• Carroll’s Towing Service
  It was a late summer’s eve in 1966, only days before many of us were to leave home for our first year of college. I was parked in a cow pasture, on a hill above Churchill Lane in Fayetteville. Jane Gaitley (now my wife of 44 yrs.) and I had enjoyed the full moon, the fragrance of ripening alfalfa, some guitar music,and some conversation. My “ride” was a ’55 Cadillac hearse- “the beast.” After saving from a summer of construction jobs, this $300 purchase had finally “put me in the driver’s seat.”
  A small oversight of this first auto purchase was about to emerge, however; I had failed to notice the condition of the tires. As I put the beast in gear, ready to exit the meadow, the bald rubber tires responded as if we were on ice- much whining, but no forward motion. Did I mention it was late? Dew had fallen, and the grass was slick. Although we were on a hill, we were parked on a flat spot. No amount of pushing (it was a very heavy vehicle) would budge the beast.
  The home of Frank Carroll, a best friend, was just down the hill, at 411 Churchill Lane. He was an admirer of the hearse; In fact, he had been so impressed, he had (surprise!) recently gone out and gotten one of his own! Perhaps Frank’s hearse could help?
  Jane and I cut through the weeds and seeds, and slippery grass, and made tracks for Fran’s place. His room was on the second story, facing the street. When whispered shouts proved ineffective, we tossed some pebbles at the glass windows. The lights eventually went on, but surprise! It was Adele Carroll-Frank’s mother- who stuck her head out! Shouts of alarm! Wrong room! Next room over lights go on, and Frank stuck his head out. Total confusion, embarrassment, and then much laughter erupted. On the front porch the Carroll Clan gathered to engineer a solution. A plan was quickly formulated.
  We first promised we would return to Adele and Frank, Sr’s., post vehicle retrieval. We then returned to the hill. Frank’s hearse fortunately had tires with tread. By the light of the late August moon, and using a heavy rope as a tow line, we pulled the beast to a nearby gravel road.
  Two Cadillac hearses in a cow pasture at midnight- Carroll’s towing service. I wish I could share the picture of that moment that remains in my brain. Frank’s parents so enjoyed the drama. They later served us up some food and drink, and some more laughs, before we departed, and they turned in.
  Frank and I shared many strange and wonderful moments over the years, which were recounted and re-enjoyed whenever we reconnected. The memory of the night that “Carroll’s towing service” saved the beast, will always remain a jewel in the crown of our lifetime friendship. 
• 
  

I met Francis Patrick Carroll at Seilerstatte 30 (I don’t have an umlaut to place above the “a” for correct spelling auf Deutsch...) in October, 1968, when we were students at Stanford in Austria, Group VII. We quickly became friends. 

Frank and I became roommates again when we returned to Palo Alto and rented a house in College Terrace, where we inherited 2 cats, a male whom we named “The Mu Meson Voluptuizer” and a female named “Little Kitty.” Mu Meson acquired his name from his loud behavior and I spent too much time listening to the Mothers of Invention album “Uncle Meat,” which included the name for our big male cat. 

Frank had driven his 1954 Cadillac hearse from Troy, New York to Palo Alto; we used it numerous times to travel to the coast near Santa Cruz for group acid trips. The hearse was Frank’s version of Frank Zappa’s “1937 refrigerator white Chevy taco wagon helicopter” featured in “Uncle Meat.” We laughed a great deal, usually at our own stupid inside jokes, which we believed were fiendishly clever at the time. 

More entertainment and a lexicon of our own developed from Zappa and excessive listening to albums by the Firesign Theater. Frank taught me to spell Ronald Reagan’s last name as “Ray-gun.” Frank was in Chad, Africa at the time.

Frank was an immensely talented engineer (and a decent semi pro second baseman) who graduated near the top of his class, followed by a 17 year long pursuit of a Ph.D. at UC Berkeley, while he traveled the world designing water treatment facilities for native populations and acquired a couple of master’s degrees along the way.

The last time Frank and I spent quality time together was 1993-94 when I represented him in Washington, DC pursuing a lawsuit to recover a bunch of money Frank was owed by a clever con man, who hired Frank to develop a computerized model and design for a sewage treatment “swamp“ in Morocco. Frank was able to explain to me (sort of...) how partial differential equations and “the Wronskian” could determine relative quantities of pollutants in the water oozing through this swamp in which the algae were breaking down toxic organic compounds from a slaughterhouse, partially treated sewage, and other “contributions” from the town upstream. 

I loved Frank Carroll as a wonderful man and true friend and I write these words to honor him and his memory. He was good to every living thing around him and dedicated himself to making this world a better place—and he succeeded. May you Rest In Peace, Bro’— I’ll see you on the other side.

Your friend,

Bill