The Mystery Machine

Scooby Dooby-Doo, where are you? If Scooby were in Kirksville, he probably would be riding around with Bob Ebert and his 10-year-old son, Elijah, in their very own replica of the Mystery Machine, the cartoon van Scooby and his pals have been driving around to solve mysteries since the late 1960s.

Bob, a network specialist at Truman and a single father, said the idea for the Mystery Machine started a couple of years ago as a father-son project.

"[Elijah] came up with the notion of doing the Mystery Machine," Bob said.

The idea seemed feasible to Bob, an admitted "car guy" who has owned at one time or another a '57 Chevy, a '66 Mustang convertible, two Porsches and a Jaguar, among others vehicles.

"The thing that amazes me is I have had just about everything you could imagine as far as cars go," Bob said. "This is the one that draws the most attention."

Bob said he didn't want any recognizable brand for the Mystery Machine because in the cartoon, the van always was generic. He and Elijah came across an old delivery van at Pro-Tech, a computer repair store in Kirksville. Pro-Tech was not quite ready to sell it, however, so the project got put on the back burner, Bob said.

Then, in spring 2001, Bob got the call that Pro-Tech was ready to sell the van, and on July 4 he finally was able to purchase what would eventually become the Mystery Machine.

Most people might consider a father-son project to be building a model car, but Bob and Elijah were faced with building the real thing. Transforming a beat-up old delivery truck with 150,000 miles on it into the Mystery Machine required some serious time and elbow grease.

The first step was using razor blades to remove the vinyl lettering that decorated the truck. Step two was taking the van to Potosi, Mo., a five-hour drive, to a body shop run by one of Bob's high school friends.

"Before we got started, we talked to him about it," Bob said. "The neat thing about doing the Mystery Machine is the kids love it, but the cartoon actually started in our generation, so we identify with it, too. We thought it was cool."

Then in fall 2001, dad and son made the first of many 10-hour round trips to and from the body shop. The initial trips were to do body work on the van. Bob said Elijah got tired sometimes, but he always helped out with anything he could.

"This has taught him a lot as far as hard work pays off," Bob said. "Sometimes, when you're in the midst of the grind and the dust and tired and don't feel like going on, that's when you keep pushing on because the payoff will be worth it."

Perhaps the toughest weekend of work was when they got to do the actual paint job. To complete the paint job, every area on the van was covered with thin tape, except where each new color belonged. Bob said masking off the green alone took a total of 26 hours. The weekend began Friday night and did not end until nearly midnight Sunday when Bob and his son finally arrived back home.

The next trip was a bit more exciting as father and son finally got to see their turquoise, green, yellow and orange masterpiece.

"The thing that is kind of weird about it is you don't know what you have because you keep covering up until you're completely done and you pull the paper off," Bob said. "Needless to say, when the paper came off, there was much joy because it turned out as good as or better than we'd hoped."

Although there was still more work to be done, the Mystery Machine was almost ready to come home. Some of the final touches included finding flat disc hubcaps that could be painted and using polyurethane foam to make the "spare tire" on the front of the van. Bob said a real tire would have been too big, and it was actually a member of the science faculty who gave him the idea to use polyurethane. Finally, there was the matter of coming up with the perfect license plate.

"I wanted 'Zoinks,'" Bob said. "But believe it or not, that is already in use in the state of Missouri."

Bob said the employees at the license bureau helped out by checking some other choices before they finally came up with "WareRU," a reference, of course, to the popular line in the show's theme song, "Scooby Dooby-Doo, where are you?"

Then, in July 2002, just more than a year from having purchased the old delivery van, it was time for the Mystery Machine to make its triumphant voyage to Kirksville.

"We just caused mayhem all across the state," Bob said. "It was fun to watch heads snapping as we'd come buzzing along."

Heads continued to snap, and the Mystery Machine became a source of intrigue and entertainment.

Freshman Nick Billington said he first noticed the Mystery Machine last summer.

"I had to do a double take," Billington said. "I didn't make the connection at first. Then I saw 'Mystery Machine' on the side."

One of the first trips Bob and his son made in the Mystery Machine was to the Macon Drive-In Theater for its opening of the Scooby Doo movie in late July. The van caused quite a stir, and the drive-in even put a picture of it on its Web site.

Since then, Bob said he has taken the Mystery Machine to most of the day cares in Kirksville, and it has been a part of two parades: the Labor Day parade in Novinger, Mo., and the Truman Homecoming parade.

Senior Micah McKay, the student representative for the Board of Governors, got to ride with Bob in the Mystery Machine in the Homecoming parade.

"It was really cool," McKay said. "There were a bunch of little kids on the parade route, and they were all asking where Scooby was."

The Mystery Machine is parked along Baltimore Street, just north of the Hair-Tec Salon, and Bob said a lot of people have stopped by to take pictures of it. A couple of people have even left Scooby mementos on the van. One person left a coffee mug in the shape of the Mystery Machine complete with two straws, one with Scooby on it and one with the van on it.

Despite the attention, Bob said it is not a show car.

"We built it to have fun," Bob said. "We're just going to drive it and enjoy it."

Bob also was quick to dispel the myth that he invested a lot of money in making the Mystery Machine.

"We bought the van for next to nothing," Bob said. "Since we did most of the work ourselves, we've got a tremendous amount of time in it, but we don't have a whole lot of money."

For a car guy and his son, it was all worth it. After all, as Bob said, "Life's too short to drive dull cars."