When my photographer’s alarm rang at 6:00am on July 9, 2025, I had one thing, and one thing only on my resin mind – Wendy Peffercorn, the lifeguard in the 1993 movie The Sandlot. During our previous day’s adventure, we had made it to five different filming locations used in that classic movie. But Tom saved the community swimming pool in Ogden, Utah for that Wednesday morning. Throughout most of the night, I stood alongside the TV set and envisioned the 19-year-old blonde in her one-piece swimsuit. At the same time, I pretended to be the 13-year-old Squints Palledorous, the sandlot baseball player who had a devious and ingenious scheme all set for Wendy.
My companions packed up their belongs after our two-night stay at the Comfort Inn in Ogden and we began the short three-and-one-half-mile drive Eastward to the Lorin Farr Community Pool. The morning’s temperature was already in the upper 80s when Vicki pulled the Jeep into the pool’s parking lot at roughly 8:15am, and once again, there wasn’t a cloud in the sky. Upon arrival, the first thing we learned was the complex didn’t open to the public until noon, which meant we had the entire area to ourselves – at least from beyond the fence. Unfortunately, that also meant I wouldn’t be able to stand on the exact spot where Wendy Peffercorn performed CPR on Squints at the Valley Vista Pool Community Pool in 1993.
During our entire 45-minute stay around the pool complex, Tom was able to photograph me at a few of the locations where different scenes in the movie were filmed. The highlight for me came when I stood at the chain-link fence where Squints gazed at Wendy from afar after he and his friends were banished from the pool. All I could do was smile and think of Scott Smalls’ narration during that scene.
“Michael ‘Squints’ Palledorous walked a little taller that day, and we had to tip our hats to him. He was lucky she hadn’t beat the crap out of him. We wouldn’t have blamed her. What he’d done was sneaky, rotten, and low… and cool. Not another one among us would have ever in a million years even for a million dollars have the guts to put the move on the lifeguard. He did. He kissed a woman, and he kissed her long and good. We got banned from the pool forever that day. But every time we walked by after that, the lifeguard looked down from her tower, right over at Squints, and smiled.”
I walked a little taller that day, too. After all, I thought about the blonde lifeguard performing mouth-to-painted-mouth resuscitation on me throughout our entire visit at the pool. I snapped out of my daze, however, as soon as Tom carried me back to the Jeep where he planned our next move. There was still one filming location from The Sandlot left on his agenda, but when my photographer discovered that site was over 35 miles away on the South side of Salt Lake City, Tom decided we’d visit that one on our return trip through the area in a couple of weeks.
Shortly before nine o’clock in the morning, and as the day’s early temperature began to rise, the three of us headed North – leaving the beautiful Salt Lake City area behind us in the rearview mirror. Our next destination? I’d describe it as the “Middle of nowhere, just West of B.F. Egypt and North of Bumshart, Nebrahoma.”
For roughly 50 miles, Vicki guided our vehicle along a two-lane highway which had wound its way alongside what Tom had verbally described as “scenic terrain”. Whenever I looked out from an opening in the camera case, however, all I saw were endless miles of sagebrush and a sundried barren landscape. There may have been some distant mountains, but they might as well have been on another planet.
At about twenty minutes before ten o’clock, my photographer’s wife pulled into the parking lot of what I thought was a rest area along a deserted highway. Just as I was about to say, “I can’t believe you drove thirty miles off the beaten path just to pee”, I heard Tom say we had just arrived at the Golden Spike National Historical Park. I was confused – did we just drive miles out of our way to see a pair of gold-colored shoes worn by a famous professional athlete?
It turned out we had arrived at Promontory Summit where on May 10, 1869 the Central Pacific Railroad and Union Pacific Railroad met, which formed the First Continental Railroad. That last stretch of track laid had connected Sacramento, California with Council Bluffs, Iowa, thus extending America’s rail system across the entire country. On that historic day, Central Pacific Railroad President Leland Stanford tapped the ceremonial gold spike into place, and the coast-to-coast railroad connection was complete. The First Continental Railroad revolutionized the settlement and economy of the American West.
When Tom carried me out to the actual place where the ceremonial spike had been driven over 156 years earlier, I figured I had arrived at another Presidential site. After all, President Grant had just taken office two months prior to the ceremony, and the accomplishment would have definitely been a feather in his already impressive cap following the Civil War. Unfortunately, that wasn’t the case. In fact, Grant was 1,872 miles away from the site; likely smoking cigars in the White House as he was getting used to his new role as Chief Executive. Truth be told, Ulysses S. Grant was never accused of being a genius and is widely considered to be the President with the lowest I.Q. in United States history – current President notwithstanding.
A National Park Service Ranger was speaking to the crowd of about 45 men, women, and children when the three of us arrived at the historic site following a short walk behind the Visitor Center. Directly in front of me, I saw the railroad tracks, which I noticed featured a ceremonial tie that symbolized where the golden spike had been driven in 1869. I wanted to get closer. I needed to stand on that spot, but the ranger wasn’t letting any of the visitors get close to the actual historic site – and I began to get a bit miffed. In my mind, I hoped my photographer would simply pull-off one of his signature moves and set me on the tracks when the ranger was distracted. Instead, we sat on the 93-degree sundrenched benches and listened to the monotone drone of the young NPS Ranger as she went over the rules of the park, which included staying off the tracks until the trains had arrived.
Did she say trains? Sure enough – seconds after she had finished spewing out the rules, I heard the distant sound of a train whistle, which was soon followed by the arrival of the Jupiter, an engine and tender car that replicated the original Central Pacific Railroad No. 60 steam locomotive from 1869. The engineer of the red and blue engine with gold trim sounded the steam whistle a few times before it came to a stop just West of the ceremonial golden spike railroad tie.
Roughly twenty minutes after the Jupiter had arrived, a second train appeared on the horizon. This engine and tender replicated the Union Pacific No. 119 locomotive from 1869, and it eventually came to rest just East of the Jupiter. The two engines faced each other and were separated by only twenty feet or so.
While it was an awesome experience to witness the arrival of the two locomotives, I quickly became irritated as I watched the forty-some tourists rush towards the trains like flies attacking a raw rib roast. At one point, I nearly gagged when I saw the mammaries of several extremely large women nearly flop out of their harnesses as they rushed towards the two trains. That’s when I wondered whether or not the engineer was giving out free Twinkies to the first people to cross the tracks.
Tom, Vicki, and I stayed back near the seating area for nearly fifteen minutes until the stampede had subsided. When the feeding frenzy from the larger-than-life land sharks had concluded, the three of us had the site and locomotives to ourselves.
While there wasn’t a glimpse of civilization in any direction from my position on the railroad tracks at Promontory Summit, I felt very lucky to have escaped with my life during our visit. That was all thanks to the stampede of dozens of extremely overweight female wildebeest who rushed the site to capture images of their precious rugrats near the trains.
When the three of us returned to the Jeep, Tom felt hungry and without thinking of the consequences, he grabbed the box of Hostess Twinkies from a tote on the backseat. Thankfully, none of the women caught a whiff of the aroma, and we avoided a second wildebeest stampede.
On a Northern trajectory along a desolate Utah highway, I heard Vicki ask her husband where we were headed next. When Tom replied, “I don’t know”, I nearly fell out of my camera case in astonishment. My chunky photographer always knows where we are and where we’re headed each and every minute of the day. It turned out that particular moment was no different – he simply talked with a Twinkie in his mouth.
At precisely 12 noon on July 9, 2025, we crossed the border into the state of Idaho. Yeah, Idaho sounded very similar to “I don’t know”. It was an exciting moment as the three of us had never been to the Gem State before; and for me, Idaho became the 44th different state I’ve visited. The only thing running through my hallow head, however, was the vision of endless fields of potato plants.
But that never happened. I didn’t see one spud, or a tot, or even a small fry – the only fields I saw were filled to the horizon with sagebrush. I always believed Idaho was very mountainous, but the southern part of the state was flatter than a map of Kansas. Not since we traveled through Wyoming had I seen anything so boring as Idaho. But that all changed shortly after we arrived in Twin Falls, our final destination of the day.
Initially, I thought Tom had guided Vicki and I into Twin Falls because of its connection with the original Oregon Trail; or perhaps due to the fact he and his wife enjoy visiting impressive waterfalls during their travels. After all, Twin Falls was named after the two waterfalls in the area along the Snake River – Pillar Falls, which is nearly non-existent today, and the more impressive Shoshone Falls, known as “Niagara of the West”. But on that scorching hot and cloudless day, my photographer had something else very Evel on his agenda, and he was hell-bent on taking us there first.
Up until that point, Tom’s GPS system on his phone, his beloved Siri, had been flawless in navigating us all the way from home to Southern Idaho. But after she barked out directions in her sexy voice that took us along the southern rim of the Snake River Canyon and through a subdivision, we hit a dead end on Pole Line Road. When our Jeep came to a screeching halt, I saw several signs that warned people to not enter the private roadway in front of us. My photographer was perplexed, and I heard him say to his wife, “I can’t believe this. We’re less than a half mile from the site and we can’t go any further? I know the historic site is on public property, but I’m not sure I want to risk driving on private property to get there. The last thing we need is to be arrested, or worse yet, shot. After all, I believe Evel Spirits are still lurking in this area.”
After we backtracked our route through the subdivision, Tom once again relied on Siri to get us safely to Shoshone Falls, which was about three or four miles to the East. Not only did my photographer want to see the Niagara of the West, but Tom also figured we might discover an alternative public route that would take us to the historic site still left on his agenda.
The series of scenic and chaotic roads to Shoshone Falls proved to be no challenge for Vicki, who is a veteran at driving along treacherous, narrow roadways with little to no shoulder and steep drop-off. Although there was a five-dollar fee to enter Shoshone Falls Park and its scenic overlook, the entry fee turned out to be a Godsend for my cheap photographer. As Tom reluctantly forked-over the five-dollar bill to the elderly attendant, my thrifty camera man was given something in return that proved to be priceless – directions to the historic site that the guy said would bypass the private subdivision.
Once my photographer’s wife found a spot in the crowded parking lot, the three of us took off on foot towards the overlook, which consisted of several viewing areas. During our short hike, I overheard someone say Shoshone Falls was 45 feet taller than Niagara Falls. That fact alone made me shake with excitement, and I remained cautiously optimistic that I wouldn’t be disappointed. There’s only one Nagara Falls, and during my two trips to the most-famous waterfalls in North America, I was left in a state of wonderment and awe.
The moment Tom removed me from the camera case, I had my first look at Shoshone Falls – and I became instantly emersed in a state of newfound wonderment. While I believe no waterfalls in our country can compare to the intense beauty and power of Niagara, the Shoshone Falls were uniquely splendid, and the view was breathtaking in their own right. As my photographer held me over the guardrail for a few photos, I was extremely nervous. Had I slipped out of his hand, there was no getting me back and my Presidential quest would’ve come to an instant halt.
I didn’t care what my photographer had thought, the five dollars he spent to visit Shoshone Falls Park and its observation platforms was worth every penny – even though none of our past Presidents had ever visited the falls. One would think that any President concerned about preserving our precious natural resources would use Shoshone Falls as a backdrop for a speech, but so far, that has never happened.
Vicki carefully drove our Jeep back down the winding road while Tom recited the elderly guy’s directions to the historical site from memory. The fee collector at the falls made it sound so easy, and that’s usually when problems arise. But only ten minutes after we left the Shoshone Falls, we arrived at our final stop of the day – a manmade dirt hill situated near the Southern rim of the Snake River Canyon.
It was nearly three o’clock in the afternoon and the temperature was hovering around 96 degrees when we began our short hike from the parking area to the site. At first, I didn’t know where in the heck-fire we were. All I saw in front of me was a 108-foot-tall manmade earthen mound with several concrete slabs embedded into the Southern side of the hill. Due to the heat, Vicki refused to climb the mound with her husband; she opted to explore the area near the edge of the canyon instead.
With me in hand, Tom huffed and puffed his way up the Southern side of the large mound. Once we had finally reached the summit, I was disappointed to discover we didn’t have a great view of the canyon itself. We barely saw the Northern rim in the distance, but the Snake River was totally obscured by the Southern rim. While that site was not associated with any President, the two of us basked in the moment because we were in the presence of an Evel Spirit – the spirit of motorcycle daredevil Robert “Evel” Knievel, that is.
Suddenly, the entire hill and surrounding area sprang to life in my mind’s eye. It was 3:30pm on Sunday September 8, 1974, and we were just six minutes away from the most hyped sports spectacular event of the year. Evel Knievel was attempting to jump the 1,600-foot-wide Snake River Canyon in a specially designed steam-powered “motorcycle” known as the Skycycle X-2.
I looked up and was surrounded by the crossbeams of a 180-foot-tall launch structure that occupied most of the Earthen hill. Suddenly, Knievel was lowered, and then strapped into the Skycycle, which quite frankly looked like a small rocket ship. The daredevil was dressed in a white canvass jumpsuit, complete with his signature red and blue trim. All eyes, and closed-circuit television cameras, were focused on the most-famous showman on the planet as he awaited launch. No one, including Knievel himself, knew what to expect. After all, each of the two previous test launches resulted in failure, but it was too late for anyone to cancel the highly anticipated event. As a matter of fact, the promoter had hired armed sharpshooters who were strategically placed near the launch site to ensure Knievel didn’t change his mind.
At precisely 3:36pm, I heard a voice over the loudspeaker say, “Three, two, one”, which was immediately followed by the loudest noise I’ve ever heard. A blast of white steam, heated to 500 degrees Fahrenheit, propelled Evel Knievel, seated in his rocket cycle, skyward into the blue sky. The large crowd near the site gasped in horror when it became obvious something had gone terribly wrong. The cycle’s parachute had deployed prematurely, which prevented the X-2 from travelling far enough over the Northern rim of the canyon. Evel Knievel was on a collision course with certain disaster.
From my position on the mound, I looked towards the canyon and saw a stream of red smoke, which was released for visual effects. The Skycycle, dangling from a large white parachute, slowly descended towards the Earth before it disappeared past the Southern rim and into the 500-foot-deep Snake River Canyon.
Since 1965, Knievel had attempted roughly 75 motorcycle jumps. Some of the ramp-to-ramp jumps were successful, and some were not. As a matter of fact, the daredevil had broken an estimated 433 bones from the jumps that were not. But the coveted Snake River Canyon jump in 1974 forged his legacy and defined his amazing career – a career and life that nearly ended on that hot September afternoon near Twin Falls, Idaho.
Evel Knievel was still strapped in the vehicle when the Skycycle crashed into the rocks along the Southern shore of the Snake River, just ten feet from the water. Had the vehicle landed in the river, Knievel would’ve likely drowned before his rescue team arrived. Instead, he suffered only minor bruises; and some public scorn when rumors about him panicking and intentionally pulling the chute’s lever had surfaced.
When Tom plucked me off one of the concrete slabs, the launch device above me and the crowd around the site were gone. It was just him and me standing there in the heat as we looked out towards the Snake River Canyon; and that was okay. I knew how much that site meant to my nostalgic photographer, and I could tell it gave him a brief glimpse back in time to his childhood. For on September 8, 1974, eighteen-year-old Thomas Watson was seated in Port Huron, Michigan’s McMorran Arena where he watched the infamous canyon jump unfold on closed-circuit television.
The afternoon heat was growing dangerously high as my photographer slowly carried me down the manmade mound. I began to worry about my fat friend when he decided to take a short hike to an area several hundred yards West of the jump site. Not only was Tom without something to drink, but he also sweated profusely as he huffed and puffed his way along the paved trail near the canyon’s rim. When we finally made it to an unobstructed viewing area, I was happy my photographer threw caution to the wind because the view gave us a chance to see exactly how dangerous Evel Knievel’s stunt was back in 1974. Not only was the span of the canyon 1,600 feet across, but it was also 500 feet down to the Snake River below. That super-hyped stunt may have been the most dangerous “motorcycle” jump in history; that is until Fonzie jumped over a live shark while on water skis during an episode of Happy Days that aired on September 20, 1977.
It seemed to take forever for Tom to slowly make his way back to the Jeep, which was parked a few hundred yards South of the Evel Knievel jump site. Although he refused to call his little jaunt another ‘Hike from Hell’, it was definitely hotter than Hell throughout our entire 45-minute excursion. Once we were safely back in the air conditioning, Vicki made hotel reservations from her phone. It was only four o’clock in the afternoon, but my companions had been exposed to enough fun in the Sun for one day.
Roughly ten minutes after we left the jump site, Vicki drove our vehicle over the Perrine Memorial Bridge where we caught another spectacular glimpse of the Snake River Canyon. Our hotel, the Comfort Inn and Suites, was located about three miles North of the bridge. I stayed with Tom as he unpacked our vehicle while his wife registered in the lobby.
After my companions had unpacked their belongings in our room, the three of us headed for dinner at a place called Jakers Bar & Grill, which was located South of the Perrine Memorial Bridge in downtown Twin Falls. I laughed to myself when Tom looked at the menu and complained to his wife about the high prices of the food. Even though my photographer was extremely hungry, he protested the cost by ordering a small hamburger and side salad. The cheap bastard also refused to buy a Diet Coke and drank water instead. Lots of water, as a matter of fact, because he was dehydrated from our Evel adventure.
When the three of us returned to the hotel at roughly 6:10pm, Tom placed me alongside the television where I stayed for the remainder of the night. My photographer spent some time searching for a program to watch, but he was too tired to care. By eight o’clock, my larger-than-life friend turned off the TV and extinguished the lights; within a few minutes, I heard him snoring. The funny thing was – it was still daylight outside.
Once the Sun had set in the West and our room was bathed in total darkness, I spent the remainder of the night thinking about the man; the myth; the legend; the greatest showman of his generation; Robert Craig Knievel. After the Snake River Canyon stunt, Evel Knievel made five more motorcycle jumps. His last jump was held in Chicago on January 31, 1977 when he attempted to jump 13 sharks. He crashed in practice, which resulted in a broken collarbone and a fractured right arm. Perhaps Evel Knievel should’ve used water skis in ’77 rather than his Harley Davidson XR-750.
Remember, there’s heroes and there’s legends. Heroes get remembered, but legends never die. Robert Craig Knievel passed away in Clearwater, Florida on November 30, 2007 at the age of 69. But even in death, Knievel’s legacy and his Evel Spirit will live on forever – especially along the Southern rim of the Snake River Canyon.
