Dave, Bob Sidebothom also did the chassis work on Bruce McDowel's Bad News Coupe, and drove it for Bruce.
Hello, This unusual Model A sedan needs a little more information. It was built and run by Ray Callejo from the SF Bay Area. It was in a lot of car shows and as the early Drag News ad/photo shows, competed in the Altered Sedan class in those early days. Jnaki Here are a couple of posts from the past: Hello, Here are a couple of drawings and some actual facts found in my research of old Altered Coupes and Sedans. There were a few multiple engine Altereds and this was one of the most popular during our time at the drags and in car shows, but it was located in the S.F. Bay Area. The drawings and info were posted in the Friday Art Show back in August, 2020. We had never seen it in person, despite the fact that they were sponsored by Clay Smith Cams from Long Beach, CA near our old house. Jnaki If anyone has a Bay Area color photo, I would be happy to change what I thought and a digital imaging company thought was the actual color from a B/W photo. In all of the stacks of old car magazines, there must be a color photo of the multiple engine sedan. 1961 So, does anyone have a June 1961 Hot Rod Mag or October 1961 Car Craft Magazine for comparisons? FROM ANOTHER POST: Friday Art Hello, Ray Callejo had/has a well rounded background in hot rods and drag racing. He was at the Fremont Dragstrip with his 1931 Model A Sedan and a 283 C.I. SBC that ran in the B/Altered class. This was the ALTERED Coupe and Sedan Class many years before they dropped the designation and included Altered Roadsters. Ray Callejo Model A Fremont Drags Then with his connections to the custom/hot rod world, he created a 584 C.I. SBC powered (283 x 2+ 566 c.i.) So, he bored the 283’s up to 292 c.i. each and put them inline inside of the Model A sedan. There is no record in any publication that can show the car at the drags, but it did manage to get to several Northern California hot rod shows with the twin inline SBC powering the modified Model A Sedan. Jnaki The research shows that the copyright for all show photos belongs to a person that has not made them public. The old designation of BA-7 is no longer correct and should have read A/A-7. (with 584 c.i.) The Model A Sedan with the twin 292 SBC motors was featured in Car Craft and Hot Rod Magazines back in the early 1960s.
I don't have any other photos of the dragster beyond what was posted above...here is their Crosley sedan that also ran an Olds for power.
That is one I posted many time here and on FB, my mom took that and I still have the original. I’m honored that you like it.
Barb Hamilton on the left and next to her is her right hand man Nancy Leonello, uh, make that her right hand woman. They worked together at TRW in technical services and wrenched on Barb’s Willys, building the engines and doing all maintenance and tuning at the track. I met her at the Thompson, Ohio Gasser Reunion in 2003 (?) or so when we ran a fuel altered in exhibition runs. She was quite a woman and very interested and knowledgeable about the fuel car we had. RIP Barb.
Ivo and Don Prudhomme on a national tour making exhibition runs and probably doing some match racing too. I think Snake was a 17 year old kid at the time. Can you imagine trailering a car like that and parking it overnight at a motel in this day and age? That was a different time!
Hey D, Nice photo of the Chrisman Garage Special from those early days. That front mounted 671 blower was the first step in the long line of great power for the record books. From that early streamlining to the later top mount 671 was a pretty good run and development for the Chrisman garage guys. NHRA Blog: “In 1958, the slingshot-style dragster was beginning to make its mark. The Chrismans, along with Frank Cannon, built their famed Hustler I dragster, which immediately won the Best Engineered Car award at the 1958 Nationals in Oklahoma City (pictured). The car, powered by a blown 392-cid Chrysler engine stroked out to 454 inches, recorded the sport's first 180-mph run with a 181.81 at Riverside Raceway and won the Smokers Meet in Bakersfield in 1959." "The late 1950s was a jittery time for the United States: the Cold War with Russia had intensified and the country had just suffered through a moderate economic recession. For drag racers, this was also the time of the nitromethane fuel ban. The NHRA, fearful for driver safety, banned the use of this racing fuel at their sanctioned events. Prominent tracks, like Lions Drag Strip in Wilmington, California, although not under the NHRA umbrella, also imposed the proscription at their weekly race. That was not to say, however, that the nitro cars disappeared from the drag racing scene. Tracks like Fontana and Riverside Raceway continued to embrace the class, but there was no one big event on the West Coast for these "fuel" junkies." "This would all change in 1959 when the Smokers of Bakersfield decided to host the first annual U.S. Gas and Fuel Championship. There was a young man down in Florida named Don Garlits who had been making a lot of noise with his Swamp Rat fuel dragster. To promote the event, The Smokers paid Garlits a hefty sum of money to come west and challenge the top dogs from the Pacific Coast. Interest in the race really started to swell when in February of that year Art Chrisman in his Hustler 1 recorded a run of 8.54-181.80 at Riverside, a new Standard 1320 record." "The first annual U.S. Gas and Fuel Championship was contested on March 1, 1959. Garlits wowed the crowd when he ran 178 mph right off the trailer. But, sans a supercharger, his Don's Speed Shop Spl. was no match against more powerful dragsters like the Chrisman Bros. and Frank Cannon. Garlits lost in the first round and Art Chrisman would go on to win the inaugural event with a final round of 9.36-140.50 over Tony Waters and the Waters-Sughrue-Guinn A/FMR. Chrisman also set low e.t. at 8.70 and Gary Cagle ran top speed of the meet at 180.36." By the time we started reading about the Chrisman Brothers and the streamlined FED in So Cal races, they had changed over to a top mounted 671 Hemi motor. It made record runs, highlighted by the late-night final of the first March Meet put on by the Bakersfield Smokers in 1959. "The final between Art Chrisman and Tony Waters at the very first March Meet; Tony had a length or two on Art, but got wiggley-squiggley down track and had to click it. " DON PRIETO PHOTO Jnaki My brother and I could not wait to see the Chrisman Brothers run with their “Hustler 2” version at the biggest drag race on the West Coast in late 1959, at Riverside Raceway. 1959 Riverside Raceway Hustler 2 1959 December
Great information on a great car. My father was showing my brother and I where he made his medical rounds in Compton when he was a medical intern. We passed the Chrisman garage, and there was the Hustler in the shop. Art was there, and let us wander around looking at it. Never forgot that.
ME TOO!.. I wonder if some of the 'PhotoShop geniuses' on here could fix it and colorize it? It would make a heckuva poster/avatar...whatever!! What do y'all think????! 6sally6
The Jalopy Journal
