Sue and I  were heading back to Brillion on Saturday, July 3rd, 1999.

We now take Lax Chapel Road off of Hwy 57 by Millhome to Cty C to Niles Rd to 151. Then take 151 to Cty W to Hwy 10.

Anyway,

We had turned off of Cty C and were heading north on Niles Road at about 2:45pm. Note - when heading south off of 151, Niles Road has a steep hill that turns into a 90 degree curve, with a barn on one side and a farm house on the other side of the road at the base of the hill, right in the middle of the curve. We were approaching this curve, and I noticed that a south bound car was going down the hill pretty quickly. I figured he would be slowing down for the curve. I slowed some, and then lost sight of him as he approached the curve and the barn blocked my view. When I saw him again, he was going through the curve at the same speed...... and now he was in my lane, coming at us head on !!! I had about 2 seconds, and the only thing I could do was ... HARD RIGHT !! I turned hard to the right, not knowing exactly what would be over there (I think there happened to be a driveway with culvert just in front of where I started to turn). As I am turning my right knee twinges as I see him still coming at us head on. He made it past the front of the truck, my door.... then his mirror hits the back door and he creams my tire and takes out my entire rear quarter.....at about 50 mph or so.... the impact turns me a bit straighter, otherwise I probably would have hit a telephone pole. We then go into a fairly deep ditch - cut grass since it is part of a farmers yard. I go down in back up and down, and I must have been braking too, since I stopped in about 20-25 yards. Had I not stopped, I would have hit the culvert to another driveway, with a 2 foot diameter tree right next to it.

We are now at a complete stop...... I am fine and so is Sue. The driver of the white Taurus backs up, his drivers side front quarter panel is gone, he is fine, but shook up. He is about 19 or 20, heading to his girlfriends house up the road.  I think he was ready for me to fly off the hammer, but I was calm. I was happy that everyone was not hurt. Steel is easy to fix....

We left my truck in the ditch. A lady from the farm house on the curve came out, and thought she was going to find us dead. Two had died on the curve a few years back, and another car had hit their house. So me and Sue walked to the house to call 911. 

Going back to the scene, we looked at my rear tire, and the rim was cracked from the impact. My back door was bent, but still closed. Everything under the gas cap was gone, but the gas tank was fine. The rear hatch was bent, but still latched. The bumper was bent out and down, but was still on. The tire had be hit pretty hard, but it looked like the suspension and springs were not bent. The father of the girl friend was the first to get there, and then the dad and step mom of the driver came. Once the officer got there and took pictures, I was able to back out of the ditch, and then they helped me put on my full size spare.

So all in all, we were all lucky to not get hurt..........

Side note, earlier on in the trip I had contemplated going to St. Nazianz to stop by my Grandparent's graves on my Mom's side, and then heading through Clarks Mills to stop by my other Grandparent's graves. Then as I was heading up Cty C, approaching the turn onto Niles Road, I decided against it, then some 20 some odd seconds later we got hit. I wonder, had we not been there, would that guy have flown off the road and hit the ditch and trees, etc, and then would have been really injured, or died ??? and since we were there, we kept him on the road, and all were fine....

Hmmmm,

Anyway, that's my story, and I'm sticking to it !!

We were able to drive back to Brillion. I put some more air in the spare and it looked fine. We were heading back for a 4th of July party in Green Bay. I decided to drive the Explorer to Green Bay, since I thought I would rather have trouble there than be 1/2 back to Milwaukee and have trouble. It worked fine. Then on Sunday I drove it back to Milwaukee, and on Tuesday took it in to the shop. They gave me a silver Mercury Tracer, which I drove for almost two weeks. The damage ended up being about $4000.00