60'-70's Vintage Oval Track Modifieds

Our own Denny Z at Plainville Stadium, CT in 1964
(photo courtesy of speedwaylinereport.com)


Reggie Ruggiero at Plainville Stadium early in his carreer
(photo unknown)


Richie Galullo at Plainville Stadium, CT
(photo unknown)

 

So sorry, I think you're right. In fact, you are right.

 

My info was incorrect. I'm glad you had the right information.

 

Ah, so. If that's Trenton, it could have been LeeRoy Yarbrough in the Donlavey car.

 

Does anyone recall anything about a coupe numbered# CEB 57 that ran in the 50's or 60's driven by Robert Brown? might have been raced at Riverhead or the CT. area? Thanks

 

RJ,

Thanks for all of the additional information and the corrections.

JBull

 

Dr. John,

Thanks for the additional info and the corrections. I appreciate it when people jump in and embellish on the posts. That is why I put questions marks on items that I am not sure of. Keep the interesting information coming.

JBull

 

Some embellishment for the JBull.....lol

That 1960 Starliner that MT ran at Langhorne was run as a LM on the Spencer/Lancaster circuit garnering 10 wins at each track....They dropped in a 427cid Ford and went to Langhorne for his very first modified race of any kind, finishing 6th(1966)......Neat shot with the legendary Al Tasnady!

....They built the '67 Fairlane bodied mod over that following winter. Maynard won with it in it's very first race opening day at the Fulton Speedway in a close battle with Billy Blum #54.....Unfortunatly, the car was destroyed a week or two later......

Pretty impressive start: 6th at Langhorne('66).....A win on opening day('67) in his 2nd mod race!.

I have a few more old shots for you, just couldn't get the scanner working correctly tonight........kt

 

Thanks for embellishing KT (lol)

That's what happens when I post things during normal hours and not the wee hours of the morning.....

Here is some more that I have on Maynard Troyer...

in the Falcon in victory lane in 1970 at the 100 lap All Star Race at Lancaster





and now onto the pinto years....




in victory lane at Fulton...






the nerf bars seem to be showing some signs of wear on this shot....





with Roger Treichler in victory lane....





at speed alongside Donnie Kroft in the 231 Gremlin...






in victory lane at Fulton? fans look cold standing up against the fence....





looks like at speed at Pocono maybe, can't quite see who is on the inside, maybe Mike Loescher?





At Lancaster with the gremlins of Merv Treichler #58 on the outside and Marc Newton #55 on the inside with Jerry Cook #38 on the outside of Marc....








alongside Lou Lazzaro #4 and Dave Lape #22 at Utica Rome...a young George Kent following the three of them

 

Maynard Troyer #6 leading a stellar group of cars at Lancaster: Geoff Bodine in the #99, Ray Hendrick in the Armstrong #1, Richie Evans in the #61 and Frank Vigliarolo's #34 (usually driven by Ed Flemke)





another fine group of cars: Maynard in the #6 outside of Lou Lazzaro's #4, Merv Triechler's #58 and Jerry Cool's #38





in victory lane





Maynard leading another pack of Top centenders: Geoff Bodine #99, Richie Evans #61 and Jerry Cook #38










another competitive pack: Bud Schilling #36; Roger Treichler in the #74 and his brother Gordie in the #47





I have another 40 pages of Maynard Troyer to scan. I'll get there slowly but surely

 

This one is heavy because it was originally built "back-in-the-day" when light weight parts weren't being used. It's a steel head SBC with Frankland drum brakes. Only thing light on this car are the aluminum wheels. With me in it (I'm not light either), I'm at about 2,750 lbs.

 

Post #10677, Maynard and Donnie Kroft is at Oswego, 1975 I believe (possibly the Port City 150). Below it is Maynard at Fulton. That pic is in the '73 gater news yearbook, probably spring of '73, so yeah, probably cold.

 

OK, this one's been bugging me. In #10656 - "Another shot from the open at Langhorn...Charlie in the #1, Ed Brunnhoelzl in the Artie King #333?. Max Berrier in the #12?, Rene Charland in the #888? Al Tasnady in the #39?" the covered grandstands have me baffled. I went to just about every October race at Langhorne in the 60's and early 70's and can not remember covered grandstands. Memory is not that good any more, but did they build a 'cover' at some point and I'm just dis-remembering?

 

I believe that shot in post #10656 is at Trenton.

 

Yes,it is Trenton. That photo has been on this thread at least once before.

 

That shot is definitely Trenton and I believe it is the 200 in 1966 or 1967.I was there and it was Lee Roy Yarborough in the 91 on the outside pole. The start was pick out of the hat for the guaranteed starters up front and Eddie Brunnhoelzl picked the pole.

There was a team car to the 91 numbered 90 and Sonny Hutchins drove that car. Ford had pulled out of the Grand National (Sprint) series due to Nascar not letting Ford run an engine package to make them more competitive with the Chrysler hemis. Holman & Moody contracted the Wood Brothers to build these 2 cars and they were incredible for the time. Independent front suspension, the best Ford 427 FE engines available and on the trailer they were lower than most of the other modifieds. Nascar had a rule that the roof had to be no less than 48" from the floor and the Wood Brothers did exactly that...but being good interpretors of the rules mounted the floorboard on the bottom of the chassis not the top like almost everyone else.

 

The 90 and 91 were Junie Donlavey's cars.
Are you saying that he went to H&M, who in turn went to the Wood Bros, to have these cars built?

 

I do not know how the deal was put together and who did what first, years ago Junie Dunleavey was on Eli Gold's TV show and I tried calling in to ask Junie but never got through.

As far as I know the Wood Brothers built the car and H-M provided the drive train and probably the suspension and Junie was the owner. Junie was not solely in the Grand National circuit at this time and the Richmond Virginia area was the center of the southern modified scene at that time and a lot of top shelf teams and drivers were from the Richmond area. Sonny Hutchins also drove one of the cars at Nazareth National Speedway.

The Wood Bros. were still involved out to a small degree with modifieds throughout the 60's and built at least one other car after the 90 & 91 which was a brown Ford coupe #21 that Gene Royster drove and he crashed the heck out of it at Martinsville in the late 60's early 70's. It would be great if some of the southern Hamber's that are familiar with that era of modifieds would chime in with more information from that time frame.

The southern modifieds were somewhat ahead of the northern cars due to the Grand National influence and the Tant Mitchell "#11 had a-frames in 1966 which was well before they showed up in the north. The southern cars also had different appearing bodies and often had fuller rear fenders that curled around the rear tires and less cutting on the windows.

 

Maynard Troyer's first race car in 1958....photo by mom

Maynard was originally from a small town named Plain City, 20 miles NW of Columbus Ohio.

He followed in the footsteps of his brother-in-law, Vern Schrock, a great racer in his own right......Two uppity young amishmen....lol

They both raced at the now defunct Powell Speedway.

 

JBull, love that victory lane shot(1970) with Ed Serwacki and Bob O'Rourke, two real promoters.....I can still remember bits and pieces of that race. (I was 12 at the time)

MT was the 1970 All-Star League Champion representing Lancaster Speedway.

....kt

 

RJ, Eddie Royster drove the Wood Bros #21 and wrecked it at Martinsville. The link to the youtube video of this race and wreck are back about 10 pages on this thread.

 

I think you may get some friendly disagreement on this thread about who was ahead of whom.
Certainly in the early '60s, the top New England boys were ahead of their counterparts in the South. By the mid-'60s, the top Southerners closed at least some of that gap, perhaps all of it. Whether "they" (as opposed to just Ray Hendrick - the best southern driver in the best southern car) ever actually got ahead is a tougher call to make.

It was my (perhaps incorrect) impression that at least one VA Modified track required the Modified coupes to retain a reasonable semblance of the fenders, which was what accounted for that distinctive, and attractive, Southern Modified look.

 

Let me throw this in to the discussion...For the '68 season, here in western New York, one of my neighbors debuted a new modified, with the "radical" idea of an independent front end, but using a Ford pick up truck "twin I beam" set-up.

 

I can attest to the fact (and as New Britain has stated) we were way ahead of the southern folks as far as handling and chassis dynamics in the very early 60s but within a year and a half they were as good as we were. And the person responsible for helping them close the gap...the person who took pride in helping the competition...Eddie Flemke.
Denny Z

 

I'll weigh in on the Dunleavy /Wood Bros. deal since I am one of the Virginia H.A.M.B.ers. I'm pretty close or have at least listened in on the stories of the Wood Bros. but I've never heard that they built Junie's cars! Dunleavy was a helluva builder in his own right and I'm sure either of those guys could get any motor they wanted from H/M and Ford. Dunleavy loved Ford engines as did Glen and Lynwood. Altho Junie did use a '37 Plymouth coupe as one of his cars!
The Woods built their #21 1937 Ford Coupe in 66/67 originally with a 289 and it had beautiful full 1937 Ford fenders.Sonny Hutchins drove it for them. They then cut the fenders and added a 427. Bobby and Donnie Allison,and Runt Harris,drove it then with Donnie getting a big win at Martinsville with it. Eddie Royster apparently went in as part owner with another guy and bought it from the Wood Bros. He then tore it up at M'ville I believe in '68. It was found several years ago in the Richmond area and was fully restored by Butch Humphreys.
M'ville did require full fenders for awhile and Richie Evans had to rely on some of the good ol boys there to help him out when he came in for the first time not realizing the rule. They got him some fenders. (worked both ways didn't it Denny?)
And some really stretched the rules on what a fender was. Check ot Mousey Kempsters #3B coach one of these days. Had two little bumps on a old pickup hood that he called fenders!
And yeah we didnt cut them up as bad down here. Ya'll were fast,but some of those were butt ugly!
Like I've said before Denny,every old timer I've talked to down here was in awe of Eddie Flemke. My uncle said he could look at and walk a track and set the car up on the trailer. But they also said yalls cars were a little 'light' . Ha!

 

Radford, Not only were they a little light they were very light. Make no mistake it did work both ways, the "southern folks" were our friends and we were theirs. Junie was a huge help to us, we would arrive on his doorstep Friday morning after towing all night from New Egypt NJ, and he would let us use his shop to get ready for Southside that night then if necessary use his shop again Saturday morning to get ready to run Manassas Saturday night. Toward the end of my stock car days (64 and 65) I actually lived and made my base in Richmond during the season (reason being I could run as many races with less travel) I first stayed at Red Foote's place then at Red Brittan's house. Ted Hairfield, Junie and some others started calling me "The Transplanted Yankee" and I liked that. I guess to make it official the last part of 65 I drove a southern car...Ray Platts 59 owned by Dale Orr and wrenched by Junie Nelson, I think his last name was Nelson he married Ray's widow.

Radford, On a side note I hope someone will keep me posted on any reunions (Southside, Manassas, So Boston or Langley) this summer, I really enjoyed the one at Manassas last year.

Denny Z

 

I know the big complaint is low paying tracks for the modifieds. Well Seekonk Speedway is having their annual Open Wheel Wednesday tonight. 100 green flag laps with $10,000 to win. Plus NEMA midgets and Pro Four Mods. Only $25 for adult admission.
http://seekonkspeedway.com/

 

I live in Roanoke Denny so I don't get alot of info about the Richmond tracks.Closer to Martinsville,Bowman Gray,Franklin County. You ran Starkey didn't you?

 

Radford, I don't remember a track named Starkey, did it go by a different name in my day? Where was Starkey? There were some tracks I only ran once or twice that I don't remember now. One I do remember though...Fredericsburg Va, only ran once and won, my first NASCAR win. I ran Bowman Grey once on New Years day but crashed badly. ouch. Denny Z

 

One of the things I've heard is that when Ed Flemke's modifieds were tons better than the southern cars he still didn't go around so fast he made them look bad...Guess nobody ever mentioned that story to Ryan Neuman.