Folks Of Interest 1957 a day in Norm's life

1952......
Norm Grabowski, recently discharged from the military, builds the now iconic Model-T, aka: the Kookie Kar. A modified '22 T-touring with a shortened pickup bed. This style of car became known as a T-bucket and was partly responsible for the fiberglass T-bucket craze in years to follow.

The car was at a shop for chassis work and a movie executive spotted it. He asked to rent it. The car appeared in TV shows and movies in 1955-56. It became a 'car' star on TV show 77 Sunset Strip. Later Grabowski painted the body a 1956 Dodge 'Royal Blue' as seen here, with flames and pinstriping by Dean Jeffries.

In 1959 Grabowski sold the T to Jim Skonzakis who modified it. The car still exists, but not in it's early iconic configuration.

 

I'm sure by now everyone has seen the pictures of Norm Grabowski vs Tommy Ivo posted on Life Magazine's archive. They were from an NHRA drag race in Santa Ana, CA in 1957. If you haven't seen them, below is a link. Life keeps adding photos. There are more than 200 photos in this group but their search limits you to 200 thumbnails.

http://images.google.com/images?sa=4&imgc=&imgsz=&q=National+Hot+Rod+Association%27S+Drag+Racing+Meet+Held+In+Santa+Ana%2C+Calif.+source%3Alife

or see the original "early Santa Ana drags" thread on the HAMB here:
http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=352138

 

I found a few additional 'Norm' photos taken about the same time frame as the 1957 Santa Ana drag race photos. Maybe the same day? They're a little harder to find in that massive collection of Life photos.

There's no link to a thumbnail picture page but below is a link to a photo and that page has links to the related photos.

http://images.google.com/hosted/life/l?q=&imgurl=6155db01ca659db6
All of the photos posted here are available high-resolution on the Life site.

 

not bad for a kid from " New Jersey"

 

He's a real legend, I still smile whenever I see this old Life photo, looks like he's lovin' the burger!