History NW WA dirt track races 1950- pre and Early Skagit Speedway

Let's bring this one back to life. My old Willys will be getting some performance upgrades this winter, one of which is a new and improved trans. Fellow on the far right in this photo taken at Skagit Speedway is pretty well known in our area for doing racing transmissions for dingbats like me. That's his dad standing behind the drivers' compartment, early to mid 60's time period. This is their first chrome moly car, tubing hauled home tied to the roof of the family sedan, chassis laid out on the floor of the back-alley shop/garage and gas welded together by him. Added bonus to getting your trans rebuilt you'd be hard pressed to find a nicer guy! He gave me a handful of programs from earlier days at Skagit and asked me to pass on to another mutual car friend/old sprint car driver to enjoy, he was thrilled to get them. Before I passed on, I scanned some pages which I'll post up over the next few days.

 

Try this racin' thru the raindrops (befastpast.blogspot.com)
If you take the time to go through it there's a lot of north west history
Get a coffee and enjoy !

 

Now tell me where'd all those 32 5 windows go again? The owner/car biographies are fun, what the guy do for a living, [lots of guys working in the timber industry, farming especially dairy, wrecking yard guys, etc.] You didn't have a pit crew, one guy you had a pit man, more than one guy you had pit men. And the sponsors, "Big Ed's", perfect!

 

My late brother-in-law's brother Bob Donker raced in that area years ago, but I don't know any details.

 

I knew Bob and raced against him a couple times. Al Cooper was one of my best friends. He built the engine.
The car was one of the best. It was featured in some magazine in the 50's.

Cooper/Donker 2 car at Aurora Speedway early 50's.

 

I worked with Gerald as an apprentice Millwright 45 years ago. He had fists like hams and was a larger than life personality. The first day working with him I had the "pleasure" of holding the drift while he smacked it with a 12 lb. sledge to drive a pin out of a machine. After the first couple of whacks I grabbed my vise-grips to get my hands away from the area of the impact. He just laughed and called me "Chicken"... good times!

 

Here’s a cool calendar

 

That's cool! Thanks for the post!!

 

Sure is!!

 

AMERICAN HAMMERED .......