Balboa stadium: early pictures of races??

searching for early pictures of cars that raced at Balboa stadium. I have done a websearch and found some interesting pictures and sites but just wondered if any HAMBer's out there knew of any or had any photos?


This is an unfortunate name, but interesting site.


http://www.b2-design.biz/Racing/bogan_racers.htm

 

Probably the most prolific photographer at Balboa Stadium was Bob Harde. According to Bob McCoy, tens of thousands of negatives were destroyed after Harde's death.

 

This is sad but true. Lots of Hardee's stuff went in the dumpster after his death. I have a small number of his prints that I made copy negs of and once I get home later today, I will try to remember to dig them out and post some. Most of them are from Cajon Speedway because I worked there for 15 years, but I have a few from Balboa Stadium.

 

A good place to try might be www.racinghistory.org. It's focus is open wheel racing up to 1970. They have a forum/message board with many racing people familiar with the period of sprint and midget history.

 

I found my copy negs of Bob Hardee's Balboa Stadium photos. I've got way more than I thought I did and don't have time to get them all scanned tonight. So here's a teaser.







Over the next couple of days I'll get the rest of them scanned and set up a Fotki album so everyone can see them.

 

[





Over the next couple of days I'll get the rest of them scanned and set up a Fotki album so everyone can see them.[/quote]

Thank you!

 

Several years ago Mike Bell did a great story on Balboa racing. It was in Stock Car Racing Mag. Sorry i dont rember the issue..

 

Thanks guys. looking for ford coupes in particular more so than midgets etc, not that their not cool! and NOT that I or others dont want to see them either.

cheers.

 

Hey Roy... (Racer5) Is this your Dad???

Jimmy Caruthers racing indoors in the No. 4 car. I think that's Bob McCaw pointing in the other direction.​

During the TQ years, Bob even towed cars to run in the Indiana fairground

 

P.J.- Balboa 1959

 

Okay, got all my photos scanned.

Bob Hardee was the track photographer at Balboa Stadium and his work was impressive. When I worked at Cajon Speedway I used the best Nikon stuff I could buy, state-of-the-art film, and processing, and I couldn't get anything near the quality of what he shot in the fifties with the film and equipment he had to work with. He was a master. He also shot lots of car features in and around San Diego for both Hot Rod and Rod & Custom in the '60s

The photos you see here are scans from copy negs that I made from 8x10 prints loaned to me from a friend. The evidence of how good a photographer Bob was is that these third generation images still look as sharp and crisp as they do.












You can see the entire collection of 33 photos by clicking on the link:

http://public.fotki.com/2002p51/racin/the-photography-of-/

Hardee also photographed races at Cajon Speedway in the early '60s. Here are some examples:






You can see some more of photographs from Hardee and others, including myself, from Cajon Speedway at this link:

http://public.fotki.com/2002p51/cajon_speedway/cajon_speedway_photos/

 

Here's a couple more:

 

No he was my brother but there was a picture of my dad standing by him on that same site

 

my dad is in the white short sleeved shirt

 

If you wanted pics of old ford coupes,see if you can count how many are in this picture from Balboa. The cars were all on the track at the same time only for this photo. I can not help but wish I could have seen them throw the green on that field of cars.
Andy

 

no wonder there arent many 32 5 window coupes around!! makes me cringe. I hope some survived.

 

Great pics and the last photo were jalopies and likely about half went home in one piece. Since the east coast Modifieds are the cars that I'm most knowledgeable about, I'd love to find the info of when this West Coast class turned into the Hardtop divisionb and later the Bakersfields style Supermodifieds. Perhaps I'll build a website some day devoted to coupes and coaches nationwide and would love to include these cars.

 

Outstanding pics!

 

I nominate you to organize it, make sure we get some track time!!

 

Junkyard Jan,
The narrowing of jalopy bodies and channeling them down over the frames, shortening of wheelbase ect. started at the Balboa track.
Then migrated north to Orange Show Stadium in San Bernadino. and on over to Ascot. The biggest sanctioning body at that time was the California Jalopy Association or CJA. There was some good old boys racing with CJA at that time, Parneli Jones for one. I first got involved in racing in 1960, [about the time the first modifieds were getting started] at the old Orange Show Track. About this time was when the first overhead valve V8's started showing up in these cars. I still race vintage jalopy type [flathead and six cyl. cars] and enjoy the hech out of it.
Andy

 

Don't feel bad....at least those cars got a second lease on life as race cars. Most old cars got scrapped without any such glory. It's not like they'd be still sitting in barns waiting to be discovered if they hadn't been raced....they'd have been recycled into beer cans years ago.

 

Growing up in the upper midwest in the 60s, about half the barns, sheds and silos in the country had a old coupe or sedan sinking in the mud next to them. Many of the old farmers, like my dad, had absolutly no use for that old junk, they had their share of freeezing their ass off while bouncing down the old country roads in them and couldn't imagine any good use for them. The only reason they kept them is that most were survivors of the depression and NEVER threw ANYTHING away. My dad (who was a dirt track racing fan) often said the only thing they were good for was as a dirt track modified.

 

It's a progression with the racers. They went through tons of early Ford V-8's when the flatheads had supremecy on the tracks...32-38 were most popular because the Fords from the 40's were a bit heavier.

Later, the racers used up many 55-57 Chevies. Then the early Chevelles and Camaros. Back in the early 80's a lot of Z-28 Camaros and SS Chevelles were turned into racers. At the time they were close to worthless.

In the 90's we were using the 78-81 Malibus and a lot of the 74-81 Camaros/Firebirds and 73-77 Novas. Currently it's the Monte Carlo SS models that are most popular. I'm already starting to regret chopping up the 78-81 Malibus....but as I said, they were on their way to the scrap heap anyway. If we hadn't raced them, they'd have gotten junked even sooner.

 

I didn't get upside down EVERY time I ran there, it just seemed that way

 

Thanks for explaining the progression from jalopy to the West coast modifieds, Andy. I'll gladly file your info. I remember reading of Art Atkinson running a used car lot and being a prolific jalopy racer in the '50s-early '60s. I knew that Parnelli began his career in a jalopy owned by Frank Deiny. With the name 'modified' describing such different sorts of cars depending upon the part of the country, it's hard to keep everything straight. But I hope to get some webspace from a friend and cover the mod scene coast to coast. I own two eastern style mods, a '37 Chevy coach and a '70s Gremlin bodied car which is being prepped for exhibition racing in early August with the http://www.vintageamericanracecars.com/

Jan

 

The San Diego Racing Museum has just released a DVD of color home movies of Jalopy Races at Balboa Stadium...
Here is a link to where you can get this DVD
http://sandiegoracingmuseum.weebly.com/balboa-stadium-jalopy-races-dvd.html

 

The San Diego Racing Museum just released a DVD of color jalopy races at Balboa Stadium.. Here is a link to where you can get one of these DVD....

http://sandiegoracingmuseum.weebly.com/balboa-stadium-jalopy-races-dvd.html