Pierre Louis Eschardies Jr., known as "Pete" to his friends, had it all, or was about to.
Tall, dark, and athletic, Pete was born in Los Angeles to French immigrant parents in 1893. He was named for his uncle Pierre and his father Louis.
Pete may have been mechanically inclined from a young age - the 1910 census lists a teenage Pete as a helper in a foundry.
Pete was a noted amateur boxer, a member of the Los Angeles Athletic Club, and according to the Los Angeles Herald "one of the most daring road drivers who ever tackled a mountain race."
The automobile industry was young, and Pete was already one of its rising stars, at least on the West Coast.
Pete worked for J.W. Leavitt, first as a mechanic, then adding sales to his skill set.
Leavitt's firm sold Overland and Willys-Knight cars, but took over Chevrolet sales from the Ryus Motor Car Company (sources disagree over whether this was in 1916 or 1917).
In 1915, the manager of Chevrolet's sales division and driver Fred Aubert came up with the idea of demonstrating the new Chevrolet 490 by lighting up Mount Wilson on Labor Day evening and racing the car to the top, setting a record driving time of 36 minutes (hey, it was 1915!). The race took place again on Labor Day, 1916, but Aubert was injured in an accident on a practice run, and a replacement driver had to be arranged on very short notice. About twenty Chevrolet salesmen clamored for the chance, but Pete, or "Wild Pete", as the newspaper called him, was selected.
Pete spent Labor Day in its entirety making practice runs up and down Mount Wilson to familiarize himself with the 120 curves along its 9.5 miles of road. By 7:30 pm, it was dark and foggy, and Pete was tired, but about a thousand spectators were waiting to watch Pete drive the 490 up the mountain.
In the words of the Los Angeles Herald:
With a roar and a blast Pete was on his way. With lights flashing in and out around the curves and in the canyons, he climbed rapidly upward until he was lost in a fog bank three miles from the top. A few minutes of anxious suspense and then a great red flare broke out at the summit announcing that he had arrived safely.
Pete not only made it to the top of Mount Wilson despite the fog and a long day of practice runs - he set a new record of 35 minutes.
Pete quickly worked his way up to Chevrolet sales manager in 1918 at the tender age of 25. The buzz around Auto Row that summer was that Pete was going to marry his sweetheart, Esther Lind, and then go off to fight in World War One (he had registered for the draft the year before). It didn't quite pan out that way.
Shortly after World War One ended, the Spanish influenza pandemic broke out, and several members of the Eschardies household were stricken.
The Spanish flu was a brutal killer, claiming the lives of many otherwise perfectly healthy adults. On the night of January 8, 1919, it became apparent that Pete was not going to live for much longer.
Despite quarantine restrictions, someone sent for Esther Lind and a minister. Esther stood on the Eschardies' porch, Pete's bedside window was opened, and the minister performed the marriage ceremony.
Pete died the next day and is buried at Calvary Cemetery.
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