Go-Cart and Mini-Bike Dreams

My recent visit to the Clinton Engines Museum in Maquoketa (Visit www.clintonengines.com on the Web or call (563) 652-5020) rekindled memories of how badly I wanted a go cart and/or a mini-bike when I was 10 or 12 years old.

I suppose kids today, at least some of them, have similar dreams. But in the old days, the early to mid-1960s, we didn't have video games and cell phones. We played pickup baseball or shot baskets in the driveway or built coaster carts or rode bicycles around the neighborhood and to/from school. Outside was the place to play.

Wouldn't it be cool, we always thought, not to have to pedal? To just twist a grip on a mini bike and roar off down the road? To race around the track just inches above the ground in an open wheel, metal frame go-cart.

Clinton Engines, manufactured from 1950 through the 1970s in Maquoketa made a lot of those dreams come true. The museum, that opened last month, has a 3.5-horsepower mini-bike on display. It has a go-cart set up with a simulator so you can sit in it and pretend to drive around a dirt track.

My dream, however, never did come true. I rode a friend's mini-bike in and out of tall corn one evening. I drove a few go-carts (with governors limiting the speed) at amusement parks. Alas, I never owned either.

The Clinton Engine Museum is located in the old manufacturing company's administration building at 606 East Maple Street, Maquoketa. It's open from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Tuesday through Friday; noon to 4 p.m. Saturday and Sunday. Admission is just $5, which includes admission to the Jackson County Historical Society museum at the fairgrounds in Maquoketa.

If you visit, be prepared to take a drive down memory lane.