Author: Mike

Fairly often in the ’50s the various sports car clubs sponsored drag races at one or another of the strips operating in southern California. Local strips included El Segundo, Saugus, Irwindale (Azusa at that time), Colton, and San Fernando. Here are the results for the SCCA’s event at the latter on April 8th, 1956, as printed in the club newsletter the following month.

“The San Fernando Drags were held on Sunday the 8th of April with the results shown below. Fastest time was put up by Ernie McAfee in the 4.4 Ferrai–12.24. Eric Hauser, in the Victress, went thru in 13.09 as did Jerry Austin in a D Jag. John von Neumann clocked 13.15 with the Monza, and Jay Chamberlain put the Lotus through in 13.43 for fourth FTD.

Results

Class B Mod.
172 Hauser, Eric Victress 13.09
27 Salat, S.W. Jag 140MC s/c 14.10
10 Hagerty, Bob Wildfire 15.26
19 Sloan, Dan Olds Allard 15.85

C Mod
4 McAfee, Ernie Ferrari 4.4 12.24
133 Austin, Jerry D Jag 13.09
26 Cannon, John Cannon Spl 14.19

C Stock
3 Anderson, B.C. Thunderbird 14.50
28 Eurengey, Al Jag XK120M 14.74
163 Friedman, Bill Jag XK120M 14.81
42 Kinner, Bill Corvette 15.39
2 Peterson, Ralph Corvette 16.22
9 Dair, Jack Thunderbird 16.45
226 Hall, Cameron Jag XK120C 16.97
22 Watelet, R.P. Jag XK120 17.23
7 Wogan, J.C. Jag XK 140MC 17.42
21 Matheson, James Jag XK140MC 17.64
15 Fullien, F.J. Jag MK VII 18.48
14 Krueger, Rudolph Jag XK 120M 18.52

D Mod
111 Von Neumann, J Ferrari Monza 13.15
87 Anderson, Michael Hairpin Spl 15.29

D Stock
5 Jones, Harry MB 300SL 14.54
18 Buchanan, G MB 300SL 16.26
80 Weber, Ch Lancia Spyder 17.71

E Mod.
112 VonNeumann, Josie Ferrari 1.9 14.85
50 Sawyer, Bob Frazer Nash LeMans 16.34
24 Jacobsen, Lars MG NA s/c 17.23

E Stock
113 Bracker, Lew Porsche 1600 14.99
11 Bethell, Alan Triumph TR 3 17.16
29 Verrecchia, V Siata 208S 18.73

F Mod
159 Eschrich, Dr. W Lotus 15.14
23 Timanus, John MG Spl 16.91
F Stock
8 McArthur, S.G. Porsche 1500 18.73
30 Davis, D MG TF 19.73

G Mod
16 Chamberlain, J Lotus 13.43

G Stock
129 Lawrence, J MG TD MK II 18.38
13 Garlick, W Porsche 1300 19.86
20 Herrmann, Ben Volkswagen 20.32
25 Sargent, Earl MG TC 21.30
6 McKenzie, Dr A Porsche 1300 20.70
1 Gebhart, Art MG TF 20.24

Your writer was present at this event and was quite astonished at the announced time of Jay Chaimberlain’s Lotus XI climax, a quite impossible time no matter what the gearing was and remains my thinking. This was the first Lotus XI on the coast and it did well racing, but it did not beat the Porsche 550 engined Lotus of Bill Eschrich whose time seems about right–a wee bit quicker than Road and Track’s road test of John Porter’s 550. Other surprises are the time of anderson’s TBird–way too fast for stock, and Bracker’s Porsche, which was a frequent winner on the track and did have the lowest gears available as well as expert tuning. Remeber that “stock” really meant stock at that time-but some makes provided factory options for racing that made the difference between some of these results where two of the same model have significantly different times. A bit slower than expected are Sawyer’s LeMans replica F-N (the same car had won Sebring 5 years earlier!), and, alas, my Dad in the Magnette at 17.28 was more than a second slower than the previous drags we had run. Incidentally, I have transcribed this as printed, and several of the times for G Stock are listed out of order or the times are typos! The Canon Spl was the gull-winged car with a 240 Offy. Ernie McAfee was, alas, killed in the same Ferrari at Pebble Beach a few weeks later. The car was a beast to handle; those who saw it say he missed a shift and locked up the brakes coming into the bottom tight turn. He was a first-rate driver at this time.

–Michael Jacobsen

The argument over who was the best driver was taken to new heights a few years back by the English journal Motorsports in an article naming the top 100 of all time, thus pitting Jenatzy against Clark, Ascari (pick one) against Hill (pick any) and so on. Comparing drivers of different eras is as silly as comparing tennis players of different eras. Comparing drivers of the same era is hard enough! IROC never seems to have proved much and the early races were run on road courses when many of the pro US drivers had no experience on them.

In the ’50s, drivers of the East Coast seldom came west and vice-versa. Being a California boy, I thought our West Coasters had the edge. Actually, in the big bore classes, it seemed a toss up between the two Phils–Walters and Hill. They were seldom on the same grid. Phil Hill was “pleased” to have beaten his former idol (Walters was a top east Coast Midget pilot when Hill made a few starts in one around LA in the late ’40s) at Elkhart Lake driving an XK C (the Hornburg car recently sold to Europe and visible on this website’s Villa D’Este video) to Walter’s 2.6 Ferrari coupe. At March Field in ’53 Walters waltzed away from the field in the Cunningham C5R’s last race, but failed to finish; Hill’s 2.9 Ferrari hadn’t the speed for an airport course with twin mile long straights.

In the small bore class–F modified__the matter is easier to resolve in the mid 50s because so many of the top drivers were piloting the same machine, the Porsche 550 Spyder. The first four cam engined Spyder raced in the US was Johnny Von Neumann’s which tore up practice at March Field in ’54. My Dad came off the track and reported that “Johnny was passing OSCAs like OSCAs pass MGs.” But an MG pilot pulled out of the pit lane in front of the Porsche and it crashed and burned. John had a second 550 but with a pushrod engine. It would be nearly a year before the next four cammer arrived. In it John had some good races with Pete Lovely’s Pooper and Miles’ R2 MG special, but then he hired Miles to drive for him when all the customer 550s arrived. In ’56-7 we often had six or seven on the grid at a race, and in order of speed the pilots were: 1. Miles 2. Ginther 3. Kunstle 4. McAfee 5. Weiss 6. tie between Porter, Beagle and McHenry. Lovely stepped into a Spyder a couple of times and was up near the top. Only Jack McAfee raced multiple times in the East, and he won nearly all of them, whereas he won only a few times on our coast.

A bit later the RS and RSKs arrived. At our first big pro event, the Examiner GP at Pomona. Miles was in an older RS and Sammy Weiss had a new RSK. Mid way they were running 4th and 3rd, with Miles dogging the faster car but unable to get by. In the turn entering the front straight Miles showed me the Pitt maneuver for the first time in sports car racing, bumping Weiss into a slide and then passing. It turned out to be for the win as the two big bore cars then leading them both retired. Ken raised the bar in the under 1500cc class beginning in ’53, and later became a top high horsepower pilot as well.

The grid for F modified at Santa Barbara in 1956 shows Miles, Ginther and Jean-Pierre Kunstle on the front row, with John Porter, Troy McHenry and Walt Turner also in 550s further back, as well as the 550 engined Lotus of Bill Eschrich with wheels poised in case Miles stalls!  He didn’t, taking the win instead.

On a clear, crisp Friday in April of 1953, with the sun beginning to warm the hillsides just north of San Luis Obispo, California, Harvey Mayer unloaded from its trailer the 1100cc OSCA belonging to Randy MacDougall—Pebble Beach bound—for the purpose of blowing the cobwebs out of the engine and fine tuning for the weekend’s activities, and took off up the road, the tow car in lame pursuit.

At Torrey Pines a few months earlier Randy had driven the car to second place, behind Von Neumann’s Porsche SL, wearing the blue paint it had arrived with from the factory. But now resplendent in its new Italian racing red livery, the OSCA managed to catch the eye of a wary California Highway Patrol officer, who duly pulled Harvey over. Now having very good eyes, our pilot had certainly seen the CHP as soon as he had seen Harvey, and in those pre-radar days, the officer had not been able to clock the OSCA over the mile necessary to issue a speeding ticket. But he circled the little bolide carefully, pulled out his ticket book, and began writing. The first OSCA on the West Coast, this car had the headlights recessed in the little round grill opening, and not fared into the fenders as later MT4s would. So despite being liscensed for the road, the car was illegal.

“Your headlights are too low to the ground, and too close together.” the cop said, handing Harvey the ticket as the tow car drew up behind. “You’ll have to fix it before you can drive it on the road again.”

Back the OSCA went onto the trailer, and I noted its passing from the parking lot of the Paso Robles Inn, where our equipe had stopped for early afternoon cocktails. Into the lounge I went.

“Harvey has just gone by towing the OSCA” I announced.

“What color was it?” asked my Father suspiciously. He knew it had just been painted, and figured I didn’t.

“Red” was the answer, but it didn’t convince the rest of them. They were made believers when, near Greenfield in a growing twilight, we came on the OSCA, on its trailer, hitched to Harvey’s tow vehicle, precariously tilted along the side of the two lane road. He had had a flat tire. This was fixed, but in pulling off the road where the shoulder was steeply graded, the carburetor of the tow car had become starved for fuel, and it would not restart. The tank was low on gas, and the pump was not getting any into the carb. We had no gas can between us, but we did have some fuel line, and eventually Harvey was able to siphon some gas out of our tank and pour it into the starved carb, and his tow car sputtered and off we all went, arriving at the Pine Inn in Carmel well past the dinner hour.

Harvey had become quite paternal about the OSCA, and for good reason. No more beautiful race car existed. Its thin aluminum skin was sleek and utterly unique, its little twin cam four an engineering jewel. Randy, a writer by profession, published a humerous little piece in one of the sports car journals of the day accusing Harvey of trying to keep him away from his own race car, of refusing to answer the telephone when Randy called, and of leaving teddy bears to bounce around in the cockpit to keep Randy awake when actually racing the car. This was not a bad idea. Randy put the car into the haybales twice in front of me during Sunday’s race, doing severe damage to the carozzeria. and he did not come close to showing the car’s potential. But Harvey drove it in the novice event, and as the smallest engine in the race, started dead last on the twisty, narrow, pine=lined track. In four laps he threaded his way through the field and caught the leading Jaguar Porsche, going on to win. Years later, Harvey would be the fastest West Coast Lotus driver.

Ken Miles won Randy’s event in the first outing of his R1 special. I always thought that if Harvey had driven the OSCA in the main instead of Randy, that the debut of Miles’ car would have resulted in a second place.

Update: Tony Adriaensens sent along a pair of photos of the OSCA in question taken at Torrey Pines. Leaving open the debate of when exactly #1122 changed her colors. Thanks Tony!