Hey Dave, Someone has blanked out the first part of the sign. It should say Pacific as the Body Shop is shown clearly. But, who knows what people do to post old photos. Someone will know some history from back then… so any changes are evident. I was dabbling in drawing the flames, as they looked like the early ones we used to draw on our Pee Chee Notebooks. So, the research shows that it was the Pacific Body Shop roadster from San Pedro, CA. Junji In another Friday Art Thread, I drew the Pacific Body Shop Coupe, as it had a cool look with the top chop and rounded nose. I ran a colorization computer program on the black and white photo and it popped out yellow. (The green grass and blue sky seem to give it some real color) But, there are no official color photos of the coupe and push truck. The Goodyear and Serpa "Pacific Auto Body" coupe with a 296" flathead. The team bought the car from Harry Duncan. Norm Grudem photo. But, both the roadster and coupe could have been white with red flames.
I think this is a tough one, darn, where’s @rooman when you need him! Looks like a yellow pressure plate and Don ran Schiefer clutches BITD but this would have been during his Wynns sponsorship, not Kendall GT-1 and also he was always partial to OEM Chrysler valve covers then.
He ran Kendall later on. I only remember Wynns friction proofing, not oil. You are right, we need Keith, he is the encyclopedia ! BTW, my nephew Lonny, put "Big" in the 4's @ over 300 for the first time, in Gary Clapsaw's car, at the Nats in 2001.
This is George Burkhart in the '29 roadster, far side, racing Harold Nicholson, very early '50s. Hello, I was doing some research on the George Burkhart, Evert Brammer, Reath Automotive Modified Roadster and came across a very early drag racing photo of the roadster. The version we knew was the bright orange roadster with the cool Clay Smith Cams birdy on the grille and of course, the major sponsor, Reath Automotive in big bold letters. “Burkhart, Brammer, and Burns '29 roadster, Rudy Perez photo, at Half Moon Bay. @296ardun Jnaki In the early drag racing community, the hot rod/drag race coupes, roadsters, sedans had different partners back in those days… The different team members went on to other builds and their own modified roadsters and coupes. (Brissette/Eichenhofer/Colburn) But, central to the drag racers and their fast racers was Reath Automotive from Long Beach. May 1959 By 1959, they had already established the hard driven modified roadster teams and coupes. These old photos and clips from the Drag News paper are some of the old photos that mention the early days of drag racing. Although Long Beach is a rather large city bordering on the ocean, the drag racing community was pretty close knit back then. Lion’s Dragstrip opened in 1955 and continued to be the place for most gatherings of the So Cal racers. The speed shops popped up all over Long Beach and Reath Automotive was one of the top attractions for all racers. I was reading an old thread on the HAMB and like most of us here, we are on the search of some of our missing photos of the hot rods and race cars that our families built and raced. In these times, a lot of real photos of the builds and racing photos get lost in the mysteries of house moves or family moves across the state line. The Burkhardt Family had a post asking if there are other photos or information about George Burkhardt and his modified roadsters. Help out if you can…
That narrowed rear end gives this roadster a unique look, very different from the typical BITD style.
Thanks, Junji, I knew Mike Burns and Everett "Hippo" Brammer, but never met George. The roadster got retired when Hippo went top fuel racing, and ultimately surrendered its body and other parts to the Sadd, Teague, and Bentley roadster when it was wrecked on a return road accident at Bonneville. I did see the post by the Bentley family and sent some of the few photos that I have of George. The color ones you posted above with the roadster at Half Moon Bay (by Rudy Perez) are some of the best of George.
Hey Dave, The information about the team is yours and I think I will add to the question. Who is that other tall guy the orange shirt? George Burkhardt was 6'10 inches tall and Joe Reath was at least 6'6 inches tall. The profile in the @Dean Lowe photo of the guy in the Orange Reath Automotive shirt sure looks like Joe Reath. Joe Reath, Carl Bodonni, Louie Cangelose. (Early 60’s March Meet.) His style of haircut was always the same as whenever we talked to him at the 10th and Cherry Avenue shop. Being fairly tall, for the time, teenagers, it was still intimidating to constantly look up to talk to Joe or even listen to the myriad of stories he had in his brain archives. So, it is my estimation that the other orange shirt guy in the above photo is Joe Reath. Joe Reath attended almost every Saturday drags at the local So Cal dragstrips, He followed his shop's sponsored race cars and was always lending a hand if needed. Junji My brother and I spent countless hours visiting, ordering and buying speed parts for both of our SBC motors and our Willys Coupe at Reath Automotive. It was the best place to get anything for any build. We had been given discounts for all of the speed stuff and machining done at his shop. The final cool thing was that a partial sponsorship was in the works, according to my brother.
Hello Dave, Nice old photo find in the archive collection. That photo angle and look of the roadster reminded me of this photo clip from my film the 1959-60 version of the Brissette, Eichenhofer and Quincy Automotive Roadster. But, in further research for another post, I came across these early photos of the Burkhart, Brissette team in the Burkhart orange roadster. Then the next year, a roadster like from the library archive photo, A team of Bob Brissette/Bill Colburn made waves in the record books. Finally in 1959, the team of Bob Brissette/Howard Eichenhofer added some Quincy Automotive sponsorship and took off on their own with the Candy Apple Version I filmed, also in 1959 at Lion’s Dragstrip. 1959 Lion's Junji History comes from all sorts of situations or a combination of racers/teams. It was nice to be able to be there and record some films for posterity. Drag racing just drew us in and kept at it for a several years…
Drag racing began with the birth of the automobile. The earliest beach races were side by side drag races. BOB GREEN FRONTYFORD. BOB PUTNAM SIMPLEX POP DAILY, DUSENBERG; SIG. HAUGDAHL, MILLER SPECIAL 8 Daytona Beach 1905 Daytona Beach 1906
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