Ryan submitted a new blog post: Tom Cobbs: Bonneville, 1958 Part 1 Continue reading the Original Blog Post
Thank You Ryan. Another great collection of seven decades old shots. They had the term 'slippery' perfected. ( except the TR2 ) Love how healthy the salt looked, a great stimulant.
It's cool to see new pictures of Mickey Thompson's 555 car. From Wikipedia: Mickey Thompson collaborated with Fritz Voight in building the dragster, which had a fully enclosed body (except the steel front wheels), including a closed canopy. It was powered by a pair of 392 cu in (6,420 cc) Chrysler hemis, one facing forward to drive the rear wheels, the other facing backward to drive the front ones. Wearing number 555, the car debuted in 1958 at Bonneville, after "an impromptu stop", where it achieved 242 mph (389 km/h) on its very first run. The next week, the car turned in a best speed of 294.117 mph (473.335 km/h), but broke a connecting rod, leaving Thompson unable to back up his speed to make it official. While a reasonable success in land speed racing, the car proved too slow for drag racing, never able to top high-9 second passes or 149.50 mph (240.60 km/h) (even with its body removed), when contemporary slingshot fuelers were routinely hitting mid-9s.
Yeah, I started researching the hell out of it last night... And an earlier car John ran: Just a great looking car. And it amazes me that I don't think I've ever heard of John Cramer. So much of our early Bonneville and even hot rod history is under discovered, under researched, and under appreciated.
hey boss, I think 2 of those picture are from El Mirage and if I'm not mistaken ?? Also I'm pretty sure one of the lady's in front of Mickey's 555 is Judy Thompson, Danny's mom
Having never been to El Mirage and only having been to Bonneville twice, I'm REALLY bad at telling the difference - particularly on old film where the white balance can shift shot to shot.
I taped my 2 quarters to some cardboard and sent it to Isky for a big orange fireball Isky Cams iron on for my tshirt and when it came I ironed it on by myself. Wore it to P.E. all through my high school years. Only one other hot rod thinking kid knew about Isky Cams. Grew out of it and tossed it out. Still have the stickers though!
Simply magnificent! The cool Cobbs frozen moments of vintage hot rodding, keep's showing us what was cool and fast and definitely worth recording on film!
Just finished my feature for Monday that covers the second roll... This has been so much damned fun. I’ve been hammering out three stories a week for damn near thirty years, and you can imagine what that does to a man’s brain. Even if you’re wired wrong like me, with hot rods chewing through your head 24/7, it can grind me down at times. But this archive? It’s effortless. No staring at the ceiling at 3 a.m. trying to dream up a topic, no pacing around like a lunatic. I just roll out of bed, crack open a folder, and there they are... images I’ve never seen, shot by a guy I admire like hell. Every frame a spark, every roll a gift. And somewhere in the middle of all this, it hit me: this is the golden era of whatever the hell my “career” is supposed to be. Right now, not back then, not someday... this is it.
Consider yourself dammed lucky, to be who you are, with the history you were raised with and your current ability to be the keeper of a hell of a lot of great stuff, in the form of vintage photographs, plus all of the other unique items that you have obtained over the decades. You might want to watch this film called "Kodachrome" with "Ed Harris", its right up your alley as far as the element of photography, what it was and what it might be in the future.
In recording these images, Tom Cobbs definitely had a sense of history in the making. He also had the eye of an artist. Who else at the time would have thought to do a photo layout with an event program and personal credentials? Solid gold. Thanks for taking us all along on this trip.
Hey 41 GMC,Ryan, I agree. Thanks for posting and providing all the history of the photos. The history is awesome. I was at Bonneville once, July '72. These photos sure take me back. Watching that movie clip (Kodachrome) reminded me of my brother, who was a sculptor/artist. I need to see that movie. Corky was a tortured soul, I can hear him saying "Happiness is Bullshit". Sounds so much like him. Al Hook
If the Tom Cobbs collection are scanned from slides there is no negative they are the film, Kodachrome colour reversal film produced a positive image. What is hiding behind the cardboard holder
Correct. Not all are Kodachrome though. Some of these are slide film and some were just scanned prints.
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