American Dream, right, recently won the best appearing car award at the Sears-Craftsman National Event in chicago, Illinois.
12/29/03
A family tradition, the American dream, Operation Interdependence™
By Nancy Kopff
Staff Writer
Sherburne County Citizen
American Dream, right, recently won the best appearing car award at
the Sears-Craftsman National Event in chicago, Illinois.
When Ron Chaffee began drag racing back in the late sixties, it was just for fun.
He got involved in bracket racing at local tracks, and his passion just kept growing. Back then, he just couldn’t have imgained what it would all lead to. He couldn’t have imagined that a few years later he would be married to a young woman, Barb, who loved racing as much as he did.
Nor would he have guessed that the two of them would have a family of three sons - sons that would one day follow in their footsteps and become a nationally-known race team. And back in 1967, Ron probably didn’t even consider that he might be a grandfather someday, a grandfather of six young girls who are as determined to carry on the family tradition as their own fathers were.
All that has come to pass, and the Chaffee family has realized their version of the American dream, which is why their top alcohol funny car is called just that, “The American Dream.”
While their achievements on the raceway have been fulfilling and exhilarating enough, one of the most rewarding aspects of the Chaffee tradition, some 35 years after it all began, is their involvment with something called Operation Interdependence™.
Operation Interdependence™ is “A civilian-to-military delivery system®” that was started in 2001, and works to bring care packages to deployed troops, once each month during their tour of duty.
A retiring Marine, Albert Renteria, came up with the idea, realizing that a coordinated effort was needed to bring rations to the troops without congesting the military’s resources. Renteria developed a system whereby citizens back home can create care packages, often embellished with personal notes of support, and donate those items to an organization that can efficiently get the items to the men and women in uniform, without causing logistical burdens to the military, and keeping the mail system open for letters from home to still be received by the troops.
“The response from the military has been overwhelming. Operation Interdependence™ receives E-mails and photographs from the deployed men and women expressing their extreme gratitude for their monthly treats and letters. They are ecstatic to discover that there are people at home who really care about them.
“Some of them do not receive any communication from home other than this. With OI™, the care packages supply a whole platoon so no one is left out.” - excerpt from Operation Interdependence™ website (www.oidelivers.org). O.I. is a year-round effort, a cause that everyone and anyone can easily participate in.
“This is about what’s in your heart,” says Gage Chaffee, the youngest of the three Chaffee sons. “A lot of people forget how good we have it. For the troops to get something from home, and to know that people support them is huge. Even if you don’t agree with the war, a lot of them don’t agree with it either, but they’re doing what they’ve been called to do,” says Gage. Patriotism has always had a prominent place in the Chaffee family.
“We painted our car like an American flag back in 1998,” says Gage. “We believe in those colors and have for years. It is because we have this great country that we can have our american dream.” And so the car has always been used not just to race, but to promote that American pride that the Chaffees beleive is so important.
A few years later it was just happenstance that Ron Chaffee would meet a gentleman who was involved with Operation Interdependence™. Soon he met Renteria in person, and the Chaffees have helped spread the word about O.I. ever since. Son Gage recently returned from San Diego, Ca,, the site of one of the main distribution centers.
“This organization (O.I.) is one of the truest non-profits you’ll ever find; 95 cents of every dollar received is used directly for the care packages,” he says. It is one of the goals at Chaffee Motorsports to help locate a regional O.I. distribution site in Minnesota, so that packages could be directly shipped from here.
Needed is about 2,400 square feet of office space, and, of course, many volunteers and sponsors to suport the cause. Anyone interested in learning more about Operation Interdependence™ or contributing time or donations to the project may contact Chaffee Motorsports at (320) 743-2129 or visit the O.I. website at www.oidelivers.com.