History Drag cars in motion.......picture thread.

Anyone have an old photo's of Paul Gommi "Beast from the East" front engine dragster from back in the early to mid 60's ?
Jimbo

 

Jim and Alison Lee's Great Expectations. The car was restored by Bruce Dyda for current owners, the Beattie family. Here is a shot of Alison and Jim with the Beatties and the restored car.

 

Yep, probably late 67 or early 68 before the purple flake paint and professional lettering.

Roo

 

The Leibham and Strine car is still around.

 

Left to right, Mike McKissick K & M crew guy, Chris Cherry, and me, at the 1971 Grande American at New England where we won over Tom Ivo in the final, my first race in the K & M car.

 

Later that evening in the winners circle...

 

Started out as a crew guy, wound up the driver of John Watson's Scorpion Fiat B/Comp car at New England 1967. I can never thank him enough, this is the car that opened all the doors for me.

 

Labor Day weekend at New England with a win over Mart and the Drag On Vega, ran 6.96 210 in the final.

 

Quote 296Ardun
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Same car as above, now under Ansen Sponsorship, Senter & Pink, Ed pushing on the right. Tom Dyer might be driving, though Lou and Ed put Prudhomme back in the seat and he immediately set a track record in the car at San Gabriel...and Drag News started calling him "Magic Foot." There was a dispute over who actually built the car, with Rod Stuckey claiming that he did...Fuller disputed it.....

296Ardun, in '63, Rod told me that he built and was burned in the car that later became GBP.

Did the FZP car become GBP?

In the Hot Rod Magazine feature on his restoration of Greer Black and Prudhomme, present owner and serious historian, Bruce Meyer, claimed Rod Built the chassis. Who knows? Fuller makes a compelling case as well.

 

Those old Chapparell Trailers are in demand my the guy's who run the Nostalgia Drag Races and are worth good money to the right teams. Jimbo

 

Tom, good points, the history of this car, and the GBP car are both contested...here is another take from Bill Bennett from Legacy Autosports, which created a GBP diecast:

"The Greer Black & Prudhomme A/Fuel Dragster was arguably the most successful dragster of its era if not all-time. GMP has given us this car in 1:18 scale and their work is absolutely breathtaking! The GB&P car started life when Kent Fuller built a 112” dragster frame for Rod Stuckey in the late ‘50’s. Stuckey ran this car as the Cash Auto Parts rail until financial problems ended with the car being handed over to Louie Senter of Ansen Automotive to settle a debt. This car, with Stuckey still driving, won the ’62 AHRA Winternationals at Fontana Drag City, but when Senter’s wife found out he’d bought a rail, she made him sell it. Tommy Greer, a successful machinist and big-time boat racer, purchased the car from Senter and got Keith Black, who’d established a successful business building racing engines for boats, to build him a blown 392” Chrysler Hemi. Greer then commissioned Wayne Ewing, who mostly built bodies for USAC cars raced at Indy, to build a swoopy full body. Don Prudhomme, hot off winning the March (’62) Bakersfield Smokers Meet in the Zeuschel-Fuller-Prudhomme rail, was signed-on to pilot the car."

There is at least one fault in this story, the car was not built in the late '50s, but the early '60s...here the claim is that Fuller built the car for Stuckey, which conflicts with Stuckey's claim that he built the chassis...more stories, more confusion. Stuckey died in a plane crash and Fuller has already claimed that he built it. Interesting also that the story claims that Stuckey drove for Lou Senter, when most stories hold that Tom Dyer drove (somehow Ed Pink, the co-owner, was left out of the tale above).

Glad you brought this up, it reminds us how contested the history of these cars is.

 

Speaking of Rod Stuckey, here are a couple of pictures of his Buick powered car, before and after the blower...this was before he moved to California....he was a talented chassis builder, but whether or not he build the GBP car remains disputed as Tom notes above.


To me, this is Stuckey's most memorable work...I remember when this car debuted at San Gabriel right before the '64 Smoker's meet, where guys from the rest of the country would make tune-up runs before the March meet. I had delivered some nitro to a crew (don't remember who now), and was walking back towards my truck, but when I passed this car, Stuckey motioned me to come over, and to grab the front axle. "Lift," he said, so I and one other sucker lifted, and held the car up until the Greek drained the oil....long before those high-tech hydraulic lifts, that was how the Greek did it....