History The complete story of the last drag race at Lions..

Went with my Dad often in the late 60's.......was it named Lions after the local Lions club? edit........Just checked Wikipedia, it was......

 

These are my two favorite 'grenade' pictures of all time! Who the heck took them and I wonder what speed he had the camera at? Seeing the driver looking down with what looks like a 'WTF! just happened' look is just too much. He was probably wondering if he still had legs and balls

 

Okay, you win. Thread over.

 

My dad has told me stories of this same truck tearing up the streets of Maywood / Bell / Bell Gardens in the late 50's / early 60's. the guy was a house painter. The truck was his work truck and towed an air compressor around behind it. The truck was powered by a blown hemi. The truck was found by a long time Friend of my dad's recently. It is intact and is being restored to it's former glory as we speak.

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That 3 Part DVD set is great. I have them and replay them quite a bit. Lots of great old cars/racers in there. It's surprising the things you forget about and are reminded of while watching them.

 

That would be Charley the painter and that was his dayly work truck he pulled a compressor behind it and the truck is being restored as we speak

 

Damn Mazooma1, Now that is nice!!!!

Ink is forever and so are all your memories!!!! You give alot to all these dragster and dragracing threads. And to that I am thankful.

 

Great thread!

The Zoelle Bros (who won Super stock that night) are friends of mine. We would hang out with those guys whenever we went out to Pomona.
The runner up car owner (Jim Defrank) is still very active today. In fact his son is the 2009 S/S World Champion.

We've been able to get a local chapter of The Lions involved with our nostalgia races in Phoenix. This is the first time of such involvement ,as far as I know, since The Last Drag Race.

Fellow HAMBer , Jon Lundberg will be our honoree for our Drag Racing and Hot Rodding Pioneer award on August 28th.

 

OMG!!!!-----At 77 yrs. old, I finally found someone that remembers about this truck & owner!!!!!!!!!!------Thanks for the update (?)-----Don

 

AND, my thanks to you too, for refreshing my old (77) memory!!!----Don

 

Yep!!---Jim DeFrank has returned to the folds of the L.A. Roadsters club (AGAIN) after many yrs. of absence.

 

What great thread, thanks everyone.

Mazooma, please ramble on anytime, we'll all be listening!

 

I've been trying to find some pictures of that last race... So far, no dice! Damn!

 

My shop was in Signal Hill

Mert Littlefield, Bays and Rupert both had Vega Funny cars in the same row of shops...... Sometimes I'd go along

Sometimes I'd work into the night
The lights of the harbor would wink at you looking down there. Most nights you could hear the horsepower being dumped on the ground.

The Autolite dyno would sing at the top of the hill.

I can still feel that evening breeze and hear those sounds 40 years later.

After Lion's was over it's starting line sign appeared across from Mert's shop

Just sat there quiet BIG SIGN

I always wondered where it went.

My shop rent was $75 bucks a month in those days.

 

I remember that guy!

 

What a great thread! Thanks for sharing everyone!

 

Wicked flicks. Thanks Mazooma​

 

I have the same photo- just from a different angle.
Didn't his dad run FED's at Lions? He was pretty young to actually be there- if I remember right.

 

I'm almost sure it was because of his dad. Man, the mind is a terrible thing to waste.
I'm not much for tattoos- but that was pretty cool!
Caught our eye.

 

Mazooma, you need to write a damn book. Seriously.

 

Yeah he does!

 

Wow... awesome stuff Mazooma.

 

Although I'm Missouri-born-and-raised, I greatly miss Shakey's Pizza also! Good stuff! Anyway, I've never been to LA, but someday I'm gonna go and visiting that shipping container facility is at the top of my list. That is sacred, hallowed ground no matter what is currently there! Man........what I wouldn't give to go back in time and just spend a typical Saturday night there. Anyone that hasn't seen the 3-part Lions' Drag Strip Documentary by Don Gillespie.........well, all I can say is that you are really missing out on something special. You can just tell that video is a true labor of love of time and place that can never happen again. I'll tell you what........I had a girlfriend a couple of years ago that just absolutely hated drag racing..........she was cleaning house while I was watching the Lions's video and within a few minutes, she had stopped cleaning and sat down down on the couch to actually watch the whole thing. That's really saying something and that alone tells you how good those videos are!

 

Bunch-0-lunch

We'd show up and eat them outta a months profit. Wasn't one guy on our lunch gang that couldn't eat less than 3 pizzas each!

 

WoW!! Thanks Mazooma.

 

I just recently got a poster from the last drag race.. Its at my shop I will take a picture tomorrow

 

Garlits has this sign in one of the back rooms that the public, generally, doesn't get to see. Don't know if it's real or not but it did look old.

 

awesome thread

 

I went to Lions one time, early in 1972. My self and a high school buddy rode our BICYCLES from Manhattan Beach to Lions on a Saturday morning. There was no one at the gate so we just went on in and sat in the stands. My guess is it was amature day at Lions because we saw a large nunber of low-buck street cars doing the drags. At some point someone brought in a REAR-engined non-painted top fuller and it was put on rollers of some sort near the start line and the car was put thru in-place starts with the engine at full song. I have always wondered who that might have been. Garlits? Prudome? I don't know. Anyone else remember these rollers? (for lack of a better word.)

 

This is a repro, but I love it!