Michael Bullock:  

Got a minute? 20 or 30 minutes? I'm feelin' prolific. I came to Burlington in 1963 from Anacortes. My family arrived in Anacortes in 1957 from California so that my father could help start up the then, Texaco refinery. I went to school in Anacortes through the first half of my third grade. My parents got a divorce when I was eight; divorce was very unpopular at that time. My Mom struggled to raise 3 kids in Anacortes and finally moved to Seattle to get work and away from her acquaintances that didn't look lightly at a divorced woman with 3 children. We kids stayed with Dad who had moved to Burlington and re-married. Along with 2 stepbrothers and a stepsister (Jimmy,Jacqueline and Mark Gatti), we moved into a rented farmhouse just below Peterson road. It was on the farm of Jess Knutzen. Peterson road was just across the field from our house. There were many refinery brat kids for us to play with, the Mainards, the Collins', Beechers, Curt Knutzen's family, the Cowells and the Tullers (not refinery brats, early entrepreneurs), to name a few. Sorry I missed a few, CRS(Can't Remember Shtuff) and all. This whole CREW of kids and more, played in the tall grass of the field between Peterson road and Avon Allen road (the road our house was on), making mazes and playing hide and seek. I met Hal Tuller and his sister Susan here and spent a lot of time playing with them. Summertime, we spent stealing peas from the back of pea trucks that had to stop at the intersection of Avon Allen and Peterson roads, taking long rides on the riding lawn mower and rolling down the hill in the field, inside inner tubes...those were the days! I attended school at West View elementary from the last half of third grade through the first half of fourth grade at which point I moved to White Center, in Seattle, to stay with my Mother and her new husband. Susan tells me now that she was crushed when I left....aww, it's OK to wipe the tears, it's a sad point in the story. It was in White Center that I picked up my passion for motorcycles, at the ripe old age of nine. It started with a 4 hp, horizontal shaft, Briggs and Stratton lawn mower engine bolted to a mini-bike frame....oh the FREEDOM! We had a small motorcycle gang, 6 guys with mini-bikes (hey, we were 9 years old)and we rode those things all over the suburban streets, sometimes going 5 or 6 miles from home...unheard of nowadays but that is where the love for 2 wheels, the sounds, the smells and the wind in my face came from. Hope you're not bored....I left White Center after my freshman year, only at the time, I was in a junior high school, so I was really a senior and moved back to Burlington to live with my Father. He was renting a house on Samish Island and I still didn't have a driver's license, I was driving but only on the Island, so I had to take the bus to school. An hour in, in the morning and an hour back, in the afternoon. I couldn't wait to get my license. I used to DRIVE to Edison to catch the early bus to school, to attend driver's training...go figure. Finally got my license. Started buying and trading cars, went thr...Expand for more