Rocket PoweR, InteRstellaR tRavel and eteRnal lIfe

Figure 17. Following a period of military service, George Mapes went to Champlain College. The Hungerford brothers kindly lent
Mapes the rocket car for travel to and around Plattsburgh. This photo shows Mapes and the “Moon Girl” near a Champlain College
building, April 3, 1947.
Photograph courtesy of George Mapes.
right side was limited, there was a rear-view mirror on
each side of the car. Two twelve-volt motors turned
inverted toy tops on the roof of the car. These tops
hummed as they rotated. Crossed American flags on
top of the car were illuminated.
When asked if he ever had passengers in the rocket
car, Mapes recalled leaving Plattsburgh at the end of the
academic year. A roommate from Long Island seated to
the right and slightly behind Mapes in the interior of the
car accompanied him to Elmira.
Mapes remained in Elmira after his second year at
Champlain College. He was recalled for military service
during the Korean War. Afterwards he worked for a
period at the American LaFrance Foamite Corporation,
supervising the experimental station. He left Elmira
permanently in 1955, continuing his education in
Oklahoma. A thirty-year career with the Atomic Energy
Commission followed before retirement in Nevada. 131
Another regular young visitor to the Hungerford establishment
was Robert M. Boyles (born 1930). He lived on
First Street near the Hungerford property and bought a
couple of cars from the Hungerfords, who helped keep
those vehicles running. Boyles recalls a 1924 Ford and a
1936 Nash. The Ford, Boyles has written, was a touring
car “used of late to pull out stumps on a farm. It no
longer had a canvas top or side curtains, if it ever did
have. . . . Dan taught me how to drive and maintain it.”
Of the Nash, Boyles writes,
Dan must have felt remorse at selling me that car in
such bad shape. Almost all of the window glass
was shot and the oil rings were shot…So we pulled
the Nash into my parents one car attached garage,
unheated…[for] reboring the cylinders and putting
in over-sized pistons. It was the dead of winter.
I say “we worked”. Dan was the master machinist
with the tools. I was the laborer. . . . The job done,
Dad got his garage back and I had a good running
fast car with overdrive . . .
I left it home with my folks when I was recalled in
the Reserves in September 1950 . . . My folks sold it
back to Dan as I recall for fifty dollars, probably
about what I paid him for it. 132
Boyles says Hungerford was “great guy”, who treated
Boyles as a son. Speaking of Hungerford’s socialist
interests, Boyles says his friend was a member of the
Communist Party, not a help to Boyles when he sought
security clearance while serving in the military. But
Boyles says he never discussed politics with
Hungerford.
Chapter Four: The Hungerford Rocket Car 29