Update on Erica? (1 Viewer)

[__]

I didn't see Erica Enders listed at Topeka and she's not on the entry list for Englishtown. Any idea if she's going to be there? If not, any news on the team?

 

[Paul]

I think she will be in Joliet this weekend, at least that is what she indicated on Myspace.

 

[none]

The plan is to attend every race the rest of the year. Topeka is the only one they weren't planning to run.

Alan

 

[none]

I seem to remember that they were expecting new and improved parts some time this year. Does anyone know where that stands?

 

[none]

The car is not here, when I get a chance to ask Erica I will let you know what happened. they were planning to be here.

The new block and heads are in the works, but not ready to race yet.

Alan

 

[Bob K.]

Hey Alan Reinhart, Bob Frey keeps saying that the "Greek" started racing Top Fuel in 1964. He was credited with a 204 mph run in 1960 at Oswego, Ill. I think (rusty memory) That car was in the Chicago Museum of Industry for some time. Keep up the great announcing!! Bob Kirkbride

 

[mach9]

Darin Morgan stated on another site yesterday that currently the tooling is being machined for the new heads. He said that actual parts should be following very soon. He was pretty amazed at how fast the program is moving along.
It will be interesting to see who, besides Morgan, will switch to Ford in the coming months.

 

[Paul]

Hey Alan Reinhart, Bob Frey keeps saying that the "Greek" started racing Top Fuel in 1964. He was credited with a 204 mph run in 1960 at Oswego, Ill. I think (rusty memory) That car was in the Chicago Museum of Industry for some time. Keep up the great announcing!! Bob Kirkbride

People keep on telling me there was a drag strip here in Oswego. Where was the track located?

To the subject of this thread, Erica is at the track and just like Alan said the car is not.

 

[Unk]

I talked with Erica today, work on the heads is coming along and they are planning to be @ Etown next week.

Unk

 

[.]

People keep on telling me there was a drag strip here in Oswego. Where was the track located?

This might help: Time to save a piece of dragway history : News : Oswego Ledger-Sentinel : Hometown Newspaper for Oswego and Montgomery, Illinois

For the few people who may not know about the strip, it was on Route 34, a short distance west of Orchard Road, which at that time was not even a dream in the eyes of highway engineers.

and

Oswego Drag Strip proves fertile ground for Oswego documentary film maker : News : Oswego Ledger-Sentinel : Hometown Newspaper for Oswego and Montgomery, Illinois

Thompson said he learned that Dale and Darold Cutsinger of Oswego encouraged Dan and Wally Smith to build the track on their U.S. Route 34 farm, situated between Yorkville and Oswego. The Cutsingers’ father was a tenant farmer who worked the fields for the Smith brothers’ parents, owners of the farm. The Smith brothers inherited the farm after their parents were killed in an automobile accident.

In 1955, the brothers plowed under several acres of soybeans, and the dirt track known as the Oswego Drag Strip was born.

Only a few races were held on the original dirt track which at that time went from north to south.

“But, but they were enough to encourage the brothers to borrow money to build an asphalt track in 1956 that began to satisfy the needs of racers for several states around,” Thompson said.

My dad told me that it wasn't until many years after Greek ran that 204 that he finally admitted that they'd been running hydrazine in the nitro.

 

[Al smith]

Oswego

Is this the track to the left of Orchard road? i think i can see the strip and its return road under the trees.

Orchard Road, OSWEGO ILL. - Google Maps

 

[Bill]

The run in which the Greek ran 204 as the first car to break the 200mph "barrier" was not at Oswego, it was at Alton, IL, close to St. Louis.

From "Drag Racing Online": "...the Greek, now 74, said to a standing-room ovation. His "Chizler" made drag racing history as the first car to break the 200-mph barrier, recording a 204-mph charge at a track in Alton, IL, back when the Greek was just a youngster."

I thought that was common knowledge...

 

[Bill]

Guess not....

 

[Chi-Town Brown]

Re: Oswego

Is this the track to the left of Orchard road? i think i can see the strip and its return road under the trees.

Orchard Road, OSWEGO ILL. - Google Maps

If your heading west on 34 just the other side of the river on the right there used to be a tree nursery and now is just an empty field with a small shack and a narrow road going North getting overgrown. That’s the original track. It was scheduled to be redeveloped by now but the builders ran out of $$$$$ and now I hear it may be back on the block?

Yes what your looking at is the old track. Were the communication tower to the right is located is what used to be the track entrance. The pits (area between entrance and track) was always dirt. Now its trees and dirt

 

[d'kid]

Guess not....

If it wasn't "N", it never happened... by the way, did you ever read '1984' or 'Fahrenheit 451'

d'kid

 

[Muddy]

I remember Alton as being a 1/8 mile track or am I confused?

 

[jpee]

Is she supposed to be at Englishtown this weekend.. ??

 

[PJ]

yeah, they just got some new parts recently and they boys and the shop wanted to play with them there.

 

[Bill]

John,

I lived in St. Louis in 1961 for about 6 months, during the summer, and used to drive the short distance over to Alton, IL for the local races, frequently.

Karamesines' 204 mph run there at Alton had happened the year before.

At that time (48 years ago), it was a quarter-mile track. I moved away that year, and never went back, so it COULD have changed to an eighth-mile facility at some later point; I don't know.

What WAS unusual about the place was that it had two asphalt lanes, with a grass median thoughout the strip. IIRC, the median was about ten-feet wide.

Just what their thinking on that was, is a mystery to me.

Hope this helps.

Bill

 

[Bill]

>>> Karl wrote: "If it wasn't "N", it never happened... by the way, did you ever read '1984' or 'Fahrenheit 451'"?"


"Never happened"???
Not so, says the DRAGLIST I gleaned from GOOGLE:
ergo...
"1960 1 7.600 204.08 Chris Karamesines The Chizler 392 Chry 59 Fenn 323 AAFD Chicago IL Chris Karamesines"

There's also a listing on there ( http://www.draglist.com/lists/tf.txt) for 1960 for Garlits having gone 204.23 at some Florida strip in 1960:

1960 8 8.230 204.23 Don Garlits Swamp Rat 1 454 Chry 57 Garlits 204 AAFD Tampa FL Don Garlits

I never heard of that run anywhere else; for some reason, it didn't garner the acclaim that the Alton "barrier breaking run" did. Of course, since Alton wasn't an NHRA track, Hot Rod magazine didn't mention it, since Wally and Pete Petersen were still acting as a team, pretty much, at that time.

RE the Vonnegut books you mentioned:

Yes, I read both of those books, a long, long time ago. But, Kurt Vonnegut wrote much better than that, in my opinion.

He was one of my favorite authors, and taught creative writing at Iowa State University in the late '70s when I lived in Des Moines. I thought seriously about taking his course, but never got around to it. Wish I had...

I thought his "Sirens of Titan" and "Cat's Cradle" were much better books than "Farenheit 451" and "1984," although I must be a cult of one; the ones you mentioned got all the press...

And no, I don't walk around in a trance, reciting a comprehensive list of 1950's drag strip names... LOL!!!


BTW, the Karamesines run has had its share of nay-sayers over the years, claiming "Happy Clocks" because it was a long time before he could duplicate
that run.... years, I think. Who knows? Probably Chris....

Bill (whose '54 Olds 88 once won a trophy at Alton!)