Team Blog

Two weeks ago Emily and I traveled down to the Tampa area to meet with Peter Ramsey (Alice’s grandson) and Alice Ramsey - Bruns aka “Little Alice” (Alice Ramsey’s 98 y/o daughter). We wanted to make a special trip down to meet Alice and to finally get introduced to the Ramsey family. We are, after all, taking a few years of our lives and undertaking this “road trip” in the spirit of Alice’ drive. We felt it was important to say hello and spend a few days with the family.

I, of course, wanted to take the opportunity to put Alice on camera and to film Emily and Alice meeting for the first time. This was a monumental moment in my mind! We had been talking about Alice Ramsey for years (my father and sister since 1996 or so). To us, it’s like meeting a character right out of a fiction novel.

Anne P. (camera) and I went ahead to meet Alice and get situated. Alice greeted us warmly and firmly shook both of our hands. She even made a couple of wise cracks about our cameras breaking because we were trying to film someone who is 98 years old. I realized at that moment that Alice was a formidable and still very strong-minded force and that she and Emily would get along just fine.

The meeting proved to be fascinating and illuminating. Peter motivated much of the discussion when he sat and opened a large bag of “stuff” that may have been every piece of news written about Alice, including her original trip logs from 1909 written in leather bound notebooks still in impeccable condition. He also had a very large stack of photos we had never seen from the original trip and much more. Alice proceeded to “interview” Emily about her capabilities with starting and driving the 1909 Maxwell DA. She wanted to be sure Emily was doing her mother (Alice) justice by taking on the trip as fully as her mother did in 1909. It was quite a scene to watch. Emily admitted freely that she has some work yet to do, but that she’s up for the challenge.

“Little Alice” as she called herself a few times, was sharp-witted and clear-minded. She speaks matter of factly and has fond memories of driving with Alice on numerous road trips during her lifetime. It appears that Alice never did stop driving having crossed the country in a car more than 30 times. She even drove an ambulance in the war effort during WWI.

At one point Peter found an obituary written about Alice Ramsey who passed in 1982 (I’ll have to check my facts…). The obituary was very touching, comparing Alice to many other women who have been “firsts” and expressed deep gratitude to Alice for being a pioneer and an adventurer. As Peter read this aloud, Anne and I stood back filming, but I couldn’t help to be captivated into the moment. All I could do was stand there and be a spectator for a moment.

The two days we spent with Alice was a lot of fun. I ended up being the tail end of a few of her jokes on a few occasions. One in particular because I wore blue jeans on a day she wanted to take us to her club for lunch and so we weren’t able to go. That night, I went to a nearby mall and bought some khaki slacks so I wouldn’t cramp Alice’s style should the invitation arise the next day.

Emily was just as touched by the meeting as I was, perhaps even more so. Afterward, she sent me an email of thanks for pushing for us to go down to Florida and that it was such a great thing to be able to meet Alice and Peter. After all, Emily is paying homage to a strong, independent family matriarch and it was important for her to go through the approval process. Now the real kicker is going to be getting Emily into that Maxwell for some serious driving lessons. It’s not long til she drives away – 10 months and counting.