat, and before we cleared the driveway, he thumbed my Cream Goodbye tape into the Pioneer 8-track deck and pegged the volume knob. When we made the turn at Boston Avenue, the rattle and thump from my homemade plywood box speakers and Jack Bruce's "Badge" bass line shook the storefront windows.
We took our usual route down Hwy 365 to 124, through Winnie and down to High Island. Then, hung a right on the Beach Road to our routine first stop at Meacom’s Pier. After a quick survey of the conditions and a dune side pit stop, we decided to push on to Galveston and find a rideable spot at the Flagship or 37th Street. Since it was early, if we hit the ferry right, we could still get out before the Houston crowd showed up.
Twenty minutes later, as we passed the Bolivar Point Lighthouse, I could see the approaching ferry's lights. Perfect timing. We rolled up to the landing and took the coveted first in line position, an ideal set up for a shot at the prime "first off" spot on the ferry's bow. As the last car came off the ramp, the deckhand's traffic cop mime and orange-glow flashlight wand waved us toward the center lane. I eased the VW into gear, and we chugged forward and claimed our prize. I killed the engine, set the parking brake, turned the key back to "on" and tuned the radio to 740 AM so we could listen to Bob Stephenson's fishing report. The sky was purple and the eastern horizon glowed with orange and pink as we settled in and waited for the ferry to finish loading and depart for the Galveston side.
It was full daylight when I was jolted upright by a deckhand knocking on my window with the rubberized butt of his flashlight. We must have dozed off during the transit, and he was clearly agitated as he yelled, "move out," windmilled his arm, and pointed toward the ramp. I was dinged from my nap, so it took me a second or two to realize that our VW was blocking the cars behind us, thus paralyzing the starboard side's disembarkation process. He yelled again, and I slammed the clutch pedal down and turned the key only to hear a sickening click..click..click. My second try was, even more, impotent, and we sat, deader than a doornail, as the drivers behind us began to honk and gesture. The normally torpid ferry crew quickly gathered in front of us. I could read their lips as things escalated into a full-blown donkey roast. By then, the guys were awake and had figured out what was going on. Tommy yelled for me to put it in neutral and scrambled out to push us forward. He was a stout guy, and I could see him straining mightily in the rear-view mirror, but we only moved a few feet. Finally, an exasperated attendant and a big guy with a ponytail from a truck behind us pitched in to help. All three looked like they were busting a gut as we rolled off the ramp at a snail's pace.
As I steered the Beetle to a disgraced stop on the gravel shoulder, I glanced down only to see that the emergency brake was still on. I discreetly clicked it off, looked around to see if anyone had witnessed my deceit, and quickly stepped out to thank the panting, red-faced crew. As I waved back to them, I could see the Cone Johnson name above the pilothouse observation railing. And so it began.
After a “what now?” meet-up on the shoulder, Terry raised the engine lid to signal our distress. The ferry had already begun to load from the Galveston side queue. As the last few cars behind us rolled off the ramp, a guy in a blue Impala pulled over and offered a jump. The VW’s battery was beneath the rear seat on the passenger side (German engineering!). A row of oleander bushes on the right side of the shoulder blocked the logical right rear to left front jump-start set-up. I'm sure the Samaritan rued the day he offered to help us. It took us a half-hour of back seat contortion and pretzel logic maneuvering to position his Chevy so the jumper cables would reach from the left. After three tries, we finally got the Beetle started, thanked the gentleman, and mercifully got back on the road.
When we finally arrived at 37th Street, the lineup wall to wall with Treasure Isle locals and Houston surf shop teams. The surf was already starting to mush under a stiffening southwest wind. We u-turned in Gaido’s parking lot and squeezed into a spot on the beachside behind the Locked In team's Chevelle wagon, piled out walked down to the concrete steps and watched the action for a few minutes and then walked across Seawall at the light, past the Commodore to the Dutch Kettle and ate a dejected breakfast. We never took our boards off the rack. On the bummer ride home, I didn’t have the heart to tell Tommy and Terry about the brake.
I can’t recall any bad Galveston trips when we rode the Cone’s fleet mates the R.S. Sterling and E. H. Thornton. Still, our misadventure that day, and the dark cloud of subsequent "snake-bit" Cone Johnson crossings are now a part of the folklore of our youth. And our Galveston ferry stories are still recounted today, as “the parking brake incident,” “the seagull and surf wax incident” (don’t ask), the “Bamboo Hut incident,” the “37th street jailbirds incident”, and the “Hill’s towel serape incident.”
In the '90s, the Cone Johnson was finally retired. After languishing for years at a shipyard dock somewhere down the Intracoastal, it is rumored to have been sold on eBay, towed to New York, and repurposed as a reptile museum. I thought it was a fitting end.
It's only 2.7 miles (as the seagull flies) across the Bolivar Roads Channel. But the crossing has both confounded and delighted upper Texas coastal travelers for hundreds of years. In the 1800s, Texas filibusters, pirates, including the infamous Jean Lafite, and Bolivar Peninsula watermelon and sea-island cotton farmers made the journey by skiff, sailing vessels, and barges from Bolivar Point to Galveston and back. After the Gulf and Inter-State Railway was completed, affluent Beaumonters would ride down and spread picnics under Hackberry trees and stroll the beach and lighthouse grounds while they waited for the Silver King and Pelican and later the Jefferson and Galveston to take them across the bay to weekend soirees at the Grotto and the Hollywood Dinner Club or to swim and sunbathe at Murdoch's Bathhouse. The first free service to the Island started in 1949 as the post-war surge in automobile ownership spurred family vacation travel. The Cone Johnson, E.H Thornton, and R.S. Sterling entered service the next year, all named for directors of the Texas Department of Transportation. In the '90s, the Johnson and Sterling were retired and replaced with five new vessels: the Robert C. Lanier, Gibb Gilchrist, Dewitt C. Greer, Ray Stoker Jr., and Robert H. Dedman. In 2012, a sixth boat, the ‘high tech’ John W. Johnson joined the fleet but had an inglorious debut after mechanical, and software glitches extended sea trials and delayed the maiden voyage. Time will tell whether the 'Johnny Johnson' joins its like-surnamed predecessor as a harbinger of bad luck Galveston trips.
If you are planning a trip to Galveston on the Bolivar ferry, take my advice:
Get there early!
And as the captain's announcement says:
Don't feed the seagulls from the front of the boat.
Turn off your engine.
Don't forget to set your parking brake.