Vintage shots from days gone by!

What happened here - somebody lose control of the pace car?

 

Building a wooden go-kart with your buddies...

 

Looks familiar.

 

Invicta S type, 4.5, Brooklands 1931?

 

Local Dodge dealer Eldon Palmer crashing the pace car into a photographer's stand at the '71 500.

 

Don't look like it's gonna buff out.....

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OTNDPmIO4Lw

 

Looks like Eric 'on the roof' Carlson. These 96's seem to look better to me as time passes on.

 

Seems like I read that the car is owned by an Indiana collector.

 

The owner sits at the bar thinking; "now I will be able to jazz up the front and someone else will pay for it,such a deal". No wonder he's smiling.

 

Actually, #8 would be Stig Blomgvist. He finished 1st in the '73 Swedish rally.[He was also known for racing in heavy work/combat boots ]

My girlfriend in those days had a Saab 96 Monte Carlo. 850 whopping cc's, and two-stroke to boot! She'd pull into a gas station and tell the pump jockey to put in 8 gallons of regular and hand him a can of 2-stroke oil to put in the gas tank! It was 3-cylinder and the Monte Carlo had three Weber carbs.

Many years later I rallied Saab 99s.

 

Looks like he was really hooking into it - trying to keep up with the race cars, but then reality bit ................... real hard!
I hope no one got hurt bad.
Tool.

 

This photo is from Zion National Park (yes, I'm behind that far).

 

I was at my first Indy 500 sitting right across the track from where the pace car crashed. I spent the whole race listening to my little transistor radio trying to find out what happened to those hit.

 

Thanks for the info Search Dog. Yes, Stig looks like he's putting the right combat boot to good use here!

Back in '69, I worked at a dealership that sold Saab's, PAM Motors in Manhattan Beach, Ca. All our inventory was V4 96's and Sonnett's with the V4. I never had the 2 stroke 3 cylinder experience, ring a ding ding. But the V4 96's were great cars and I would have loved to own one.

 

Hi guys.Thanks for the correction on the misidentifying the Hawker.Vision goes to hell when my blood sugar is wonky.This thread is THE best that I have EVER seen anywhere on the web.Thanks to all who have contributed.
Good luck.Have fun.Be safe.
Leo

 

Somewhere in country Australia with an early colonial homestead in the background.This is a typical Aussie conversion with a wooden back ute added to a tourer body.Predates the Aussie 33 Ford Coupe/Utility.

 

Westbury New York 1969

 

My parents were there that day...right across from the wreck. I have it on 8mm film.

 

You Aussies are damn good! Every time an Australian vintage shot is posted it doesn't last a day before being identified and/or claimed. Seriously. Caption:

On the farm in outback New South Wales, Australia.

 

Wikipedia synopsis pretty concise. No one killed. 29 injured including Tony Hulman who was riding in the pace car with Palmer. ABC broadcaster Chris Schenkel, riding in the pace car as well was too shaken to work the broadcast and third passenger, astronaut and future US Senator John Glenn probably thought, what's the big deal, I survived space flight.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eldon_Palmer#Pace_car_crash

HM

 

Various Oregon venues.

 

The story I heard is during practice Eldon watched for a cone on Pit Road as a marker to lift and start braking. When race day came a pit crew member from one of the race teams was unaware of this and removed the cone from his pit stall. Because of this Eldon stayed on the throttle too long, panicked and locked up the brakes when he realized he was too far down pit road.

 

It was my understanding during the day that 2-stroke 96's were outlawed in CA because there was no way to eliminate the ever-present trail of visible blue smoke. Really.

 

I think that's the story. Drum brakes at 125 mph is pretty nuts, particularly when you're driving the great Tony Hulman, an American hero astronaut and a major network TV personality at the start of the Greatest Spectacle in Racing.

After this mishap, I don't think they allowed pace car drivers that weren't trained drivers.

HM

 

Cool. That makes sense to me cause I'm pretty sure that the 2 strokes were still available in Jersey in '69. We moved plenty of Saabs through our store, but no 2 strokes. I liked the 4 speed on the column and the freewheeling.

 

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