The Bruckner Wars
by a special correspondent, who shall remain nameless
Mr. Leslie Bruckner was a teacher at Burbank High School where I attended. One of my friends - who wrote up this tale - had an older brother who went there, too, as you'll read. I had Mr. Bruckner for Government, a dreary class in which I received a "C." Despite that cheerful smile you see in the image to the left, the man was overbearing. Now, I would have thought that Bruckner, being as far right politically as they come and this family, numbering among them a chapter president of the John Birch Society, would have been natural idealogical allies. But they weren't. Here's an account of why this was - a little chapter about Burbank High, teenage boys and leaping to erroneous conclusions. - Wes
This is a long story, but hey, that's why I learned to type.
My brother hung around some rather interesting fellows while at BHS in the early 1960's (He graduated in '63). They were an eclectic group of car aficionados. Corvettes, Austin-Healeys, '57 Chevies, Woodies, Deuce coupes, etc. Some of them were Bruckner's students and tended to goof-off in class.
Well, it seems that Bruckner's wife started getting some crank phone calls of a somewhat pornographic nature and Bruckner suspected one of my brother's friends. So one Saturday afternoon, when his wife was on the phone with one of these calls, Bruckner ran over to the neighbors and called this friend's phone number -- which was busy. Considering this to be case-hardened evidence of malfeasance, Bruckner jumped to the erroneous conclusion that he was the perpetrator. (This friend, by the way, had the perfect alibi as he and my brother were in Santa Barbara at a car race - he clearly was not the guilty party.) So Bruckner set forth to exact vengeance.
Bruckner called the kid's mom to report this evil behaviour and she didn't believe him one whit. In fact, she protested that she had been on the phone when he had tried to call and had found it busy. He didn't believe her and accused her of covering it up for her son. Words were exchanged and Bruckner elevated it to the point of besmirching the reputation of the friend's father, who had been killed in a plane crash earlier that year. The mom was extremely hurt, and was crying and very upset when her son returned from the races to learn of the evil wrought by Mr. Bruckner. Of course, this meant war. My brother, along with the others, was recruited and guerilla warfare began in earnest.
It started small, a whimper, when the first of several unordered pizzas was delivered to the Bruckner residence. In fact, every pizza delivery place that would deliver to Burbank (there really weren't many as delivered pizza was not all that common in the early 1960's) learned to avoid the Bruckner home. And every Chicken Delite (much more common than pizza at the time) learned as well.
[Historical note by Wes Clark: At home pizza delivery in Southern California wasn't really established until the late 60's, as I recall, and was largely the business of Pizza Man - "he delivers." Dominos at this time was an also-ran.]
Running out of the easy stuff, a Sears folding boat was ordered COD (Flamingo Pink, as I recall) and a confused Mr. Bruckner had to wave off the delivery guy. Then came the ad in the Los Angeles Times for the '32 roadster at the unbelievably cheap price requiring an early morning phone call. It ran three weeks. Then a similar ad for a woody wagon ran in the Herald-Examiner for two weeks which listed the Bruckners' address but no phone number. People actually showed up to buy the fictional car.
Then another friend of my brother, who worked part-time for ConRock, arranged for a BIG dump truck to make a very early morning delivery of several cubic yards of gravel into the Bruckners' driveway. On a school day. Bruckner had to walk to school.
That very afternoon, as Bruckner was walking home from school, my brother and his friend drove by in his mom's station wagon and my brother rolled down the window and asked if "that '32 roadster was still for sale." Bruckner flipped, picked up a rock and threw it at my brother, hitting the wagon.
They drove to my house where my brother retrieved his fire extinguisher. He and his friend urinated into it. Then they filled it up with orange juice, motor oil, water and, of course, compressed air and then went looking for Mr. Bruckner again. Since they knew where he lived, he wasn't hard to find. He was almost home when the wagon pulled up. My brother made some smartass remark and, as Bruckner lifted another rock, he sprayed him head to foot with the awful brew. Bruckner absolutely snapped. His car still stuck behind a mountain of gravel, he chose to run to the police station.
The friends dropped off the extinguisher, eliminated as much evidence as they could, and then drove to the police station themselves beating Bruckner by only ten minutes or so. Then they ran into the police station and explained that there was a crazy, unkempt man who was throwing rocks at cars.
As they were filing the report, Bruckner ran in. My brother's friend screamed, "That's the guy!", and Bruckner flipped again. He rushed menacingly toward them and was forcibly restrained by several police officers. During the melee, Bruckner kicked a cop. Supposedly, Bruckner got tossed into the drunk tank for an overnight stay. I'm not sure if that's really true but I sure do like the visual image of Bruckner, clad in a urine- and oil-stained suit, exchanging pleansantries all night with some of Burbank's finer drunks.
After the inevitable round of accusations, it sorted out nicely. Bruckner dropped his charges against my brother and his friend (the fire extinguisher assault) and they dropped theirs against Bruckner (the rock throwing assault). But Bruckner was reprimanded by School authorities and my brother and his friend were chewed out, slightly, by their respective parents.
Ten years later, I strolled into Bruckner's Health class on the first day of my Junior year and listened to the roll call:
"Adams"
"Here"
"Borillo"
"Yo"
"(My surname)?"
"Um, here."
"Do you have a brother named (his name)?"
"Uh, yeah" (cool, he knows him -- easy A, yeah)
"GET OUTTA MY CLASS!"
"Huh?"
The man was scary. Do you remember how BIG he was? [Yes, I do. - Wes] I grabbed my stuff and got out. My friend was there and he told me later that he couldn't figure out what I had done wrong. I couldn't either.
Moments later I was seated outside the Vice Principal's office and wondering just what the hell I had done. I don't remember the V.P.'s name, but I do remember that he laughed out loud when I told him I'd been kicked out of Bruckner's class and that I hadn't done a thing to deserve it (I was actually a little angry by the time he got to me). He didn't explain why, but he said he wasn't surprised that Mr. Bruckner remembered my brother. I was transferred to another Health class. I think it was the earth-mother lady who wore the potato-sack dresses.
Several days later, I asked my brother about Mr. Bruckner and told him that I'd been kicked out of his class for no apparent reason. He told me the whole story.
Well, you asked.