Ina Mae Overman and Stanley Dean Miller were tapped by Ak Miller to run a support truck at the 1954 La Carrera PanAmericana. Ina Mae had a 1953 Ford truck, so they painted it up in team colors and headed south. As it turned out, AK didn't need the p... <BR><BR>To read the rest of this blog entry from The Jalopy Journal, click here.
That's the kind of stuff that gets me all kinds of fired up! I wish we could hear the cars on that long straight-away. Thanks for posting it!
Great stuff ! The Carrera has the dubious distinction of having the highest mortality rate per race in the history of motorsport. I am surprised that anyone finshed the race when you see how some of those cars ended up.
Jeez, Louise, nice film. No spectators injured in the running of this race? Loved the dog and burro shots! Ak is a hero, with the fastest and fugly-est hot rod ever. Gary
I think tire and suspension technology have come a long way in the last 50 years.Only the foreign jobs were managing that last corner.
Interesting enough, last year I sold a 65 Valaint convertible to a guy who was planning on running it in the modern incarnation of the La Carrera PanAmericana. I think in the "historic" class.
It is also an endurance race, you can tell by the looks of the racers when they hop off their cars. Its a lifetime experience to be at one of the stops waiting for cars to arrive. If you ever got the chance you have to live it.
Carson,,One of our members on the '54 Ford Club of America site drives this race every year or so with his daughter. HRP Carson runs in the stock class and has won a couple of times in that devisoin,,he didn't far to well this year,HRP
A video of the 2010 stock class. HRP <iframe src="http://player.vimeo.com/video/16348986?title=0&portrait=0" width="400" height="225" frameborder="0"></iframe><p>Stage 8 of Day 7: La Bufa, Zacatecas, La Carrera Panamericana from bringatrailer on Vimeo.</p>
What a neat film makes you wish you could have been around in that corner of the world in the 50's, cant get enough of the Saratogas and New Yorkers!
Great stuff Ryan... im a sucker for all the Carrera 50/54 stuff especially original pics so im still on a mission to rescue a huge private Panam pics/slights/negatives archive from the son a pro photographer (now 82 ) that he took personally in the 5 races This stuff has never been shown for some reasons ..and still locked in a room after 3 generations of photographers... fingers crossed
From a time when people did what they wanted and took responsibility for it. Love that era. Thanks for sharing.
Gotta love the background music... reminds me of a trip to Baja in the late 60's in a pristine '60 Desoto that came back looking like a refugee from the crusher..... Here's a link to all the Studebakers that ran in the '54 Pana <CITE>www.studebakerracing.com/internat2.html</CITE>
In the late eighties, I worked at Antique Automotive in San Diego, we had a 54 merc or lincoln that was all restored in the showroom and had raced at the panamerican race, if I remember, the engine had been built by Vic Edelbrock for the race, the car was a pale yellow but I cant remember if it had a black or white roof, I know we sold the car to a collector , but I cant remember who purchased it.
Link to a video my Dad shot from the 1954 La Carrera Panamericana. My Dad was a crew member for the Stroppe Lincoln team for the '54 La Carrerra Panamericana. Footage was taken from one of the team backup/chase cars and from various stages of the race http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5R8Z8mPaIjs Thinking of adding background music. Perhaps 'Hot Rod Lincoln' and 'La Bamba'
These are shots of Portland, Oregon's Len Sutton with his 1954 entry, he crashed while attempting to miss a herd of cattle in the road. He suffered a broken vertebrae and was flown to a Mexico City hospital, for a body cast!
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