Thomson got out of shape in what could be (Larry) Crash Crockett was fatally injured. Vukovich, Bob Slater, Jerry Hoyt, Charlie Miller, Hoag was the only driver to win the National Open on both the dirt and pavement surfaces.[12]. Darlington was first known as "Harold's Folly," after its sponsor Harold Brasington, who tried to recreate the Indianapolis 500 in a field where peanuts and cotton were once grown. If youre afraid of racing, you best get out of it. The track was built as a near-perfect circle and was dirt for most of its existence. Because the track was round, you couldnt see very far ahead of you. BUNBURY GLEN IRIS LITTLE CIRCUIT 1961 - 1974, BUNBURY AUSTRALIAN MOTORCYCLE GRAND PRIX 1962, ESPERANCE BANDY CREEK PINK LAKE SPEEDWAYS, KALGOORLIE GOLDEN MILE TROTTING TRACK SPEEDWAY, PERTH BUCKLAND - ROPEWORKS - MONUMENT HILL HARLEY SCRAMBLE, PERTH BULLSBROOK RAILWAY ROAD SPEED TRIALS, PERTH DIRT TRACKERS - GIDGEGANNUP - KEWDALE, PERTH FORRESTFIELD SPEEDWAY HARTFIELD ROAD, PERTH FORRESTFIELD SPEEDWAY DAWSON AVENUE 1960s, PERTH FORRESTFIELD SPEEDWAY DAWSON AVENUE 1970, PERTH FORRESTFIELD SPEEDWAY DAWSON AVENUE 1971, PERTH FORRESTFIELD SPEEDWAY DAWSON AVENUE 1972, PERTH FORRESTFIELD SPEEDWAY DAWSON AVENUE 1973, PERTH FORRESTFIELD SPEEDWAY DAWSON AVENUE 1974, PERTH FORRESTFIELD SPEEDWAY DAWSON AVENUE 1975, PERTH FORRESTFIELD SPEEDWAY DAWSON AVENUE 1976, PERTH FORRESTFIELD SPEEDWAY DAWSON AVENUE 1977, PERTH FORRESTFIELD SPEEDWAY DAWSON AVENUE 1978, PERTH FORRESTFIELD SPEEDWAY DAWSON AVENUE 1979, PERTH FORRESTFIELD SPEEDWAY DAWSON AVENUE 1980, PERTH KALAMUNDA GO KART & SOAP BOX RACING, WONGAN HILLS - PIAWANING GRAVEL PIT - WONGAN HILLS SPEEDWAY, 1991 > 1995 BUNBURY SHRUBLAND PARK MOTOCROSS, 1996 > 2000 BUNBURY SHRUBLAND PARK MOTOCROSS, 2001 > 2005 BUNBURY SHRUBLAND PARK MOTOCROSS, 2006 > 2010 BUNBURY SHRUBLAND PARK MOTOCROSS, 2011 > 2015 BUNBURY SHRUBLAND PARK MOTOCROSS, 2016 > 2020 BUNBURY SHRUBLAND PARK MOTOCROSS, KATANNING PINWERNYING PARK SPEEDWAY 1985 > 1998, WANNEROO PINJAR PARK SENIOR SPEEDWAY 2021, PORTLAND HI PINE SPEEDWAY SOUTHERN 500 SPEEDWAY, CANBERRA TRALEE - FRASER PARK SPEEDWAY 1970, CANBERRA TRALEE - FRASER PARK SPEEDWAY 1971, CANBERRA TRALEE - FRASER PARK SPEEDWAY 1972, CANBERRA TRALEE - FRASER PARK SPEEDWAY 1973, CANBERRA TRALEE - FRASER PARK SPEEDWAY 1974, CANBERRA TRALEE - FRASER PARK SPEEDWAY 1975, CANBERRA TRALEE - FRASER PARK SPEEDWAY 1976, CANBERRA TRALEE - FRASER PARK SPEEDWAY 1977, CANBERRA TRALEE - FRASER PARK SPEEDWAY 1978, CANBERRA TRALEE - FRASER PARK SPEEDWAY 1979, CANBERRA TRALEE - FRASER PARK SPEEDWAY 1980, CANBERRA TRALEE - FRASER PARK SPEEDWAY 1981, CANBERRA TRALEE - FRASER PARK SPEEDWAY 1982, CANBERRA TRALEE - FRASER PARK SPEEDWAY 1983, CANBERRA TRALEE - FRASER PARK SPEEDWAY 1984, CANBERRA TRALEE - FRASER PARK SPEEDWAY 1985, CANBERRA TRALEE - FRASER PARK SPEEDWAY 1986, CANBERRA TRALEE - FRASER PARK SPEEDWAY 1987, CANBERRA TRALEE - FRASER PARK SPEEDWAY 1988, CANBERRA TRALEE - FRASER PARK SPEEDWAY 1989, CANBERRA TRALEE - FRASER PARK SPEEDWAY 1990, CANBERRA TRALEE - FRASER PARK SPEEDWAY 1991, CANBERRA TRALEE - FRASER PARK SPEEDWAY 1992, CANBERRA TRALEE - FRASER PARK SPEEDWAY 1993, CANBERRA TRALEE - FRASER PARK SPEEDWAY 1994, CANBERRA TRALEE - FRASER PARK SPEEDWAY 1995, CANBERRA TRALEE - FRASER PARK SPEEDWAY 1996, CANBERRA TRALEE - FRASER PARK SPEEDWAY 1997, DUBBO SPEEDWAY - DUBBO SHOWGROUNDS SPEEDWAY, GOULBURN RACECOURSE SPEEDWAY SHOWGROUND SPEEDWAY, LAKEVIEW HILL CLIMB CANBERRA SPORTING CAR CLUB, NEWCASTLE BOOLAROO MOTOR CYCLE HILL CLIMB, NEWCASTLE MEMORIAL DRIVE HILL CLIMB (NSW), NEWCASTLE MOTORDROME - JERILDERIE PARK SPEEDWAY, SYDNEY CASULA MOTOR CYCLE HILL CLIMB (NSW), SYDNEY CUMBERLAND OVAL PARRAMATTA SPEEDWAY, SYDNEY LANSDOWNE MOTOR CYCLE HILL CLIMB (NSW), SYDNEY - 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GREATER CINCINNATI RACE BOWL (OH), DELAWARE VALLEY SPEEDWAY - STROUDSBURG SPEEDWAY (PA), PITTSBURGHS PENNSYLVANIA MOTOR SPEEDWAY (PA), CAROLINA MOTORSPORT PARK ROAD COURSE (SC), GAULTS MOTOR SPEEDWAY - BUFFALO MOTOR SPEEDWAY - UNION COUNTY SPEEDWAY (SC), TENNESSEE MOTOR SPEDWAY - COOKEVILLE SPEEDWAY, OLD DOMINION SPEEDWAY - LONGVIEW SPEEDWAY (VA), PULASKI COUNTY SPEEDWAY - NEW RIVER VALLEY SPEEDWAY - MOTOR MILE SPEEDWAY (VA), NORTHERN WISCONSIN STATE FAIRGROUNDS (WI), REDEX TRI STATE MOTOR CYCLE RELIABILITY TRIAL 1954, 1936 SOUTH AUSTRALIAN CENTENARY INTERSTATE CAR RALLY. Another I However, Langhorne Speedway, which opened in 1926 and closed in 1971, was tabbed with numerous nicknames during its almost half-century of stock-car, open-wheel and motorcycle racing. for Ferrari, both in sports/racing cars and also in Grand Prix cars, after LeMans. AAA was in town for a day of racing with the sprint cars. it three in a row, caught Hartley, and passed him on the 81st left after the 1955 racing season. Nelson Applegate suffered an apparent skull fracture when he reportedly bounced his car over the guardrail. Bryan charged on, and was And naked fear. The lives of future racers of Darlington, I hope, will remain with them. area. "They just screwed it up when they paved the track," Foyt says with typical bluntness. The NMRA operated Langhorne from its inception through the 1929 season, staging 100-lap events on Labor Days and occasional shorter races. Its most recent casualty was in 1996. As a result, the speedway sat idle and did not host a race of any kind until 1946. Bryan. Some of the era's top drivers won those Langhorne races: Curtis Turner (again), Lee Petty, Dick Rathmann, Fonty Flock, Tim Flock, Herb Thomas, Buck Baker, Paul Goldsmith, and Fireball Roberts. Who wants to go to Langhorne? Little track was oh, so fast, on May 1st. The rate of fatalities saw a dramatic slowdown following 1973, however, and only eight people (one of whom was a trespasser) have been killed by crashes in the following 45 years, down from 64 in its first 64 years. after the Levegh accident. Jack Turner was the last car Due to the obviously dangerous nature of auto racing, many individuals, including drivers, crew members, officials and spectators, have been killed in crashes related to the sport, in races, in qualifying, in practice or in private testing sessions. It was on that date that Larret Thats where a lot of guys bought it. Now a 1.022-mile, tricornered superspeedway, ISM once featured a 2.5-mile road course sewn into its layout that was reduced in 1991 to a 1.51-mile waltz through the infield. Background Garrett, Flaherty, Rathmann, McWithey, feature race would be over a distance of 30 laps 30 miles. rough track played havoc with both drivers and machines. That view was basically remember, quite well, his last lap as he raced his way to disaster. Virtually from the beginning, Langhorne was a fixture on the major-league open-wheel circuit, first under AAA sanction and later as a premier USAC event. "In fact, the year I finished second, I used the prize money for my honeymoon.". Freddie Winnai of Philadelphia qualified in 42.40 seconds, a new world record for a one-mile (1.6km) track, and went on to win the 50-lap main event. ", If anything, Andretti was too brave for his own good. 4 cut-down 1932 Ford coupe. I wanted to be a race driver. Andretti raced for the first time at Langhorne in 1964 in an IndyCar race. The Speedway hosted the nation's most noted race for the Modified division; the first post-war stock car race run at the facility was a National Championship Stock Car Circuit (a forerunner to NASCAR) race in 1947, with Bob Flock taking home the checkered flag. Ralph Liquori and Jim Hurtibise(#88) leap from their cars as Mel Kenyon(#21) slumps in the cockpit, badly burned and unconscious. He said they expected to get a good report. The next year, Andretti was standing in Puke Hollow during the sprint car race when Bobby Marvin clobbered the guardrail, flipped end over end, and burned to death in front of him. During the prewar years, the lap record was already a few ticks above 100 mph -- an astonishing speed considering it was a dirt track with no straightaway. a photo, again, one taken by Walt Imlay, of the start of the 1956 100-mile race Unclaimed. On this day, we sat in the first Daytona opened in 1959, and within the steep, 2.5-mile tri-oval, which reaches 31 degree banking in some spots, a 3.56-mile road course exists, where the 24 Hours of Daytona are raced, as well as a short oval, a dirt oval, a karting tack, and a motorcycle circuit. to make the show were Rodger Ward, Bill. Three-time Indy champ Bobby Unser agrees. All cars were flagged in and the race . and Ratjmann were out before 60 miles had been fast but rough track greeted the drivers and fans on June 24th. NASCAR Car Generations; NASCAR All-Star Race Averages; Driver Ratings Info; DriverAverages.com; NASCAR Averages Database; But I liked Langhorne because you could run fast there. A third myth holds that sewage collected at the bottom of Puke Hollow, making it stink to high heaven. lost control of his car, with the car going through the fence and then into a race, a small piece of solder was found in the fuels return line, which, in Though asphalt makes up most of Indy today, the start-finish line remains a ribbon of red bricks three feet across. "Billy" Foster was classified last in the Motor Trend 500 at the Riverside International Raceway after he lost his life in a practice crash two days earlier in his #22 Dodge. From its earliest days, Daytona was synonymous with racing fatalities: two drivers lost their lives in its first yearone just less than two weeks before the original Daytona 500 was held. fast but rough track greeted the drivers and fans on June 24. Also killed at the track were five motorcycle riders, three spectators and one flagman. What is undisputed is that the Milwaukee Mile's future looks grim. As there is a tie on this list, tracks with equal casualty counts will be ordered by their years of operation (shorter histories push them up the list). My earliest Langhorne program is from May 1939 when Duke Nalon won the feature " Orange City Hotel Speedstakes" from Tommy Hinnershitz. Some of North Americas most popular racing venues have fatality counts in the dozens. was a member of the graduating class of 1956 from the Pearl River, New York High School. Billy Garrett, who had Review. Failing Thomson, Keller and Musselman. Share. The Both cars caught fire. On January 22, 1967, William A. Land Speed Racer Memorial cites 10 deaths of competitors at the Bonneville Salt Flats throughout history. A first visit to the track prompted another Indy veteran, Jimmy Daywalt, to declare: "I never saw so many guys go on their head so hard and so quick. The holes were up and the smooth side was down. This is not Mann's fatal flip as you can see the #43 of Mann spinning into the wreckage at the end of the clip. Track ownership responded to that with an expansion to the facility's catch fencing, raised from 15 to 21 feet, and with overhangs doubled from 3 to 6 feet. So when he heard that Roger Ward wanted no part of the Champ Car race there in 1960, Bryan agreed to a one-off ride in the vacant car, the A.J. vicious series of end over end flips, with Crockett being thrown out of the car "During qualifying, he told me that there was a pole with a yellow light, and I should back off there no matter what," Andretti says. ISM Raceway is the modern name for a speedway some know as Phoenix International Raceway. Click on the race number to see the results of that race. looking at previous trips to Langhorne, and the times that we arrived back LANGHORNE, Pa., July 1 Hugh Randall, a 29-year-old driver from Louisville, was killed today in an end-over-end flip during the 100-mile Indianapolis car race on the one-mile Langhorne Speedway . Track finances are in question, and some are concerned that the recent sale of one of the track's grandstands is the first step toward dismantling the whole thing. track at Langhorne was higher at that end, and quite a bit lower in what you Just look to the (non-fatal) video below, in which a Honda Insight rolls at 190 MPH, scattering itself across the salt. Peters, Herman, Mussleman, Swiekert, He was five laps behind race winner Gwyn Staley. tremendous racing took place around the circular, oiled down, big dirt mile rough track played havoc with both drivers and machines. And some of those who did never came home. Note: Some of this information, below, was taken It was very rough (in its dirt-track days). Title Langhorne Sprint Car Crash Source Bruce R. Craig Photograph Collection Years 1963 Date 1963-04-07 City Langhorne State Pennsylvania Country United States People Marvin, Bobby Venue Langhorne Speedway Identifier 2004-100CRAI-b67_53.0_0002 Original Format black-and-white negatives Rights Copyright has been assigned to The Revs Institute. All Rights Reserved. on one of those flips with Crockett being found about 300 feet from where the completed 97 laps. most every occasion when I went to Langhorne, I sat in the stands in what you Includes the menu, user reviews, photos, and highest-rated dishes from Langhorne Speedway Diner. However, as suburban growth engulfed the speedway with Levittown being built up around the area, the offers from developers became too tempting to refuse. a time of 32.941. An Aldi store sits roughly where Turn 3 was located on the later paved version of the course. "When the race was over," he recalls, "you just threw your uniform away.". six weeks later, he too, would suffer the same fate as Crockett. Palm Beach Speedway in West Palm Beach, Florida, was a half-mile, dirt track that saw its first NASCAR event when it opened the 1952 NASCAR season on January 20, 1952. 65 USAC JIM HURTUBISE KENYON AUTO RACING CRASH LANGHORNE SPEEDWAY . You wanted more power.. LANGHORNE, Pa., Oct 11 (AP)Freddy Adam of kutztown, Pa., won the annual 100mile national open championship for modified stock cars at the Langhorne Speedway today. happened to mention to another race fan that on that date in 1955, I was in The track now is a faded memory. It was all over for Nazaruk, in an almost In the 50-mile feature, held as usual during the worst of Pennsylvania's summer heat, Russ Snowberger, who would go on to achieve considerable fame at Indianapolis, was overcome by the combination of humidity, dust, bumps, and fumes from his straight-eight Miller. to make the show were Rodger Ward, Bill Cheesbourgh, drivers had blistered and bleeding hands. Tinglestad escaped injury. trials, with clockings of 33.06 and 33.45. Bob Veith asked for Curing a three-month stretch beginning with the June 24 race in Charlotte, N.C., and ending with the Sept. 18 event at Langhorne (Pa.) Speedway, Flock captured 11 of 15 poles and won eight races. Langhorne Speedway was located near to Langhorne in Levitttown, adjacent to the Lincoln Highway. AAA sprint car show was held on May 1, 1955, at the big, circular oiled dirt and headed towards the track to show it to him on his next lap. [10] The Strictly Stock series was renamed the Grand National series for the 1950 season, and the series is now known as NASCAR Cup Series. three events that appear, below. It was like jumping a fresh-plowed field. South Carolina driver Johnny Allen, now 82, ran in three NASCAR Cup events at Langhorne Speedway in the mid-1950s with a best finish of third place in 1957. Watson-built Leader Card Special. AAA also had a sprint car race scheduled for out in the mid-west, at Salem. Magill and Thomson, and was challenging Musselman for We have a great online selection at the lowest prices with Fast & Free shipping on many items! Indy car ace Paul Russo, whose brother was killed at the track, told Riggs that Langhorne "gave me butterflies the size of B-29s." in row 5, Don Freeland and Mike Magill in row 6, Eddie Russo and Jack Turner in the lead if he could make up that lap before Bryan got back onto the track, but . The Lady In Black, as some old-timers call Darlington, will never lighten up, and drivers will continue to earn their "Darlington Stripe" of paint lost to the walls for years to come. Langhorne Speedway was a 1-mile circle that challenged even the toughest drivers. The proposal will have to go through the land development process. run. A year later, Andretti got his own baptism by fire at the 'Horne. The rest of We may earn money from the links on this page. It also marked the final IndyCar race to be held at the circuit. Considering the risk of speed record attempts and the 104 years of doing so at Bonneville, we can hope that this count stays low, if not static. Fried and Gerber announced the sale of the property to mall developers in 1967, but the speedway held on through five more seasons. "One of the spectators said, 'He's throwing up there in Puke Hollow,'" Riggs says, "and it stuck.". Jan 1, 2013 - Langhorne Speedway flyer. Apr 12, 2016 - The aftermath of Bobby Marvin's fatal crash at Langhorne, PA in 1963. Al gave his car a little breather there, and I kind of closed my eyes and got around him and won the race. were: Crockett, Twenty-seven people had died there over its 45 years of existence. 2022Recurrent Ventures. Langhorne hosted the fourth-ever Cup race in that series first season -- on Sept. 11, 1949. , Johnny Thomson and Al Keller had the fastest times during time Then they covered it back up with dirt. Tinglestad escaped injury. "It wasn't just the track," Dallenbach says. a photo, again, one taken by Walt Imlay, of the start of the 1956 100-mile race The number of individuals -- drivers, officials and spectators killed at Langhorne officially totals 27. Jack McGrath and Pierre Levegh, whos Foyt, and Mario Andretti raced here in stock, midget, sprint, and Indy cars. You were carrying so many lateral g's that it was hard to get around there comfortably. Many others suffered grievous injuries and burns. He survived and raced again (though not at Langhorne) after the giant splinter was inched out of his abdomen in a hospital. Concord Speedway was built in 1982 by Henry Furr. No Man's Land," calls the track "a man-maker and a man-breaker." the field lined up like this: Jimmy [9] Several other noted drivers were injured in accidents, often described as spectacular, due to high speeds on the mile-long but rough dirt surface. He began racing at the track in 1938 against his parents' wishes with a V8-engined car that he built himself. most every occasion when I went to Langhorne, I sat in the stands in what you and Garrett, running second and third, were lapped by Bryan, as he circled that rough track. Langhorn. Larry Crockett (born 23 Oct 1926 Cambridge City, Indiana; died 20 Mar 1955 Bristol, Pennsylvania). L. Spencer Riggs, author of the definitive motorsport history, "Langhorne! the win, but fell about a car length short. The payoff was a record setting, whopping instant fashion, with him receiving a broken neck and a severed jugular vein. Team Tactics Come Into Play He was followed by Magill, Hoyt, Carter, Rogers, Despite temperatures that reached 106 degrees, Bryan wasted no time getting back up to speed. Amick led the rest, In the first national open, in 1951, a large wreck blocked the track and burned driver Wally Campbell, that year's NASCAR National Modified champion. March 20, 1955, was no exception. Johnny Boyd (pictured below) was badly burned when his cars fuel tank was knocked off, and cars broke up and got upside down in Puke Hollow. Marvin's car hit the outside fence, flipped high in the air and landed on Bud Tinglestad's car. Amick was Heres Bryan. 2029 E Lincoln Hwy, Langhorne, PA 19047-0000 +1 215-949-3533 Website. The track's most recent fatal accident occurred in 2013, when a student and tutor of a performance biking school collided fatally on track. accident at LeMans has to be the worst ever, with This time the Larry was thrown from the car, but suffered fatal chest and lung injuries. The swamp had devoured it. Rex White, 88 and the oldest living NASCAR Cup champion, ran three times at Langhorne in the 1950s with a top finish of fourth. A longtime local diner location could become a fast food joint. In time, drivers lost their patience with Langhorne. called turn four, and Keller had no place to go, hitting Thomsons car, then I was a little almost a lap down, in third. It hosted a NASCAR inaugural race in 1949. Notable drivers Doc Mackenzie, Joie Chitwood, Rex Mays, Lee Petty, Dutch Hoag, A.J. The track was paved. [2] His first win happened at Seekonk Speedway in 1946 and he won seven times in 1947. I worried about that. Land Speed Racer Memorial registers 20 fatalities as part of record attempts at El Mirage, though the timeline of lives lost at El Mirage does not align those at Bonneville, with the most recent listed fatal accident occurring in 1995, and most between 1940 and 1970. were built level, so in the first turn area, the stands were quite a lot higher mile track at Langhorne. I felt like I was going into battle. Thomson, Russo, McWithey And I made it! could say was the fourth turn area. The length of the oval itself is contested, with different organizations claiming 1.0-mile, 1.015-mile, and 1.032-mile lengths. Spectator deaths have ceased at Charlotte since, but on-track incidents continued. Langhorne Thats Langhorne. As sad as it is to say, the Milwaukee Mile may go the way of the nine known to have lost their lives in incidents at the track between 1930 and 1982. They let it settle in over the winter. in the Nyquist # 29, also from March 20, 1955. Russo and Thomson. The Sprint cars, midgets, motorcycles, and stock cars hadn't raced there for years, and for Indy cars -- by far the fastest of the bunch -- Langhorne was unmercifully bumpy, dangerous, and unpleasant. In September 1949, Langhorne hosted the fourth race of NASCAR's first year of . but Nazaruk pretty quickly disposed of Thomson, and The night before Langhorne, I was actually really concerned. first two rows of the feature consisted of. at Langhorne. Autoweek.com takes a look at the history of Langhorne Speedway, a track that opened in 1926 and closed in '71, and in between was notorious for death and destruction. A lot of guys who ran it got killed. Joe Leonard was also involved in the same crash, and was credited with getting Kenyon out of the car, thus saving his life. Charlotte Motor Speedway got off to an explosive start, hosting the NASCAR World 600 (now the Coca-Cola 600) in 1960, its opening year. At The following year, another driver was killed. White said Langhornes well-known history of death and dismemberment didnt faze him. If something went wrong, you were in the wall.". Heres In 1941, Hankinson sold the track to stuntman Earl "Lucky" Teter after a falling out with the AAA. It was on that date that Larret (Larry) "Crash" Crockett was fatally injured. been thrown out after one or two barrel rolls. first two rows of the feature consisted of Musselman The idea behind the paving was to try to get away from the fatalities and the injuries, Riggs said. Langhorne Speedway is no more; its paddock closed for good in 1971, after 45 years. Upon his discharge in 1957, Tilley began racing the Flathead Coupes at the three-eights-mile dirt Silver Spring Speedway in Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania, and in the early 1960s he moved up into the Supermodified "Bugs" that were all the rage. A lot of racers believed -- mistakenly -- that Puke Hollow got its name because drivers felt sick when they roared through it. Following Amick across the finish line were Hartley, Keller, Elisian and Magill the only ones to go the full 100 Fonda Speedway. [8] Larry Mann, Frank Arford, Bobby Marvin, John McVitty, Joe Russo, Mike Nazaruk, and Jimmy Bryan were all killed racing at this track. However, the Langhorne book says that the never been to Langhorne previous to this day, and was making his initial run in pretty quick, too, with him doing the 6 laps in a time of 3:23.57. Dick Frazier, Al Herman, Charlie Musselman, Pat Known as "The Big Left Turn," Langhorne was for many years the world's fastest track of its size, despite being unpaved. They just don't name corners like they used to. In light of this grisly index, chronicling the loss of 215 human lives, we can take solace in the downturn of deaths recorded, with only 21 occurring at the above venues since the year 2000. As with all forms of racing, the majority of serious accidents occur at high speed, so the accidents that happen tend to be of the puckering variety. He had not raced on dirt since 1957 although he won his early fame there. That was the most dangerous track on Earth. A weather was actually like. Well, that and a lot of memories of Puke Hollow, with engines screaming and wheels spinning and the air filled with dust tinged with Pennsylvania crude. In 1964, accidents at the track claimed the lives of Jimmy Pardue and "Fireball" Roberts. Here Walters May 3, 1930 : Langhorne Speedway, Langhorne, PA : AAA Indy Car : Bill Cummings: June 16, 1940 : Langhorne Speedway, Langhorne, PA : AAA Indy Car Marvin passed away 2 hours later. FOR SALE! Next came Nazaruk 33.202, Joe Sostilio 33.233, Mike Magill 33.329 and Tommy Hinnershitz 33.671. A strapping, charismatic figure often seen with a hearty smile and his signature stogie, he was a three-time national champion and dirt-track colossus who semi-retired after winning Indy in 1958. McElreath caught local favorite Mario Andretti napping on a lap-75 restart and jumped into the lead aboard the Offenhauser-powered Zink Trackburner. to the speedway, for opening day May 1, 1955. ", Although 25,900 fans had shown up for the Champ Car race in 1970, the 'Horne was increasingly unpopular with drivers. "The whole place had deteriorated over the years -- the infield, the pits, everything.". Harroun also drove with a mirror mounted to his car, an idea pioneered by Dorothy Levitt only a few years before. http://www.motorsport.com/stats/champ/ldrivers.asp and my own memories of the This auction is for a NEW 1960's 8x10 Inch B&W PHOTO of 234903308877 Crocketts car owner, Charlie Engle, thought With a huge void created in the track's management, ownership of Langhorne Speedway was passed on to John Babcock and his family. They built that racetrack upside down, White said. An unknown driver flips during the 250-mile NASCAR Grand National race at Langhorne Speedway held on September 14, 1952. Garrett, who had passed Veith, would assume George Amick took over the lead, and he was followed The 109 12K views 2 years ago An unknown driver flips during the 250-mile NASCAR Grand National race at Langhorne Speedway held on September 14, 1952. First, a little context: The number of lives lost at a racetrack over time actually have little relationship to how safe a race track is today. mile track at Langhorne. You were running pretty fast, so if you hit, there was a lot of impact.. A conservation effort has sprung up in support of the Mile, but petition signatures can do little about the unsteady fiscal situation in which the track finds itself, due to investments in facility upgrades (safety included) during the 1990s and 2000s. I was at the Selinsgrove Speedway, last Saturday, March 20th, I The Bonneville Salt Flats in Utah make up one such place, and every imaginable type of vehicle has been fielded there since Teddy Tetzlaff set the first world land speed record of 142.8 MPH in 1914. It received this moniker due to the fact that a driver might be inclined to "puke" as a result of the extreme jostling his car would experience when hitting the deep ruts which formed in this section of the track as a race progressed. We may never see the end of death in motorsport, but every life saved is worth the price for which we will pay. Built in 1926 in the southeastern corner of Pennsylvania, "the 'Horne" was a 1-mile dirt track shaped like a perfect circle. I 300 yards from that hole in the fence. 1926 - LANGHORNE SPEEDWAY This one mile dirt circle track was built by members of the National Motor Racing Association and opened on the 12th of June 1926, The official opener was set down for the 31st of May but was rained out.
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