Famous Texas Tracks, Cars, Stories and SpeedShops

It took awhile to notice the pic, but on post #366, the photo of the 55 and the Maverick was at Little River aka Temple.

 

I have a few pictures of his cars but I think this is the only shot I have of him. BTW, I'm thinking the guy in the black sweater on the right looks like Kelly Chadwick. What do you guys think>

 

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None of those guys in the photo is Kelly Chadwick

 

TED DETAR was one of the greatest of the era---much respected by the guys i knew ...

 

Green Valley was indeed a dairy farm long before it was a drag strip. The farm was adjacent o a small farming community named Smithville or Smithfield. Bill McDonald was the owner of the farm and also the owner of the drag strip in San Antonio named The Double Eagle. He built Green Valley Raceway on his farm property and kept cows on it for years until he finally gave up of the dairy deal. He used to have to clean cow dung off of the track before each race weekend.

It was the first "built to race first class dragstrip" in Texas that I am aware of. All the others were old runways or abandoned highways etc.

GV was also an SCTA facility. When I worked for Gene Hamon Ford in LaMarque, TX we raced his 64 AC Cobra there in the SCTA events.

 

Thanks Bob, I'll leave them as unknown for now.

 

I posted an album of photos I took at the 1969 Texas CanAm on tamsoldracecarsite.net Included are shots of Jim Hall's Chaparral 2H (which was driven by Tom Dutton, but crashed during practice.)

 

post 368 has Bob Taylor's "RED HOSS" - formely Langley's Scorpian I -which Bob won many a trophy with...

 

Hey Brian,,no big deal but Bills name was McClure,not McDonald..

 

The '55 is a Nomad owned by Ed Morrow from Cameron,, ran E/Gas, E/mp, F/Gas or F/mp depending on whichever record had the best index at the time. Ed was a real contender,, usually took home the money. The Maverick he is running is I believe the Cross and Reher C/mp (Real Boss 302) SBC powered. The reason for the appearance of a terrific hole shot was because of the index difference.
Also in post #375 upper right and #376 lower left are pics taken at the river, as was the pic here of the P&S Racing E/MP. (Our car)

 

With the help from Bob, "WBRW32"-HAMB name, we have uncovered the information on the "Top Hat" Model A Coupe A/Altered in the picture attached.




The owner was Jim Pierson of Longview Texas and was built with 6 of his buddies in 1956 and finished in 1957. I was able to contact Roscoe Tinsley who was Jim's buddy who helped build the car and race it. I now have the whole story on the car, what a great adventure it has been.

 

Would anyone of you know anything about this car?
Glenn

 

Someone knows who that is on here Ive talked to on here who did. If I run across the conversation Ill let you know.

 

I found it, here's the link: http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=229575&showall=1

 

I forgot all about Six Flags but here is a cool decal from there by a Texas drag racer.

Jimbo

 

So the Mopar belonged to Buggs Threadgill? He is in the picture of the dragsters at Houston taken in 1958 or so.

I talked to him at a nostalgia meet at Noble, Ok. a few years back. He's quite a character!

 

I have found a photo that mis-identifies the car pictured. Image 5.jpg is an Elva 100 Formula Junior.

 

I wanted to thank 69CHEVELLE454 for posting his sports car photos from 60s Green Valley Raceway.

I ran across this forum (HAMB) while looking for info on SCCA driver Joe Locario and was led to this thread and was surprised to see all the great old photos of many 60s drivers I knew of and ran against.

My first time as a crew member was at the Feb 14, 1965, race of which a posted entry sheet is shown on page 14 (?). I was crewing for Allan Girdler in a Lotus 7A in EP. Later, Allan loaned me a Lotus Super 7 for my first drivers school.

I shared the link to the Corinthian Vintage Auto Race club (CVAR) facebook page which has a lot of members who raced or crewed about this time and then raced. Also, a lot of these cars are still being raced in CVAR, like mine by my younger brother and my nephew.

Thanks for posting these photos.

BTW, if you would like to see photos of the Overseas Motors Purple People Eater Mini Coopers fully restored, drop by the CVAR facebook page where there a lots of photos of these old cars still racing. We had 160 of them at the end of February racing at TWS in College Station.

 

Texas World joins Green Valley :/
http://wtaw.com/2014/03/13/plans-to-turn-texas-world-speedway-into-a-master-planned-community/

 

Not good news considering the track is busy 90+% of weekends with all kinds of motorsports.

 

wow....TWS is still active....that's cool....

 

Butch Lake is quiet the guy, we met him at little river back in the mid 70's when he had a 67 nova. After the races we sat at Jerry's place at the end of the track for some adult beverages. Butch said his car hauler was faster than ours, so we lined up on the bridge, cars on the back, and raced them accross the bridge to the other side, I think we won, but we were laughing so hard I'am not sure.
Gary

 

Hey guys, my 1st post here, hope it's OK.to start out this way. I moved from Tennessee to Texas for a while (68 to 79) to work at General Dynamics, and spent a lot of time at Green Valley, and a few trips to Kennedale and twice to Dallas International. (Seen the Foster/ Ratty Cat wreck and left when we found out the result) We lived in Azle and Haltom City the longest periods. Green Valley was just a short drive from Haltom City, so made it out there the most. Seems like we went on the occasional Wed. night for "grudge matches" or something too.????? I had a new 69 Fairlane Cobra Jet and a 61 Ranchero with a hi-po, straight axle, and cheater slicks that we drove daily. I do have some pics of Dallas and Green Valley, but in 68, 69, and 70 most of mine are polaroid. My scanner bit the dust two nights ago, but will post some when we get it fixed or another one. By the way, anyone remember a Ranchero with a 427 in Azle that had "Zip Code" written on it ? Never could entice him to run my junk there on the spurs around town, ha ! 69Chevelle, I also have a bumper sticker from the Valley I'll take a pic of. Wonder if I'll get thrown in jail if I tell that a lot of my races were from the gate at G.D. to the White Settlement bridge overpass and out on Jacksboro Hwy, ha ! Thanks for the memories, John

P.S. Tom from Tenn, we raced street cars and bikes at Buffalo Valley, Harriman, 411 Raceway, Loudon, Crossville, & Union Hill in Tenn. and Huntsville, Madison County, & Sand Mountain in Section, Alabama, and were regular spectators at most of the others.

 

great - not2big - we can wait.....

 

Any new pictures???

 

This 1970 Buick Stage 2 was owned and raced by the Holman family from the FT Worth area in the early 70s. I am looking for pics of it in action from back in the day or any information . Thanks . Oh and BTW cool thread lots of great pics and stories from back in the day .

 

Babyearl,
When I was stationed at Ford Hood in 1968 there was a Charlie who ran a used car lot who had a green Fairlane who I met at Little River. He was in the process of building a tunnel port 427 back then. He was a pretty hefty gentleman. Do you know if this is the same guy that you knew who was the salesman at Fergus Ford?
best regards, rawhide

 

That would be Charley Krempin alright. Yes I built the engine and wrenched on the car. Charley could sell an Eskimo a snowball and a refrigerator to keep it in. He called Holman & Moody and bought that Tunnelport for a super low cost. We ran the Fairlane in A/FX. He painted the car Orange,, the car was wrecked in Cooksville, Tenn. while towing to Bristol for the Nationals. I have some pictures somewhere of the car in sad shape. We pulled the engine, trans, front wheels and rear carrier,, put it in a Uhaul truck and went back to Killeen. I'll look for the pictures.

 

I will look forward to the pictures if you find them. How long did Charley keep racing?

 

Rawhide427,, After the loss of the Fairlane we put the drive train into a '69 Mustang. Charley ran it for about a year and sold everything to a guy in Waco and quit racing. The Mustang body ended up in the town of Comanche and the engine was bought by an insurance man here in Brownwood. pieced out. Block is all that is left and it has a window in it from a wayward rod.