http://mildlyinteresting-blog.blogspot.com/2017/10/my-great-grandad-escaped-from-pow-camp.html
Thursday, April 01, 2021
Wednesday, March 31, 2021
Tuesday, March 30, 2021
A B-2 of the 11th Bomb Squadron at Mines Field, California, during the 1933 National Air Races, compared to a racer. Cool that they had the presence of mind to make this photo op happen
notice the exhaust indicating an inline 12 cylinder on the bomber.
https://dailytimewaster.blogspot.com/2021/03/a-b-2-of-11th-bomb-squadron-at-mines.html
Did you know Elvis bought a 1946 Solar Midget race car from Von Dutch, took it back to Graceland, ran it into a tree, and then it was ignored and hidden until 2017, when Cofer Classics restored it?
http://cofersclassics.com/about.html
In November 1944 Solar Aircraft held its annual Craftsmanship Contest which usually produced a number of small inventions. Elmer Ross, a member of the Research Department submitted a midget race car that he had built and was racing in the Southwest. In October, 1945 approval was given for the production of twelve pilot kits to test the manufacturing process. Four of the kits were made of aluminum, four of stainless steel, and four of auto body steel. The pilot kits were completed in 1945 and all twelve were sold prior to production to enthusiasts in the San Diego area. Approximately 100 of these kits were made in 1946 and sold through a distributor. Most of the cars were powered by a Ford V8-60, with some running with Drake or Offenhauser engines. The entire production period lasted six months and there were only two changes to the body kit...elimination of the stainless steel wheels and replacement of the handmade wire grill with a cast aluminum unit.
The production of the Solar midget race car was stopped for several reasons. The introduction of the Kurtis Kraft Midgets by Frank Curtis with their tube frames and torsion bar suspension were light years beyond other midget cars built at that time including the Solar midget. America was on the verge of space exploration and Solar executives were ready to get back into the business they really knew... aircraft components. The Solar midget played its part in helping to keep Solar alive during the early post World War II years. Today an original Solar midget is a rare find.”
http://www.midgetmadness.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=16465
If you want to buy one of the Solar midgets, they still are out there, and still come up for sale https://justacarguy.blogspot.com/2019/04/ever-wanted-1946-solar-aircraft-midget.html
Monday, March 29, 2021
Sunday, March 28, 2021
the latest shipment of Fords to arrive at Frank Boyd Ford Sales and Service, a small town agency located in Hillsborough, New Hampshire. The Model Ts were cheaper to purchase unassembled
At least two Ford Model TT Truck and possibly three Model T Car chassis minus wheels are loaded vertically on the sides of the truck and on the bed in the center.
Crates containing front and rear fenders are mounted on a rack above the cab and the front of the truck. In the middle between the stacked chassis can be seen the wheels and tires and other parts. The bed and the rack on the rear are carrying both roadster and touring car bodies. The photo is from the early 1920s, but the building still survives
http://www.mtfca.com/discus/messages/411944/451629.html?1404008348
US Army Experimental Cadillacs at Ft Bliss Thanks Steve!
The vehicle on the left is a 1924 Cadillac V-63 with a V-8 engine. It is a radio reconnaissance car with the retracted radio mast mounted to the left side, and a machine gun mounted on the right - the machine gunner would perch over the running board. The Abbreviation on the hood is "USA EXP" which stand for US Army Experimental. The same car with the radio mast extended, as viewed for the other side
The car on the right is the same, but a 1925 Cadillac with the machine gun dismounted.
Fort Bliss is a United States Army post with its headquarters in El Paso, Texas. Named in honor of LTC William Bliss, a mathematics professor who was the son-in-law of President Zachary Taylor
Boss 429 has been sitting for 30 years because the original engine was pulled for a rebuild in the late 1980s, but the shop doing the work went out of business, and the engine disappeared (suspiciously)
There isn’t a transmission or a correct rear end, either, and the trunk has been replaced with an incorrect one.
https://www.hagerty.com/media/auctions/rm-sothebys-2021-march-open-roads-7-barn-finds
Jill Wilson - the BITTER ex-wife of Jimmy Wilson, who brought motorsport to Croft Circuit, in 1994, has now wasted hundreds of thousands of dollars in lawyers fees, to hit that very race track with an injunction, restricting "noisy activities" at the track to just 40 days-a-year.
And the fucking judges agreed with her.
She profited from the race track as the wife of the guy who ran it as a business, now, profits from shutting down the racing, as part of her divorce battle
And the fucking judges agreed with her, that a race track in operation since 1949, is not what the resident that have MOVED NEXT TO A RACE TRACK should have to put up with
This court case will cost the race track about a million dollars.
Because the ex wife is bitter. And the fucking judges agreed with her.
I say salt he fucking earth, burn it to the damn ground, undermine the fucking property with sinkholes, and let the asshole deal with the loss of her property value and other bullshit complaints lose her financial ground when suddenly there's no reason for her house, or any other neighbors, to be next to what had been a profitable race track where she had built a hotel for those attending races
She didn't have a problem with the noise at Croft when she and her parents were putting in planning permission to turn their house into a hotel in order to maximize income from the circuit and its various track days and testing events
She's a, something, rhymes with runt. OR maybe, it's a 4 letter word that has 'u' and 'n' and 't' and one other letter. Could be aunt, runt, you see where this is going
Being that England is an island, there just isn't anywhere to make a track that ISN'T close to a residential area. Old race tracks, that were air fields during WW2, are the best place for them, as NO ONE is old enough to claim that they lived there before the noisy race cars arrived.
Just pissed off. Heat wave has the temps outside to 95, and my cat just had a hairball on the wonderful blanket she loves to nap on.
https://www.thenorthernecho.co.uk/news/4076123.croft-motor-racing-circuit-loses-noise-appeal/
https://www.facebook.com/croftcircuit
https://forums.autosport.com/topic/106233-court-rejects-croft-noise-case-appeal/
Canadian fuel delivery, about 1937
the front end looked like this:
This is a 1937 Maple Leaf (Canadian Chevrolet) with a Landry half track conversion.
Joseph-Adalbert Landry (usually abbreviated as JA Landry) of Mont-Joli, Quebec was one of the three most influential inventors of snowmobiles
Thanks Steve and Billy
in 37 years of the ABC Wide World of Sports ratings,
Evel Knievel made 7 of the top 10 rated episodes
Saturday, March 27, 2021
Did you know about Swede Savage? Famous for being the partner of Dan Gurney, racing the AAR Barracuda in SCCA,
that Swede Savage got his start in motorsports, with a motor cycle, working with Evel Knievel in 1965
That's not how he got his start in racing though, he was soap box derby racing at age 5.
In 1965 Savage dropped by Riverside International, when he heard that Dan Gurney was to be present at a test for the Ford Motor Company. The 20-year old Savage was showing off, popping wheelies on his motorcycle.
Struck by the young man’s skill and bravado, Ford signed him on as a development driver.
The association with Ford brought Savage the opportunity to run a limited schedule in the NASCAR Grand National (now Sprint Cup) series in 1967.
Savage made his stock car debut at North Carolina’s Hickory Speedway with the legendary Holman-Moody team. He was running well before losing the engine 25 laps shy of the finish. His next two outings with the team, at Martinsville and North Wilkesboro, both resulted in top-ten finishes.
In 1968, Savage split his time between NASCAR, and running both USRRC and Can-Am with Dan Gurney’s All American Racers. In Grand National, Savage took a third place on the half-mile oval at Bristol, while he piloted Gurney’s powerful Lola Can-Am car to a top finish of fourth at the road course in Bridgehampton.
A serial noise complainer in France has been ordered by a court to pay the Nogaro Circuit damages after his campaign of complaints against motorcycle racing noise! Thanks Kim!
The case centers around the Circuit Paul Armagnac, also called Circuit de Nogaro in southwestern France, and it’s not a new development. Le Repair Des Motards reports that the first complaint the resident made against the circuit was way back in 1999. He moved to the area in 1978, the circuit was built in 1960…
The case was rejected, and the moaning neighbor was ordered to pay €1,000 to the circuit owners. But NIMBY types aren’t such soft touches - they are strong social justice warriors who are always right. So, the neighbor took the battle to the court of appeal and the case was rejected again, and he was ordered to pay the circuit a further €5,000 to the circuit owners.
Speaking after the hearing, the complaining resident, Jacques Fortinon said:
“5,000 euros in Agen plus 1,000 euros in Auch, I have 6,000 euros to pay… It is not finished. There, we were in civil matters and indeed, the court ruled that my action was time-barred based on article 544 of the Environmental Code, giving a period of 5 years.
In Albi, the police court condemned the Sequestral circuit, basing its decision on the Health Code. The basic question I ask: do they need to make noise to make speed? I am not against the circuit, I am so that everyone can live in peace and tranquility. "
The court has actually ruled in favor of a circuit, and fined the person making the complaints! Great news, great court case to serve as a precedent for future assholes who complain about noise issues they voluntarily MOVE to live NEXT to!
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