I posted previously that my granddaughter was named after Veda Orr and I was searching for a Veda hubcap I finally managed to get my hands on one,,even though it is a re-pop made,,,many thanks to Steve Sellers. HRP
Those trophies are for speed records, not show cars. Any one who would scorn those are pretentious fools.
Did a little research and found that the 1960s building that housed Orr's is still in existence. Located at 17670 Sierra Highway, it is now a pest control business. You can see the architecture is basically unchanged from the late-1960s photo with the '55 Chevy and Mr. Orr. A roof has since been installed between the Orr building and the building to the left/south. Then: Today:
amazing how the building really hasn't changed all these years, want someone to peel off that siding to see if we can still see the outline of karl orr speed shop.
I saw a really unique item today. It was Karl Orr Speed Equipment. They were 24 Stud Ford heads that were tapered much like a Navarro w/o the need to replace stock studs. I've never seen a set of these before and it seems that they're going to be made again as this was a new casting. Is there any info on anything like this? I've seen ORD heads made by Mal Ord, but never a K.O. I hope that I'm not letting some cat out of the bag as this is just what I saw. I did not take a pic, because the owner/fabricator was not there to ask. It's always nice to see different speed equipment coming out though, so as an enthusiast I'm stoked as my Grandfather (Eddie Balanger) who also did the roundy round CRA thing knew K.&V.O. when they lived in Culver City in the late 40's. I guess out near Saugus Robert & Suzanne Williams used to visit them into the 80's. CK. .
If you look closely in the left window of that famous first shop picture you will see the car behind the 32 in this picture.
The first pic above is at Bay Meadows Speedway 1951 with Bayliss Leverett. This pic is at Oakland Stadium with Bob Sweikert. The wire wheels and lack of paint makes me think it's around 1949 and probably it's first race.
Sorry for the tease, but I wanted to show that the car does exist and is in the same shape as the old black and white photos. The car is in a private collection, which is better than if it had been in the Peterson, and I only got to see it for a few minutes.
@Cyclone Kevin Here's a picture of a flathead with Orr heads in a deuce roadster. It's an old pic from 2002 taken at a hot rod event in Sweden.
Here are some more pictures taken at the private collection holding them about 5 years ago. The collector wishes to remain anonymous, so please don’t ask or if you know, don’t mention where they are.
Fantastic to learn all this information about this legendary couple and see pictures of their cars and shops.
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