PAPA Posted October 29, 2009 Report Share Posted October 29, 2009 I wish Terry would tell some stories his father-in-law knows. Mr. Moore goes way back to the original Pan Am. He spent many many hours repairing race cars that my step dad and others tore up. Those were REAL race cars by the way. I bet Lynn and Patsy have a few old photos and news paper clippings laying around. That man could fix anything and make it better than it was. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nathan Posted October 29, 2009 Report Share Posted October 29, 2009 thanks tom I will pass it on. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ToryC Posted October 29, 2009 Author Report Share Posted October 29, 2009 Hay Tom - Thanks for getting the story on the #17. Guess I'd better change that caption!!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lilmodified Posted October 29, 2009 Report Share Posted October 29, 2009 Lil's drag pics were take at Double Eagle on Gibbs-Sprawl. In one of Lil's pics, you can see "San Antonio" on the starting line. That track was also known as San Antonio Dragway during it's life. it was built sometime in the 1950's, and closed in 1969-70. Was very popular back in the day as a Sunday afternoon track. The starting line end of the track backed up to Gibbs-Sprawl, and the track ran in a slight Northwest direction. A housing development has been built on the site of the track, and they have finally covered the last of the old track. Located on Gibbs between Rittiman and the Walzem turnoff (FM1976) on the North side of Gibbs. Find the main entrance of the housing development, and that is directly over the starting line of the old track. thanks for the help tom!! no one i've talked to could tell me anything about that dragway, but i do remember it being called "san antonio dragway"...i appreciate the info! one of these days i will have to make a trip to SA and find that housing development... and, i'm thinking that my dad raced there until he went to vietnam in '67... and, i have roundy-round pics from the '70s, too...i'll try to get them posted this weekend...maybe i can learn more history! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Budman Posted October 29, 2009 Report Share Posted October 29, 2009 Thanks Tom. Now that you have mentioned it, don't know why I didn't recognize it, except for the caption I guess. That's for sure the catch fence the Wusterhausens put up to protect the pits I think between the 1961 and 1962 seasons. Paul Jett had hung a throttle in a super-modified and catapulted over that guard rail into the pits. Never did hear who it was, but somebody in the pits had gotten hurt real bad from that. So, the catch fence was put up. The car Paul was driving that night belonged to Bill White. Pretty much destroyed it. That was before Bill bought the famous #2 super. Paul told me several years ago he is still reminded of that crash to this day, every time he turns his head he feels pain in his neck from it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NickHolt Posted October 29, 2009 Report Share Posted October 29, 2009 Tom, You're a one-man. walking, racing encyclopedia! I can't even remember what I had for lunch for crying out loud. Nick Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PAPA Posted October 29, 2009 Report Share Posted October 29, 2009 Nick Im sure what ever you ate for lunch you had a Dr.Pepper to wash it down. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HiTech Posted October 29, 2009 Report Share Posted October 29, 2009 this is great reading .....tom i just want to know ..what food do you eat .what pills do you take ..whats in your water ..do you plug into the wall socket at night and get a charge....a memory like yours has to have something working on its side . Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PAPA Posted October 29, 2009 Report Share Posted October 29, 2009 I just think txtom just grabbed hold of the coil wire one to many times when he was younger and it did something to his mind. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bobby Posted October 29, 2009 Report Share Posted October 29, 2009 thanks for the help tom!! no one i've talked to could tell me anything about that dragway, but i do remember it being called "san antonio dragway"...i .. I believe the track ran on Sunday. At any rate I remember hearing the famous commercials - SUNDAY, SUNDAY! See xxxx face off against yyy in ground pounding action !!!!....BE THERE!!! etc. After seeing Toms directions, I also remember the commercials saying something like " ... a quarter of a mile past the Rittiman road cutoff". Strange what a little prompting can produce... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Budman Posted October 29, 2009 Report Share Posted October 29, 2009 Oh, and incidentially Tom, I want to thank you for posting more of those old racing pics in your Fotki file. I sure have enjoyed those. For any of you who are not aware of it, on every one of Tom's posts, below his signature line is a little line that says racing pics. Click on it and it will link you to Tom's picture file. There are a lot of great old pics on there. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
txtom Posted October 29, 2009 Report Share Posted October 29, 2009 The odd thing about my memory is sometimes I can't remember what I did on the previous day. I get a kick of these history discussions. They let me relive some great memories of years past. And we have really only scratched the surface. Everyone on here has more stories, so let's have them. And Papa, surely you remember the days when we couldn't just grab and turn a distributor like we can now.........! Buddy, Thanks for your comments about the pics; I enjoy doing them. I am currently scanning the collection of a long time Corpus Racer, Ricky Sinard. And he has some great stuff. I am juggling scanning his pics with finishing my wife's latest remodel, but when I get them all done, you will see some great shots, especially of the Corpus racing scene. And in the next couple weeks, I am renewing the Fotki Account for another two years, so they will be there a little while. This link will take you to a map of what is on top of Double Eagle. Locate the street "Cactus farms" and it is the entry to the subdivision. You will see Cedar Farm on there; it basically follows the footprint the the dragstrip. Link Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Budman Posted October 29, 2009 Report Share Posted October 29, 2009 One of these days Tom is going to be living in a totally new house. It is the only house I know of that is in a perpetual state of remodel. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PAPA Posted October 29, 2009 Report Share Posted October 29, 2009 Thats the problem Tom....Im getting so old that I dont remember all that much from the good ol days. But I do remember the first time I touched a spark plug while the engine was being cranked over. I was 8 years old and my dad built me a go-cart. I was in heaven. He told and showed me all about the car and how it worked. I didnt hear any of it. All I wanted to do was start it and drive it. I did remember the part about how you had to wind the rope and pull real hard. Guess where I put my other hand to brace myself? Scard me so bad that I didnt want to have anything to do with that go-cart for a while. Took me a couple days before I tried it again. Thats where my love of race cars started for me. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
txtom Posted October 29, 2009 Report Share Posted October 29, 2009 Guess where I put my other hand to brace myself? I vividly remember causing myself extra work from a similar event. In my case, my brother was watching me try to start a cranky lawnmower, and I convinced him that air was leaking out of the end of the spark plug. I got him to stick his finger over the end of the plug while I gave the pull rope a might heave. Knocked him clean on his hind end. He went wailing into the house, and I finished the yardwork that YEAR myself....... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PAPA Posted October 29, 2009 Report Share Posted October 29, 2009 I hurts! BAD!!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
racerjim2 Posted October 29, 2009 Report Share Posted October 29, 2009 Tom, Remembering a couple of things from the "good ole days" I remember a tire race when a crew guy , he was small short and young, thought he figured out how to wint had one of the 14" tires and realy got it going and was way out front and lost controll of the tire and he ended up chasing the tire through the infield while his competion finished the race. another time one of the infield crew jumped off the truck and tried to stop a tire that came off a car on the back straghtaway and got run over flatend him like a pancake. Can rember the lights going off in the middle of the hobby feature. and the massive rain shower that just exploded durnig the first five laps of the superstock race and piled every car in a heap in turn one. I can still remember going to eat after the races covered in rawsin (SP)and cement dust.I hope this stimulates some more stories.got some awayfrom the track tales that can be told later. We sure had some good times durning the Pan American days. Jim Creech Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lilmodified Posted October 29, 2009 Report Share Posted October 29, 2009 Thats the problem Tom....Im getting so old that I dont remember all that much from the good ol days. But I do remember the first time I touched a spark plug while the engine was being cranked over. I was 8 years old and my dad built me a go-cart. I was in heaven. He told and showed me all about the car and how it worked. I didnt hear any of it. All I wanted to do was start it and drive it. I did remember the part about how you had to wind the rope and pull real hard. Guess where I put my other hand to brace myself? Scard me so bad that I didnt want to have anything to do with that go-cart for a while. Took me a couple days before I tried it again. Thats where my love of race cars started for me. this is where my love of the sport started, too, papa...'cept i wanted to "race" so bad, that not even the closed garage door stopped me...i went right thru it!! soon after that, i had my own private little dirt track on the adjoining property to our house...i was also bout 7 or 8... and, ur right bobby...the prompting brings memories out... also, i think i could prolly spend a whole day sitting with tom listening to stories and looking at pics...history is awesome!! thanks, everyone for the pics and stories! looking forward to more of them! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HiTech Posted October 29, 2009 Report Share Posted October 29, 2009 a friend was trying to start his boat . one of them old early 60.s two cylinders ... he pulled and pulled and it just would not fire up ..so he asked me a 9 year old to pull the rope for him ..while he checked for fire ....well that motor fired right up and he could not let the wire go ..first time i saw hair stand up ..instead of me shutting it down i opened the throtle up wide open . wrong turn you might say ....my dad broke through the fence to save him .......... later in years i found out what a mag could do ..man they hurt .. old D8 dozer with that starting motor ..i got nailed ........ tom we older guys cant remember what you said two minutes ago .but always seem to find something in the memory bank from over 40 years of more ..funny how that works .. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HiTech Posted October 29, 2009 Report Share Posted October 29, 2009 get some of those cc pics up .i cant wait ..... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PAPA Posted October 29, 2009 Report Share Posted October 29, 2009 lilmodified Check this out: http://hechointexas.blogspot.com/2008/03/s...ps-history.html Check out the Martindale Dragstrip link over on the right. It has several great old videos. Some amazing cars. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Budman Posted October 29, 2009 Report Share Posted October 29, 2009 That's it Papa. THAT'S what I remember it being called ....................... SAN ANTONIO DRAG RACEWAY. Went there a time or two back when I was in high school. SUNDAY! ...............SUNDAY! ..................SUNDAY! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
txtom Posted October 29, 2009 Report Share Posted October 29, 2009 Tom, Remembering a couple of things from the "good ole days" I remember a tire race when a crew guy , he was small short and young, thought he figured out how to wint had one of the 14" tires and realy got it going and was way out front and lost controll of the tire and he ended up chasing the tire through the infield while his competion finished the race. another time one of the infield crew jumped off the truck and tried to stop a tire that came off a car on the back straghtaway and got run over flatend him like a pancake. Can rember the lights going off in the middle of the hobby feature. and the massive rain shower that just exploded durnig the first five laps of the superstock race and piled every car in a heap in turn one. I can still remember going to eat after the races covered in rawsin (SP)and cement dust.I hope this stimulates some more stories.got some awayfrom the track tales that can be told later. We sure had some good times durning the Pan American days. Jim Creech Yeah, I remember all those, and then some. That was one of Bobby's neighbors that got run over by the tire, but that actually happened more than once. I was standing in the infield during hot laps, and one of the cars lost the whole axle to tire assembly. It was coming straight at me, and then would have gotten into the safety vehicles. On that one, I timed it coming by me to where I kicked the back side of the tire. I nailed it perfectly, and it spun around and stopped within 10 feet of where I fell on my ass. A guy I knew from High School was sitting there in the turn 4 bleachers watching the whole thing; naturally, the story at school Monday was I busted my ass wrestling a tire. I remember how quick we were getting the lights on the safety vehicles turned on when the track power went out. That coulda been a disaster. Do you remember when the cow came walking down on the track in turn 1? Someone left the gate loose to the pasture off turn 1-2. I used to take stuff to the track to try to clean off that damn rosin and cement dust, but nothing really worked with only the track spigot to work with. Original go-jo actually worked really well, but the girlfriends hated the smell. Wash yourself off with that stuff, and then try to get close to the fairer sex. Ain't happening this night................. Remember the night in 78 when Lucian Wallace blew a clutch down the middle of the frontstraight? He had an aluminum bellhousing that was ground on pretty good, and they were running the modified bodies at that time. Part of that clutch hit the track, bounced back up through that sheetmetal hood into the air, and some of the fragments went so high, they took out some of the track lights, then had all kinds of crap raining back down on everyone in sight. You are right, Jim, we had some great times at that track. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lilmodified Posted October 30, 2009 Report Share Posted October 30, 2009 OMGOSH, papa!!! what an incredible website!! and, i remember olin davis and that yellow roadster! i can remember him and daddy talkin' racin'...this was after daddy quit dragging...but, you reminded of an old '40 ford coupe daddy had. during a day of racing, the shift linkage started going out in the coupe, making it harder and harder to shift it into 2nd. by the time the feature rolled around, he couldn't get it to go into 2nd, at all. so, he drafted my mom to sit on an old wooden crate where the back seat woulda been, and when he shifted up outta first, mom would haul off and kick it into second with her foot!! i remember sitting on olin's lap and listening to this story (among many others) that they told to each other...and whoever else would listen! these are some of my fondest race memories, and this story has always been one of my favorites for some reason... i had completely forgotten about that stuff....wow! and, several of those other names are familiar to me, though i can't really place the faces to go with them. THANK YOU SO MUCH!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
txtom Posted October 30, 2009 Report Share Posted October 30, 2009 Check out the Martindale Dragstrip link over on the right. It has several great old videos. Some amazing cars For those who don't know, Martindale is the Army Helicopter facility behind the Petro travel stop at I-10 and Ackermann. Trivia question--A racer we all have heard of, who won in about anything he ever drove, ran one drag race in his long career, and it was at Martindale. Who is it? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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