ONTARIO - For nearly half a century, local lore about a behemoth wrench lost
somewhere in
Chaffey High School's Gardiner Spring Auditorium has drawn more snickers than
believers. Until now.
Enter Dave Masterson, Chaffey drama instructor who first heard the story , in
1984 while teaching at Ontario High School..
"I never believed, it existed," said Masterson, whose curiosity led
him this month to a little-traveled tunnel under the auditorium balcony.
Like others, Masterson was dubious with a capital D. He'd heard the jokes
about "that legendary wrench up there." Would, Sears give a
refund?
"I said, Yeah, what kind of tool box did that come out of?'"
Through a 5-foot green door, Masterson traversed 40 feet of the catacomb-like
dungeon where only dead and dismembered theater chairs rest
He crawled under a 3-foot recess, avoided cracking his head on menacing
concrete posts and finally found the prize: a 10-foot 400-pound monster wrench
nestled in a dark crevice
"You think the wrench is big, you ought to see the pliers,"
Masterson quipped, gaping at the tool that makes observers Lilliputian by
comparison. "I suspect architects today would laugh if you ever talked
about using something like this."
Don't look for the relic in any campus auto shop. Masterson and others want
the metal lunk displayed in the auditorium museum by early next month
It will lie at rest again, this time next to programs of local appearances by
Bob Hope and the Smothers Brothers
Although the wrench's past is not entirely known, auditorium restoration and
progress chair man Harold "Tony" Zenz said the tool is a remnant of
Franklin Delano Roosevelt's New Deal -, program.
To jolt Americans from their Depression doldrums, New Deal programs created
jobs - in this
Captions:
"You think the wrench is big, you ought to see the pliers." -Chaffey
High School teacher Dave Masterson.
Harold Zenz beholds wrench found at Chaffey High School.
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