History The dark side of hot rodding?

There has always been a lot of street racing around here. Of course this is the 405 ya know....
I street raced for years and never saw one of those clowns on street outlaws. They all live in my town and they are all bracket race guys.

I think the "authorities" painted hot rodding with a wide brush back in it's inception. Once the NHRA formed and people had a place to go, a lot of that image went away. Most car clubs had cards they handed out to stranded motorists that said something like "You have just been helped by a member of the Brand X Club of Hooterville." They did that to try and change their image. I know my dad's club had them to pass out in 1959.

 

It is my impression that the movies the OP referred to were made from the early to mid ‘50s and I think were based on very late ‘40s thru early ‘50s ‘images’ of hot rodders. Not to say it ended then. But as pointed out above, there was a shift when Wally Parks / NHRA gained influence.

Ray

 

^^^^
Here on East we Knew of a few of those's guys Back earlier then 2007 ,
If you Like Drag Racing , those
""Clowns"" ( I agree some times B S )
& others are saving NHRA, IHRA , witch are Going away slow but Fast , Just look in stands , Track closing in last 10 years, Pretty much Empty , Even Classes Under NASCAR
Pre Pandemic 2020,

 

My point was these guys talking about how they have always raced in the "405" was full on bs. I should have prefaced with Farm Truck is the only street car out of the bunch. I used to see him cruising looking for a sucker. The camper was an add on for traction. His sidekick "asian" or whatever they call him used to come to some to some of our events prior to the TV show. He had a super fast 2000ish Pontiac Firebird. The rest of them were local bracket racers. They all still live here within a 12 square mile radius.

Not saying it's not good for drag racing, but bracket racing killed the fan base. It's a byproduct of their own making.

 

In '98 on Hot Rod's 50th Anv., they said naming the magazine Hot Rod was equivelent to a new gun magazine naming itself "Drive By". Evidently not a good connontaion at the time.

 

Being born in 1956, I have no idea what things were like back in the 40s, 50s or early 60s. I know what was going on in our area in the late 60s through the mid 80s though.

Street racing was pretty popular because the nearest drag strip was a 40 mile drive one way. Our local street racing was pretty dominate in the late 60s and early 70s, but it all pretty well changed directions in 74 with the gas prices more then doubled. For a couple of years (mid 74 to mid 76), the street action pretty well stopped here. After the return, things were more mellow then before. Both before that and after the pause, there were some bad actors hanging around the street action. You could have been assaulted, injured, or stolen from, but most knew who the bad guys were and avoided them. Usually, unless you were by yourself, they wouldn't do much more then make idle threats to groups of 3 or 4 guys. Being alone against them was not a good time, but if they knew you had a few good friends that would back you up, they left you alone. I personally never had a problem with them, but then I was one of the guys that helped keep their stuff sort of safe. They had deep respect for people that would help them. That respect defused a lot of problems for everyone.

We had a local dirt track on the south end of town. Occasionally there were a few scuffles after the races, but then again, it was usually the same group of people that caused the problems. If you could avoid them on a night you had a problem with them, by the next week it was usually good. If there was a problem for a couple weeks in a row, it may have been a different story. Gene

 

I'm really enjoying the anecdotes, even if they aren't quite what I had in mind. Keep em coming!

 

LOL, back in about 1965 I was up cruising the AVE in my 50 Chevy hardtop and decided to pull into a parking lot and watch for a while when a car load of guys decided that they were going to hassle the "out of town guy". About a minute into telling these guys that I didn't want to deal with them in rolls this pretty rough slammed to the ground shoe box Ford and four guys bail out of it. They were the Hoods from my town and the driver was pretty well known on the Ave for being the guy still standing when a fist fight broke out. " Hey, Toppenish, these guys bothering you?" Those guys all the sudden decided that they weren't bothering me and were just leaving. Some times it is who you know or who knows you that helps.

 

the old days was just like the movie Grease with everyone dancing and singing in the streets and screwing up old cars

 

I’m originally from Detroit and there was a lot of street racing going on in the 60’s. I don’t recall ever seeing any real violence to speak involving cars/racing other then occasional fisticuffs when some smart ass got put in place for saying or doing something stupid. Maybe I just hung around in the right places where things never went beyond trash talking.

 

Crime is traditional.

 

trevor… We bad dudes. done a lot of bad stuff.

now… please excuse me while i drive my prius to church…

 

It was about midnight on Telegraph road outside of Detroit. This was the strip for the west side of greater Detroit. Cruising was hot that night both from all the cars and it was still about 80F degrees. We pulled into the parking lot at Korvette’s Department store to sit for awhile in my 1964 Corvette Coupe. As we are sitting watching the cars cruise by a red 1964 Corvette Convertible pulls in and parks next to us. The weekend before my Corvette had run 11.98 ET at the Corvette Club of Michigan annual drag race day so I was feeling I had a pretty fast car. The passenger in the red Corvette starts telling us his friends Corvette is the fastest car on Telegraph. Well, my friend says no way and before you know it we are setting up a race. Telegraph was still to crowded to race so we decide to drive out to Livonia to race at 6 Mile & Haggerty, which at that time was all farmlands. The guys in the red Corvette complain it’s too far away and they need to race for money. So, we decide $50 which was a lot of money back then. We head out to Haggerty and pull in the college parking lot. We decided to run a few practice runs to” blow the carbon out” from cruising. We explain that we drive south on Haggerty to 6 mile, make a U turn and race north on Haggerty. We do a practice run and pull back into the parking lot and decide to go on the count of 3 and he would get his choice of lane. Just as we are getting into my car they walk back over and say “if a cop comes don’t run and stay in your car Okay, we will do the talking” I said “what??? “ they both smiled and pulled out their badges and said” we are off duty Detroit Cops so don’t run you will piss off the cop, let us do the talking cop to cop” I said “Okay”. We head out to race and my friend Luke says “are you crazy we are racing a cop??” We raced, it was a tie until 4th gear and then he pulled ahead a little. Back in the parking lot we gave them the money. I asked to see his engine. Ha!! A big block no wonder I lost. We talked for awhile and they headed out. We called it a night. What a blast!! Sort of the opposite of what this thread is but a true story. The only switch blade I ever saw hot rodding was the one in my glove box. I never really ran into any gangs or dark side of hot rodding.

 

Spent some time in that Korvettes parking lot in my
Dads 70 Nova as a youngster..1973-74 ish…West Chicago and Telegraph…even as a teen in the early to mid 80’s Telegraph was the spot for us…

 

It may depend on were you were,but also how much you were into cars. Me big time car nut.
Yup,next year I'll be 80 YO, so yes I lived the time your asking !
I can remember pretty clear from my first pedal bike to when I joined my first Car club.
That's going back a bit early 1950s for cars,,I grow up in Coconut Grove,were just down the street from house was Dinner Key/a giant airplane hanger were some of the biggist shows in the east were done..{a small town that became part of Miami Florida< big town.
Now how much did I get around,I was in 3 car clubs by 1960 < I said club* ,,not gang ,had built both a hot rod and a custom,ran all over the state of Florida to indoor car shows 3 to 6 a year and the drag races,tell getting in to oval racing.< My custom "J"that was in Car Craft Mag Jan of 63.
My exposure was more then most to every part what was going on when I was a teen! { late 50s n 1960s }.
I wrote some "Way Back Storys" for the HAMB,about the times first hand,even a bout some midnite drags,but that was not a comman thing too often.

Your right thinking most movies of the times were big BS,even a lot of what was really done to hot rods{ the star* rod would often be craped up for the over the top BS of a the movie or TV program. One of the few rod's that was real ,was on 77 Sunset Strip.
Yes ,a lot of extra hipe,it sells tickets.

 

There were "Car Clubs" and areas like Valley, East L.a. North L.A. etc. and most gang fights wrer between clubs and were brass knuckles, tire irons and bicycle chains, I only remember one shooting around 1958 in Toonerville, at a church dance and kids were shot at by guys from "Orcas", a neighborhood in Pacoima. Kids made zip guns in high school, but most of them didn't work well and made only 1 shot. Every part of the country was different as were different parts of the big cities. These stories are San Fernando Valley/North L.A.
Another fun thing was to take a new car from the car lot and keep it all day and steal the spare tire. 4 joy rides later you'd have a new set of tires for your older car
This wasn't the dark side, it was the fun side of hot rodding and L.A. was the place to be.

 

Its true about police officers and state troopers being in on getting a race off in multiple counties and in other states,
They where car law Enforcement & racers them self , happen many of times.

I feel, because I was present that most of the Dark Side of Street Racing altercations was based on the people place & amount of bet, it was more tints of a altercation happing I would say when a bet was 1k to as much as 15 & a few time more.
Now this threw 80s & 90s
Most of the time same BS would be about You have this & that . ( tire , slick ,sb,bb,nos ,blower, , lenco & 4 link , sissybars & so on, people would try to gauge how fast the vehicle was by how many point cage , chute , header size size of tire. & so on .
Then what are you going to give Me?
What !!! You think your fast , I think I am , We are here to Night to see who has the faster vehicle & bragging rights & bet!!!
I would say most all under 1k No problems...
still under 1K Then when you would bait as in Lose 1 ,win 1 Lose 1 Then set big bet & win by alittle , or keep racing win just a fender ,
"" Never """ put links on them unless you want to make it a FU , I have a 30 year old rivalry because I did this to make a point back then.
The ones over 1k , well things more likely & did happen!
This was on one that was around 10 not including the sides, the group feel like they where cheated, mouth ran , end result was winning Vehicle looked like some Swiss cheese ( from a Mac sub) .

 

It's a damn shame it ain't there anymore.... I hung out at Korvette's with my Fathom green Z/28 in the late '70s.

 

Not really. But once in while it reared it's ugly head here. Nothing very bad. Just some posturing with a fight each weekend. And only one fight because we didn't put up with the garbage.
There was always the smack talking about other's cars, especially the out of towner cars.
Once in a while we would get the hooligan asshole who had to prove something but was sent home pretty fast.
But as far as the movies? We were only afraid of those dreaded Pharaoh's...

 

Caught that show a few times. Total BS for sure. Some of the neighborhoods I raced in, if that much cash was flashed, nobody would've got out in one piece. Racers for the most part were cool. All business. Trouble usually came from the curb monkeys, wives, girlfriends, mouthy buddies and of course, the big losers.

 

I grew up in Milwaukee Wisconsin and I started cruising/ street racing in 1964 at 16 years old, left the scene in 1970, (a Judge's recommendation with threat of jail time)) for me mostly unorganized short 2 block, 1/8 type as that was fast enough on local streets in the city. There was organized "Outlaw"street tracing that moved around to different places/times, police scanners used, bigger money, faster cars etc. that venue I was on the fringe as $20 was a big race for me, $10 usual, many for just bragging rights and the thrills. I rarely saw a fight, on occasion words exchanged, everyone was OK as far as I knew, ( a few shady types) the car interest was the common ground. I was around open wheel racing from birth 1948 (Dad had a Midget racer) I started racing in 1970, driver/owner/driver retired in 1991 running wing Sprint cars, 21 years of thrills with a few spills (crash house visits) I met a lot of good people with same racing addiction, still friends with a few, many great memories (priceless). Hello, My name is John, I'm a Raceaholic. From my racing experience, it's the crew members, wife, girlfriends that would cause the problems as drivers would settle matters between themselves. So much of the Media /TV/ Movies is Total BS just as the "Hoodlum" image that came with early Hot Rodding IMO.

 

Bets under 1k , holy shit , I have no idea what time period you're talking about , but like wicarnut said ,in the mid 60's , $20 was a sizeable bet. Shit , that was enough for lunch all week + gas & if you had a regular GF , a movie date !

 

Regardless, the street racers of 50 or 60 years ago would be quite surprised to see what is being done today with the cars of their times.

50 years from now there won't be any gasoline-powered cars.

 

He^^^^^smiled!......

 

Yes, my dad even had cops setting up street races in some of the small towns. Pit the local guy against the dude from 3 towns over. Being barney Fife could get boring, I don't blame them.

 

I showed one of our deputies how slow his new mopar police cruiser was one Sunday morning. He didn't believe me when i told him how good my model A would run. So we lined up! He believed me afterwards. One of my best friends is a sergeant for the KSP, huge car guy. Has a lot of quick cars. He likes going fast

 

They were closing a local highway that was primarily a truck route and bringing out light plants running all night. Turning traffic around for a 25 mile detour. It didn't go over well. They have moved to a small town 2 hours east of OKC.

 

This cracks me up every time I read it....

 

For the most part hot roaders were more interested in their car an their buddies cars than to be gang bangers. Yes there may have been some that stole cars and parts but that is about it. HOLLYWOOD has the habit of super embellishment a downright falsifying things....