Features VINTAGE SPRINT CAR PIC THREAD, 1965 and older only please.

Running Indy on Friday the 27th......10 plus laps. Heaven!

 

A couple of Bardahl's, Joe James in the 14 KK4000 Sam Hanks in the 18 KK3000. 1952

 

June 4th 1967 Jim Moughan only drove the Deuce a few times, this was his 1 win in Hector's car, the Black Deuce's 432 or 433 of 434 total feature wins. 2nd Jerry Blundy, 3rd Ray Lee Goodwin, 4th Tom Corbin, 5th Lee Kunzman, started and finished 6th the 29 of Chuck Lynch, you can see the nose of his car 3rd row outside.

 

Al Unser, winner of the 64 Pikes Peak Hillclimb in Vince Conze's original downtube car.

 

Jimmy Davies tried to qual the conze car at the 1963 Hoosier Hundred. Didn't make the field.

 

Spider Webb, Indy 1948.

 

After tending to the Sparks sixes for many years "Chickie" finally gets his hands on the Borg-Warner. 1946.


Takeo "Chickie" Hirashima, being of Japanese descent, was interned during the war, likely at Manzanar. He later served in the all Japanese 442nd Infantry regiment that fought in Italy. During the fifties and sixties he would have
his hand on several winning engines at The Speedway. His exploits continued long after but that would be outside the scope of this thread. Edit: Could that be Roscoe Turner between Chickie and the trophy?

 

Chickie was also a riding mechanic prior to the war. Here he is with Mays in '35 when they sat on the pole, they did it again in '36 and in 1937 I believe he and Jimmy Snyder set fast time during qualifying.

 

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ Way back in the 1970's that car sold less engine for $20,000, used to call about it every month, skipped one month only to find out it sold. Bob

 

Joie Chitwood, Indy 46.

 

Love the notch in the oil tank for the radius rod.

 

I'm not sure that's even an oil tank. Indy adopted Grand Prix regulations in 1938, and these included minimum body width, hence a few cars had to attach these "pontons". Maybe some of them did double duty as an oil tank, but I don't see any plumbing here.

 

The car today, one of those just right INDY cars IMO, the overall size just looks right, like that hood treatment too. Bob

 

I don't see any filler caps and it had the same thing on the right side, so they probably aren't oil tank(s).

 

Jimmy Bryan in the Leitenberger 45 at Williams Grove circa 1952.

 

If it was done to meet minimum width rules wouldn't it have been much easier to just put the pontoons between the front and rear radius rod attaching points? Maybe they were "hiding" a "speed secret" ?

 

Now, what speed secret could possibly have been hidden there? A flux capacitor?

Seriously, I believe the regs specified that the overall width was measured at cockpit height, thus the placement.

 

Several cars of that era had similar "protuberances." One example is Al Putnams LGS Spl., a Myron Stevens built car I believe.

 

Both cars have the additions in the same place, I wonder if the measurement was taken at a certain distance in front of the rear wheel or something.

 

Elmer George leads George Amick, Jud Larson and Bryan down low while Ward finds some bite on the cushion. Springfield, 1957.

 

Ronney Householder in the Speedway Cocktail Spl. 1948.

 

Speedway Cocktail was not a bar or a tavern as many assume. At one point car owner Joe Lencki sold the engine additive that he had developed as "Speedway Cocktail". To make a long story short Lencki's additive survived him and ended up being marketed in more recent years as zMax after Bruton Smith's group bought the rights to it. And it did do what it said in many applications actually receiving FAA certification for use in piston aircraft engines.

The 6 cylinder Lencki engine in the photo showed up for years at Indianapolis finally making its' last appearance in 1963 in a Trevis roadster with Cliff Griffith as the driver. They missed the show.

Lencki claimed that Floyd Trevis was building his roadster as early as late 1960/early 1961 when George Bignotti came along and bought it out from under him. Of course, this Trevis ended up winning the 1961 500 with A.J. Foyt. Lencki then got the next Trevis which didn't make it to the Speedway until 1963. I believe the car has shown up in recent years pretty much as Lencki parked it in the 1960s.

To my knowledge it never ran in any race anywhere.

 

Tony Bettenhausen in Mel Wiggers car 1954.

 

Dewey Gatson, AKA John DeSoto, but known to most as "Rajo Jack" has found the wall here at Oakland Stadium in 1946. Looking at the tail of his car perhaps he had some help. Many stories surround this man all, of them interesting. The saddest story for me was that his wife always had to travel to the races with him in case he won, so she could give him the trophy and the victory kiss and not the white trophy girl.

 

Gene Hartley, Indy 57.

 

I believe this is Duane Carter, Oakland Speedway 1937. Check the roll bars.

 

Been awhile since I've contributed to this thread. Just got three more photos from a family member that crewed on Gil Golladay's midget out of Sacramento. First photo shows the mayor of Sacramento in Gil's (Solar?) midget at the Lazy J Speedway in Sacramento. Gill is on right in white pants. My cousin in Gil's midget at Gil's driveway dated 1949-50 . Gil's daughter standing by the midget with my cousin's truck as tow vehicle. And the color photo should be the same Solar midget with a Ford Ferguson engine and what I believe to be Gil's own cylinder head. According to my family Golladay was a very good machinist and fabricator.

 

Thanks for the post on Rajo Jack. There's not a lot of info out there about him and I'd not seen this shot before. He does seem to be an interesting character that lived in "interesting" times who deserves more recognition than he seems to get.

 

"Tipping the can" on Wilbur Shaw's Blu Green Spl. Muroc dry lake 1932.