History Real Blood Sport: Old-Time Demolition Derby

I seem to recall seeing some of these derbys from Islip Speedway on TV back in the black and white days, probably in the mid 60s. Like on Wide World Of Sports or some other similar show.

Or maybe this was back when we had a gas leak in the house!

 

been around em my whole life.here are a few pics from the early 70s when my dad was running em.

 

Those photos are painfull to look at.

 

Yes! Those before-&-afters are painful to see -- sheesh! Try and IMAGINE HOW MANY cool cars went down in this battle to the death that WAS DEMO DERBY in the day!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

BUT, this has been a neat thread, guys. SURE BROUGHT BACK MEMORIES FOR ME!!!

I do hope yo can find those books, ________, showing REALLY realy DERBIES with '30s/'40s vintage cars. The stories about the Ford A running in '64 (!!!!), the '56 Des getting bricked in '82 and the Mustang II (?) also getting bricked for people's "entertainment" are WHAT REALLY HAPPENED.

Hey, it's what we did. And -- boy -- the good sheet metal I saw getting hauled IN to the fairgrounds. I have to say -- again -- I felt bad, but . . .

I DIDN'T MISS THE SHOW !!!

 

Sorry, RustyNewYorker, it was you I meant to say, sure hope you can dig up those old, COOL books & post some keen pix.

It was (OBVIOUSLY!) an era that cannot be repeated. Like early NASCAR, THIS is something that should be documented for future car nuts!!!! (By that I meant, before we al pass on . . but, we'll NEVER die, right?)

THIS THREAD shows that guys still have the memories, still have the pix. Maybe we could make a super-cool pic-book with text. I will go lookig for the '56 DeS VICTORY pic that ran in our small-town newspaper, for my little part. But I just wish I'd taken a CAMERA when I went, 'cause I roamed all over the staging area BEFORE shit got crunched.

 

You can't save them all. Look how many old Ford bodies were sacrificed to circle track racing. It's definately sad, but when you think about it, they wouldn't be near as cool if EVERYBODY had one. Last night, my brother told me of a guy up north who had just stripped a pristine '60 Mercury 2dr. hardtop to be crashed. I wanted to cry a little for sure, especially when he said the guy took all the trim and stuff to the dump, including the grille. You can't tell people what to do with their shit. Oh well.

 

BTW, one of the things I loved to watch for (though I never blew any whistles) was HOW GUYS WOULD TRY & CHEAT TO GET AN EDGE, just hoping to slide by the judges!!!

I already told you about the guy who poured the whole trunk floor full of cement, then welded the trunklid shut. First heat -- when HIS rear end didn't shart to crunch, just his rear bumper fell off! -- the judges said, "You, sir, are obviously cheating! LOL!!!!

 

Crsh&Burns, you rae dead on. AND, the guy who said the "figure-8" was a different breed of comp., RIGHT ON!!! Now, THAT took balls!

 

Still do it out here in Malta.
Little old 80s and early 90s cars.
Some of the guys just don't know when to quit.Saw pics somewhere of a Mk1 Ford Fiesta that had been rear ended so bad it was half it's original length,and the roof had been turned into a very pointy triangle.

Sure a lotta awesome cars were wrecked but at least they went out fighting,not in cubes.

 

This is the kinda stuff I remember,,, HRP

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8X9hK1xXG-s

 

Malta? Isn't that in the Mediterranean? Oh! Malta, OHIO?

Anywho, all joking aside, I read you, buddy! Seems ther is STILL a ton of poor boys who'd work their nuts off to get a car ready to entertain the REST of us common folk on a Saturday night!!! I say, God bless them -- AND God Bless America!!!

 

Hye guys, girls, did ANYBODY take pix of their OWN machines before AND after running them in the derby?

A few people have shown pic, but not many. SUR WUD BE FUN 2 SEE!!!

 

I had a 58 chevy 4 door gave to me for our derby this year. It was really rusted (even the valve cover had a hole) but i kept all the chrome. The paint covered alot. It didn,t last long but it was fun to see the looks on the crowds face. will post pics later.

 

what town did you grow up in? I remember the derbies in Ashtabula Ohio, instead of destroying these "clunkers" they ought to let people destroy them in derbies, at least they would be useful for something. Hell I remember my cousin running a late 70's chrysler wagon, they had tried to fix it for a long time,but it was a rusted out POS, did pretty well knocking most everything else out, barge on wheels.

 

I have driven in a few derbys . I only regret using one of the cars I destroyed. It was a 68 Buick. Got it for $100 . All it needed was new quarters. It ran good. The guy I bought it from asked if i was going to derby it , I lied. I would love to have that car back.

 

here is the pics

 

barslazyr, WOW, that's really wild to hear that ANY thing from the '50s is/recently ran NOW!!! Holy!!!

Yeah, I can only imagine how the crowd reacted to the old beast.

SHIT! Wish I'd been ther to see the show!!

MAN! I hated to see the golden oldeis go out, BUT it's one of the best damn shows Iever saw for the price of a ticket!!!

 

Hell man, I still compete in Demo Derbys!!! My brother and i have been doing them for 15 years and its a total blast. One of two things will happen to you when you get into a derby car: 1. You do it, and don't like and will never get into a car again, 2. You do it, and love it, and it becomes as addictive as any drug known to man. As far as old time derbys, those were the golden days. I have several dvd's and old videos of derbys from the 60's and man they were wild. ABC wide world of sports used to have a feature on once a month that showed a different demo derby from different states. Good stuff. As far as derbying the old cars.......we still do when we find them. And believe me, they are not as abundant as they used to be. We do have rules though. My brother and I like to fix up old cars and drive them too, so if we happen to find an old car that is salvagable and can be fixed in any way, shape or form, we will sell the parts of off it, or the whole car, or keep the car and fix it ourselves. On the other hand, we have derbied 58 mercurys, lots of 60's lincolns, hell my brother derbied a 56 desoto a few years ago, and kicked butt in it. And these cars that we find that are of the 60;'s or late 50's vintage, we only derby them when there is no possible way they can be restored. And yes, we will take every single part off them that can be sold at swap meets, dash pieces, trim, window trim, anything we can save we do save.
A couple weeks ago at a derby in Orland, one of our derby peoples we go against alot had a 58 edsel, his buddy had a 59 mercury colony park wagon, and another guy had a cherry 1961 lincoln. I've seen 58-60 T-birds duke it out, early 60's chryslers and oldsmobiles, all kinds of bitchin cars. Today, we mainly use what we can find, but still go out of our way to get "the good cars." mid 70's GM station wagons, mid 70's chrysler cordobas, Lincolns, dodge monoco's, plymouth furys, those types of cars. But even those are getting harder and harder to find. It's not totally unheard of for derby guys today to pay 1500-3000 for a decent derby car and get 4-5 derbys out of it, that is if you know how to "BUILD THEM." And man, what a BLAST it is to crash cars!!!!

 

Dude,it doesn't look BAD on the trailer.

NOT so good afterwards! LOL

I know Desli-Lu Chevies aren't so RARE, but -- YIKE -- I'll bet a bunch of guys In SoCal OR east of the Mississippi wouldld have loved to do osmething with THAT!

Anyway, my DARK side still says, it's GOOD to see an old warrior STILL at it!!!

(I'm just gald it wasn't another '56 DeSoto! LOL)

 

still like to watch them derbys this year the derby at our county fair
sold out in 45 minuets!!!!!!!

 

MotorHead711, you have to be shitting me.

They actually kept this footage of old Wild-World-of-Sports stuff AND brouhg tit (OOPS! I didn't mean tit. Sorry if I offended any female viewers by saying tit!) out on DVD???

Holy shit, Batman! Where do I get in line to BUY some-a-DEEZ???

 

Actually "tit" was just an acidental transpositon of letter in the ocurse of trying to express a thought, during a moment of special enthusiam over the subject at heans, ladies! I truly am SORRY!

tit
tit
tit
tit
tit
tit!

So, THERE!

 

Tit ofr TAT. The ONLY thing I really apologize for is: I was laughing so HARD when I discovered my stupid erros, I just had to try & do Monty Python thing there, guys.

So . . . WHO's buying the nexxt round.

Can yo tell, IT FRIDAY NIGHT??????

 

Okay, okay, hose me down. I apologize to the Pope & everybody in present company.

Alright, so get out-a-my-face. I SAID I was sorry!

 

The movie Hard Driver (aka The Last American Hero) had a really bitchin derby scene with tons of old cars. The main character, Junior Johnson derbied a 49/50 ford sedan!!!

 

It took most of one night to paint the chrome back on. painted under the script replaced the script and top coat. that is the last car I'm going to build until i got my rod done. I don't have time for both and i want to build something to enjoy for years.

 

Nice '58 Chevy. Don't feel too bad about it not holding up, none of the GM X-frame cars were worth a crap back in the day either.

The cars I ran in the attached pics were all Mopar powered. The Pontiac wagon was crap, but the Fords were rock hard in the ass-end! The white '63 Ford boxtop was a 10 second drag car crashed at Norwalk before I got it. I put a '67 Ford front clip on it with a '66 Imperial steering box, linkage and column, '67 Imperial driveshaft and a '68 Plymouth 8 3/4 rear axle. The steering linkage fit right in the Ford spindles, didn't have to adjust the tie rod sleaves at all!

 

Hey man!! I actually bought mine at the Turlock, ca. swapmeet 3 years ago. This guy had all kinds of vintage race/car movies that were reproduced to dvd and he had a bunch of killer old circle track/drag racing/demo derby/and boat drag dvds. I bought 1 of 3 of the abc wide world of sports demo derby videos and it takes place in New York. A little different than todays derbies, this one was on the asphault and they did this sort-of figure 8 anything goes deal on the track! When the green flag drops, look out, they come at ya from all angles. I'll see if I can find the business card of the guy that had the dvd's for sale, and I'll see if I can find him on the net...take it easy.....

 

'60 Pontiac wagon, there's one I'd like to have had.. then, or now.

59-60 GMs aren't much good in a demo anyways, the front bumper will get pounded right into the front tires and then you can't steer worth a damn.

I have a '58 Imperial that's not worth a crap though, I'd love to see someone take and demo. Rotty gutted shell no one cares about. The biggest problem is they cut the torsion bars for some reason and the only other set I had my buddy scrapped last summer. But if you're the kind of guy who puts other rearends and front clips and so on in the cars it should be no big deal.