great photos! my best friends uncle owned the property on the north end of the track. we would walk down the fence line and hop over the fence and we were in the pits by the scales. i spent a lot of my chidhood there. if they were still opperating i would like to spend the rest of it there
Thats funny shit . Every one always ask me why I named my shop(Thufield rod& custom) after an airport.
Thanks for the pics, and the recognition. It was quite the place to be, back in the day. Love those early pics. Later on I can still hear the DJ's on KJR..64 funny cars! Born and raised in Puyallup. Always fun to listen to people try to pronounce it, when they weren't from there.
Puyallup was just the best! Great spectator track -I took the attached pic from the front row of the stands accross from the tower. Pic 2 is the NW Frantic 4 roadster - Welfringer, Zatchovich, Squires & Eaton.
We lost Don Wilbur 17th September 2016. One more of the people who paved them way for the rest of us Spokane boys! Thanks to all the guys who came before.
I used to go the races there in the 60's and back about 25 years ago I was up with friends in their Cessna 172 and after a trip around Mt St Helens we landed at Thun field for lunch or the 100.00 hamburger as the airplane folk say. I was thinking then that it was right where the drag strip had been.
I grew up not too far from Puyallup Valley. Saw some great shows there, blew up a few cars there, loved the Wednesday 'grudge night' drags. Pick up your buddies, drop them at the back so they could sneak in, then drive around and pay for the driver. But developers built houses all around it then the homeowners complained about the noise, forcing it to shut down. They tried to do that to neighboring Thun Field too, but the county bought that and had deeper pockets than the complainers, so it still exists as Pierce County Airport. But even if they hadn't shut it down, at best it would survived as an 1/8 mile track as it really didn't have enough shutdown area. As it was, by the late 60s cars got off into the alder trees at the end of the track pretty regularly.
In 1962 I met Tommy Ivo at PUYALLUP race way. 6 month later when in the CG. I say him again at Conn. race way and he remembered me from Puyallup race way. (thun Field) Cool.
I think that was the Seattle World Fair race. Garlits and Ivo in a two out of three match race, Ivo won the final at dusk, with the cars along the side of the strip with their lights on to illuminate the track. Lots of big name Super Stock drivers. I was with Jack Williams and the Syndicate Scuderia dragster. The most memorable race of my life.
The race I attended was June 8 & 9, 1963. The "Melrose Missile", blew up on the first run, and teamed up with a Seattle based team to run the event. After looking at the photos again, I noticed the last dragster, Floyd, Albrich and Bowman (The "Northwind") a Portland based Kent Fuller AA/FD. I also recognized the roadster being pushed by a 53 Olds. It's Ted Haider, a converted track roadster my old buddy Jack Gillis built in '49. That raced on the oval at Aurora Playland in 49-50.