Wyatt & Elmer T. Lee 

Fourteen-year-old Wyatt Eddy lived in Torrance, CA, but spent every summer in his favorite place, Cadiz, Kentucky. According to his Grandpa Terry, Wyatt preferred Kentucky because “he could pee behind a tree and spit in the dirt.”

To his west coast friends, Wyatt’s summers in Cadiz were legendary, from his internship at a gun-maker and taking flying lessons, to his adventures off-roading, fishing and shooting guns with his uncles and working at Grandpa Terry’s boat shop on Lake Barkley.

In the summer of 2021, Wyatt asked his parents if they would help him buy his first car. Dave and Wendy were reluctant because he was a few years shy of his license but Wyatt charmed them with daily texts about what he’d found online, from Baha Bugs and drift cars to rock crawlers and old trucks. When he saw the dark green 1966 Ford F-100 with service station markings on Facebook, it was all over and once the keys were in his palm, he named the truck Elmer T. Lee after the empty bourbon bottle being used as a radiator overflow. Wyatt returned to school in California and Elmer stayed behind in Kentucky for Grandpa Terry and his Uncle Stassin to work on.

The dream was that when Elmer finally made it to California, Wyatt and his older brother Wade would drive it to Ruby’s Beach Cruise car show along with Wade’s ’72 VW bus named Toaster. Sadly on Sept 24th, that and many other dreams were snatched away when Wyatt was killed in a surfing accident. His lifelong protector, Wade , saved him from drowning but Wyatt succumbed to a neck injury at the hospital. His favorite song, Up Around the Bend by CCR, rang out in the corridor lined with doctors and nurses as Wyatt’s family wheeled his body to the operating room where his organs were preserved for seven recipients, ultimately saving their lives. The family decided to bury Wyatt in Kentucky and insisted that his casket be transported to the cemetery in the back of Elmer.

On Dec 13th, a car trailer rolled up outside the Eddy house in Torrance CA . . . Elmer was finally home. One month later, nine of Wyatt’s buddies got to see their friend’s pride and joy for the first time outside Ruby’s Diner. Word spread throughout the classic car community and 100 hot rods, muscle cars, lowriders and classics rolled up unexpectedly and encircled Elmer, creating the Ruby’s Beach Cruise car show that Wyatt had dreamed about.

The following day, Wyatt’s family and friends met at Saugus Speedway where over the next several hours, the fourteen-year-olds drove for the first time, learning Elmer’s “3 on the tree” with instruction from Wade and Stassin. Wyatt had often told his friend, Reese, that he would be the first to drive Elmer because he was older than Wyatt by a few months and would get his drivers license first. Reese drove the first laps at the track that day.

In honor of their friend, the boys created a logo with his likeness and the acronym LLWE (Long Live Wyatt Eddy). They often wear the logo’d baseball hats and LLWE stickers are showing up everywhere in South Bay, stuck to surfboards, skateboards, street signs, sides of buses and car windows. The Eddys say they will never sell Elmer because of how close they feel to Wyatt when they’re with the truck and the anonymous recipient who received Wyatt’s heart recently contacted them with a letter of gratitude and a photo of he and his wife . . . with their classic car. Wyatt would approve.