From The Rodder's Journal issue #63 webpage: The subtitle of our feature on hot rodder Tom Prufer says it all: “The Inimitable, Indefatigable, 100-Proof Hot Rodder.” Tom’s been involved with hot rodding and drag racing virtually his entire life. Rodder’s Journal issue #63 features the first in a two-part story on his exploits, penned by his friend and hot rodding cohort, Pat Ganahl. Part one focuses on Prufer’s prolific rod building career, from his early coupes and roadsters to his well-known hot rods like the “Cop Shop Coupe” ’33 Ford three-window. His tales from the road are often hilarious and always interesting, and many of them are told first person by Tom himself. And they all provide context for his participation in the nostalgia drag racing scene, which we’ll delve into in part two. From The Rodder's Journal issue #64 webpage: For years Pat Ganahl has been pitching us on the idea of doing a profile on prolific hot rodder Tom Prufer. Sometimes we just don’t know what part of yes Pat doesn’t understand. We’ve been proponents of the idea since we first discussed it nearly a decade ago. The problem was how did we fit all of the story and photos of a character like Tom Prufer within the confines of a magazine article. The truth is you can’t. But we found the best solution was to break it into two parts. Last issue we concentrated on Tom’s street oriented cars and in this issue we devoted the space to Tom’s drag racing efforts. Prufer is certainly an iconic figure and we think that these two articles showcase Pat Ganahl at his best as well.
I can't believe I missed this stuff. His garage is always poster quality.....would love to be his neighbor, at any point of his life. Talk about a cool dude, with a knack for cool cars. Wow.
Tom built a 29 roadster hiboy that was very lipstick red (no flames, moon tank, outside exhaust as many of his cars have). Tommy the Greek striping, cabinet latches on the hood sides, windshield posts laid back a little. Does anyone have any pictures of that car? Especially from the back. I have one pic taken at Deuce Days but no date on the pic and I don't remember which decade even.
The flames on the Cop Shop Coupe were painted by the guy who wrote the book on flaming....Rod Powell!
The Jalopy Journal
