Prewar Midget winners.
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Thank you Gene, and I'm not well versed in the prewar second level competition, and this is good perspective. ? Cheers, Bob Storck in KCMO -----Original Message-----
From: <[email protected]> Subject: [RH] Prewar Midget winners. ? Fellow Rhers,?
Can you imagine how many nights a week every week they had to run to win that many victories?
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¡°Back in the Day¡± ¨C Racing historian Ohio¡¯s Wilson ¡°Bill¡± Davis compiled a list of the top auto racing feature winners through 1945, basically before World War II. Davis¡¯ list, which appeared in the November 9, 1988 issue of National Speed Sport News, showed Chicago midget racer Wally Zale on top with 178 feature wins, followed by Ronnie Householder with 165. Gus Schrader (147 wins), Bill Holmes (146), Bill Schindler (145), Tony Willman (136), Bob Swanson (111), Ray Richards (105), Harry McQuinn (104) and Jimmy Wilburn (101) made up the rest of the ¡°top 10.¡± Zale won a record 67 midget main events in 1940. Sadly, Zale, along with fellow midget driver Frank Perrone, were killed in a two-train/single car accident in Oak Forest, Ill., in April of 1942. Zale was 36 years old. I believe Bill Davis¡¯ list consists of both ¡°big car¡± and midget victories.
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Gene Ingram
New Castle, In.
-- Bob Storck KC MO USA |
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Thank you, Bob. That clarifies a confusing statement. ? Anyone who has spent time in Chicago knows the issues of the city being by far the most congested rail hub in the country, perhaps the world. Complicating this is that the city relies on commuter trains which run on the same rails, meaning twice a day, freight trains are sidelined to allow commuter traffic. A plethora of road crossings, and long trains place road and rail vehicles in constant conflict ... and they have by the highest rail/road accident rate, fortunately mostly low speed. ? Beating the train there is often a local youthful sport. ? As a kid, I can recall being caught in the middle of a 8 track road crossing in downtown Chicago when the gates dropped on both sides, leaving us in the middle ... fortunately, Mom had gone to University there, kept her cool, and drove around the barriers. ? Cheers, Bob Storck in KCMO -----Original Message-----
From: <[email protected]> Subject: Re: [RH] Prewar Midget winners. ? According to the Motorsports Memorial website:"Zale and fellow midget racer Frank Perrone were killed near Chicago on 25 April 1942 as they drove across railroad tracks. Although crossing lights were flashing red, the driver believed he had time to cross the tracks based on the distance to the approaching train. Unfortunately, he did not see a faster moving train coming from the opposite direction. After the faster train hit the car, the other train was not able to slow fast enough, and also hit the car." -- Bob Gardner San Diego CA USA -- Bob Storck KC MO USA |
Bob Storck