This crash course was in driving

LITTLE ROCK — In his first career, John Gravett wore a badge on his chest and a sidearm at his waist.

He knew the next speeder he stopped might stick a loaded pistol in his belly, or that at the next spouse-house fight, he might be the one to leave with a cracked skull.

So with that experience under his gun belt, John retired from the Little Rock Police Department in 1985 to work at a truly dangerous occupation: He tested rookie drivers who were applying for an Arkansas driver’s license.

He can’t tell you the number of wrecks he survived in 16 years with the Arkansas State Police.

A dozen? He laughed: “Probably more than that.”

Gravett is a familiar name in local law enforcement.

His son, Johnny, is a former Little Rock officer who works in the state Crime Laboratory. His brother, Carroll, was sheriff of Pulaski County; one of Carroll’s sons is a police officer, the other works in security for the Department of Veterans Affairs.

Mr. Gravett was one of the first policemen to work with a young Charles Holladay, who 40 years later is in his second term as Sheriff Doc Holladay.

The intellectual jump from police sergeant to driver tester was simple: “I was already familiar with the rules and regulations of the road.”

The real test was the one of his nerves. With each driver’s test, he inspected the car to be used: brakes, lights, horn, et cetera.

“One day a guy come in, his car had been wrecked - the passenger door wouldn’t open. He wanted me to get in on the driver’s side and slide across. I told him, ‘No way. I’m not getting trapped in there.’”

The back seat in another driver’s car “was plum full of empty Coke cans ... up to the top of the front seat.

I didn’t go with him either.

The rule said they had to have the car halfway decent.”

He tested drivers in Mercedes, Beemers, Cadillacs and the occasional old Rambler.

The most common mistake: “Driving too slow because I was in there.”

Some rookies were more rookie than others: Some “couldn’t even back out of the parking place.”

And then there were the mishaps, like the one in which a driver had stopped to turn left.

“I could hear the brakes behind us. I knew they were going to hit us. They ... knocked us around. The boy already had his wheels cut [to turn], which you shouldn’t do. That could have been a bad wreck.”

Another day, Mr. Gravett had parked his personal car and was about to go into the office when a girlat the wheel hit his car.

The worst, though: “That day the boy hit the state police car.”

“The officer had his car parked long ways,” Mr.

Gravett recalls. “When we were parking, the boy pulled in, and instead of hitting his brake, he hit the gas.”

The impact was impressive, says Mr.

Gravett.

When they had quit bouncing, the boy looked at his tester - who now laughs in telling story - and inquired: “Did I pass ?”

Arkansas, Pages 9 on 06/16/2011

Print Headline: This crash course was in driving