News Reel of the Day: Roaring Wheels (1953)

In the 1950s, Castle Films used to make short films on every subject from D-Day to Dachshunds. Think of them as a sort of a low budget 8mm movie video store of their day. The 1953 film you see below is a series of racing clips slapped together starting with tether cars, 1/4 midget racers, and then soap box derby cars. When the action moves to ‘hot rods’ (as described by the awkward narrator), the footage is actually of early ‘dune bugs’, followed by motorcycle flat track racing and hill climbs, then off-roading in Jeeps and ending with John Cobb land speed racing the Railton Mobil Special at Bonneville. It’s all quite a bit to try and track in an 8 1/2 minute long film! Regardless, I figured it was worth watching for the moments you may have never seen before…