After nearly 50 years in the travel lane, Morin’s Driving School is closing.
AUBURN – After 30-some years of teaching kids to drive, Dick Morin had no intention of slowing down.
But a recent illness forced him to close the doors on the business his dad, Normand, founded in 1955.
“I really enjoyed working with kids,” said Morin, 70, who closed his Summer Street business last week. “I’d still be running it if I were well.”
Morin figures he’s taught hundreds of Lewiston-Auburn teenagers to drive, some from three generations of the same family.
When he took over the business in 1971, he had classes of about 10 kids. His driving school cars then had standard transmissions, dual steering wheels, dual brakes and dual gas pedals. This year his classes were about three or four students each – a testament to the increased training teens need now to get their licenses, said Morin. The cars today are automatic, and the instructor only has a dual brake pedal.
There were times, though, when the dual steering wheel would have been handy. Morin remembers teaching one adult student to drive when she pulled on to Hotel Road in the wrong lane.
“Here comes a tractor-trailer straight at us, and she’s insisting the truck is on the wrong side of the road,” said Morin. “By the time I convinced her to pull over … well, it was pretty darn close.”
Morin said teens haven’t really changed over the decades. They still flunk their driving tests most often because of nerves and lack of confidence.
And they’re still subjected to tremendous peer pressure. It’s that pressure that often causes them to ignore the rules and leads to trouble with the law.
“Most kids are pretty good about learning the rules, but maintaining those rules is something else,” said Morin.
He said he knows kids violate laws – riding with passengers and drinking and driving. He said in many cases, the consequences are too lax.
“Most get a fine and a suspended license for 60 days and they’re back on the road,” he said. “They don’t learn their lessons.”
Morin stressed defensive driving tactics, especially with today’s increasingly aggressive drivers. In fact, he believes drivers ought to have a second road test after they’ve been licensed for five years to help identify the bad ones and reinforce the need to be careful. He always urged his students to be observant.
“It doesn’t take but a second to look both ways in an intersection,” he said.
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