Brooklyn, NY Infamous Street Racers Back in the Day

Makes me wonder who stole Richie Zul's '69 Camaro just as he got it competive.

 

NITROFC

THANKS for the history lesson. GREAT POST!!! Slim

 

Yes,amazing how all these big name street cars have ended up all over the galaxy,

 

hi i can remember going to connecting with my friend's 50 ish willis station
wagon/hot dog truck .. parking it on top ..he would sell-out in an hour or so ..beer / soda / dogs / cigs ... also remembor the chick with the minni-
trafic light that started some of the runs on clearveiw

 

Man, Heavy Sr. (last guy on the right) was one BIG dude!

 

I was too young for any of it But my uncle Frankie raced a Willys Gasser on Long Island and he always told me Cross Bay Blvd was the place where the street racing was going on in the 60s. One of his friends was killed over there when he lost the handle.

Before that,in the 50s my other uncle Indy 500 racer Jerry Karl used to hang out and street race from the Bow Wow at cross bay.
They used to drag race in the 60s on Sunrise Highway and I was about 8-9 yrs old and on Sat nites after midnight I could hear them winding them up on the sunrise in Baldwin. Down the block was Motion Chevrolet.

 

I have every issue of CARS ILLUSTRATED - they will never be for sale

 

Ha!..I was IN every issue of Cars Illustrated, and I don't have a single one....go figure

 

Yep, Cross Bay Blvd. South of the Belt Parkway. Burgers at Wetson's and then a race.

 

thanks al this is a great thead brings a lot of good times back

 

Seaman's Neck road was another hot spot back when everyone was cruising Burger King on Hempstead Tpke.

 

Eddie

We used to cruise out to that Burger King, from Elmont, to hunt up some new competition every once in a while. If I remember right that was the first Burger King on the island. Used to be a bad ass purple Vette from by there said wheels of fortune on the fender.
Back then you could draw races light to light all the way in both directions!

Check out my home page for some old shots from the island tracks

Glenn

 

I remember how upsetting it was when you told us the establishment closed down cars illustrated [street machine nats -e town 87 ]
brilliant work tony

 

Thanks for the nice words. It's amazing how many people remember that mag...it was a lot of fun, but at the same time a constant battle to keep alive.
This thread brought back alot of memories. Street racing in NY back in the 70's and 80's was a way of life. I remember literally running 7 nights a week at a dozen different locations...it only stopped for rain!

 

my old college roomate lived in bay shore , if you made a left at channel lumber on us 231 , he always wondered why we visited him in the middle of the night . used to have like 50 stop light street races on 231 before we made it to his house
went down that way a couple of years , demographics changed , not even any ricers out there

 

Hey Tony, I remember you! We met at Masters Shopping Center one night circa 1986; saw your black 'stang run more than a few times over at the service road (during subsequent visits to S.I.) just outside the Goethels bridge. I really 'dug' your articles in High Performance Mopar and Cars Illustrated! Also, the early issues of Mopar Action.

Man, it's really hard to believe that was over twenty years ago! Seems like it was only five.

Last time I saw you, it was circa 1996, at the Fall Englishtown Swap Meet. You had your fuel altered for sale in the spectator side lot. Didn't get to talk to ya then but saw you.

Great to know you're still around!

Pete

P.S. Maybe Cliff G. or Neil Van O. have those back issues! If not, I'm sure Norman H. does!

P.P.S. Remember our 'official' starter, Lee Q.? He went on to bigger and better things...



http://www.paalive.org/news/?p=6

 

http://www.automobilemag.com/featur...009_ford_flex_art_car_lee_quinones/index.html

Lee's Nemesis
A portrait of the artist with his street racer.

Besides painting, Lee's other obsession during his youth was street racing. "Not the crazy stuff like today," he says, "but with everything blocked off very carefully and organized. In those days, there were legendary street races for big money."

He ran lots of cars himself. One was a black Dodge nicknamed Nemesis that he's had since 1989. He shows a picture: all black, big scoop on the hood. "A 1965 Dodge Coronet two-door sedan," he says. "There's a lot of stuff in it you can't see. It has enough skunkwork materials to make Lockheed engineers jealous."

A painting Lee did of one of those legendary street races hangs on the wall of his Brooklyn studio. A Dodge Dart and a Chevy Camaro are side by side. "I call it Avenue of the Americas," he says. "Not after the avenue in Manhattan, but because the street is the avenue of achieving American dreams. This is one of the most famous races ever, in Brooklyn in 1971, with lots of money riding on it."

You can see by the wavy, movie-flashback liquidity of the taillights that the painting depicts a dream of the race. It shows how memory enlarges things, like the oversize tachometer glowing red inside the Dodge: you can clearly see the needle kissing seven grand.

There's a big window in the studio next to the painting. We stand, looking out over a glum Brooklyn. It's a rainy day, and you can see nothing but flat roofs for miles.

"A gray day in New York is a sunny day," Lee says.

"What do you mean?" I ask, genuinely puzzled.

"Well, in New York every day is bright, because there is something new, something just coming at you, just whizzing by. That is the essence of New York."

 

Ahem...I ain't tellin.

Pete

 

Not sure if this is old info but if you Google Connecting Highway someone has started a web site dedicated to it and the cars that raced there. They are looking for info.

 

Hey, thanks! Here's the link:

http://connectinghighway.com/

Pete

 

Wow - Great site!!

Are you the Pete formally from the island, who ran the big hemi cars?

 

Nope, that's not me. Never heard of him 'til you just mentioned it. But I was known as "Hemi Pete" and "Hemi Man" at one time.



This picture taken a day before I sold all my Mopar 'stuff' to a guy in Sweden a year and a half ago. Photo sez it all.

This is what resided in the GTX. Let's just say that it required Cam 2 Racing Fuel to run.





The only Hemi man from Island that I knew about was this old black guy named Willie or "Pop." He had tons of Hemi parts.
Back in the early 1990's he raced a two-tone purple Super Pro 1970 'Cuda; someone else drove.

Ever hear of him?

Pete

 

Very nice Hemi Man!!

I didn't know Pop's - I was out of NY by '90 - only back for summers & when I need a good food fix!

 

Yeah, it was fun...

Pete

 

Brooklyn "Superfly" Heavy's street/tow car in the pits at the 1972 Summernationals.

 

Cool...and the gang!

 

I love this site !!!! Brings back so many memories. It breathes new life into me.