So sit back, relax, and remember when...

The year was 1963. 

England had just given us the Rolling Stones, some band called the Beatles had just released “Please, Please Me”, civil rights protests continued, President Kennedy was assassinated, and the first artificial heart was used in surgery!  What an incredible time!

And it was a great year for me!  In July of that year I reached my 16th birthday, and all I could think about was getting my drivers license!  Once that was accomplished, the next step was to find a car, because neither of my parents drove nor did we even own a car!  My uncle owned a large Gulf gas station in town, and my parents considered him to be the “auto expert” and asked him to check out some cars for me.

My First Car

The first car that caught my eye was a used maroon 1964 Ford Fairlane K model with a 271HP motor and a 4 speed.  While my uncle and I were test driving the car, we stopped on a back road and he said to me “Go ahead, let’s see what this thing can do!”  Like the 16 year old fool that I was, I dumped the clutch at 3 grand, floored the gas, and ran the gears to 6,000 RPM like a maniac.  As we slowed down, my uncle said to me “Davey—I think this car it too fast for you and I don’t want you to get it!”  If I had only pushed the throttle just half-way down!  Duh!

Shortly thereafter, my uncle came home and introduced me to my new car that my parents were buying for me.  The good news?  It was a 1958 Chevrolet, and had a 283 engine.  That's it for the good news!  The car was a 4 door Bel Air with a 2 barrel, Powerglide, and 3.08 peg-leg rear-end.  What a tank.  But hey, it was my first car, and I had a “need for speed”!  Total price?  $400.00!

Drag Racing Beckons

Unfortunately, my dad was not mechanically inclined, but I became interested in auto mechanics by hanging out at my Uncle’s Gulf station. Over time I learned the basics of auto mechanics and became very interested in drag racing because of that.

In the early-mid sixties, drag strips were plentiful around Southeastern PA.  You could take your pick from Maple Grove, Cecil County, York US 30, Atco, Vargo, and Vineland, New Jersey .  Drag strips were almost as popular as Bowling Alleys back then!  Mostly, we were attracted to the "Super Stock Showdowns" and "Match Bash" races!

I didn’t participate in my 1^st sanctioned drag race until the summer of 1964.  I headed to Maple Grove and took off the muffler, loosened the fan belt. and took out the spare tire.  I recall pulling up to the line and the starter came over and told me to put my window down.  I thought “Uh oh”!   He said “Next time take your hubcaps off”!  I was so nervous I forgot to take off my Baby Moons ahead of time.  My ET was somewhere around a blistering 17.8.  A real neck snapper, but I sure had fun.  And I didn’t break anything – that time!  I was hooked!

I joined the hometown Coatesville Drag Team and became more and more involved in racing activities. The only real modification I made to my ‘58 Chevy was upgrading to a four barrel. This put me into H/SA at the NHRA tracks, and my time dropped incredibly to 17.5!  It won’t be long before I’m in the 10’s!

The Perks of being "Jenkins Prepared"!

I was fortunate, at the ripe old age of 17, to be a temporary crew member on Dick Welch's 1964 Jenkin's Competition Prepared Fairlane K Car.  With a four speed and 271 HP, the car fell in D/S in 1964.  Funny note:  Grumpy made Dick paint the car black because it was a Ford!

Early one Sunday morning, we flat-towed up to Maple Grove and when we pulled up, the gates were still closed and the waiting line was out on the road.  No Problem if your car has the big "Jenkins Comp" logo on the side!  So Dick just wheels our rig into the Exit lane from the track, passing everyone in line.  I was flabbergasted!  He said "Watch this"!  As soon as the track offiicials saw us barreling up the Exit road, they ran to the Exit gate, swung it wide open, waved us in and then locked the gate!  We were pitted and running time trials just as the rest of the crowd rolled in.  Thank you Grumpy!  True story!

The Origin of "Storm Warning"

In 1965, the members of the drag team decided to officially name their cars. There was a song on the charts at the time in July 1965 called “Storm Warning” by the Volcanos - a Philly group!   For some reason that I still don’t recall, I decided that was the perfect name for my ‘58 Chevy.  Storm Warning was born!

Now, my parents didn’t know that I drag raced at all, and since I was an only child I knew they would be overly concerned!  Speed Contests – Oh No!  I would win my class occasionally - when I was the only car to show up in my class - and I would bring home the trophy.  It was impossible to take them home, so I put them on display in my uncle’s gas station office.  He wasn’t concerned about my activities at all.  He was cool!

So,on a typical Saturday afternoon, our drag team would leave town and caravan, and if we were going to Cecil County that day for example, there was a car wash in Oxford PA where we would park and get out our bottles of shoe polish and food coloring!  I still remember the fun I had “lettering-up” Storm Warning with white shoe polish, and then making a large white cloud on each door with a yellow (thanks to the food coloring) lightening bolt through the cloud.  Of course, I added the other requisite items—“H/SA” “283CI” “220HP” “Nordheim’s Gulf Coatesville, PA” . Then off we would all go for a fun night of drag racing.  On the way back home we would stop at the same carwash and eliminate all of the evidence!

Drag Racing the "Family Sedan"!

One of my best memories of drag racing occurred in summer of '64. My uncle was curious about the trophies I was accumulating at his Gulf station (again, lack of competitors in H/SA – hey, I wasn’t proud!).  He asked me “What’s this drag racing thing all about anyway!”  I explained the basics to him and he said “How about if we tell your parents and my wife that we’re going fishing next Sunday in Cape May, New Jersey.   But instead, let’s take my new Cadillac to Maple Grove, you can race it and let’s see what it can do!”  Talk about me being a happy camper!

My uncle’s car was a light blue metallic 63’ four-door Coupe de Ville – a real land-yacht!

We unloaded the spare in the Maple Grove pits, took off the air cleaner, loosened the fan belt, popped the hubcaps, but we left the mufflers on.  NHRA put the Cadillac in “G/SA” with four other cars (we had a 390 CI motor).  As I pulled to the line – with the door open, of course - the Announcer said "Here comes Governor Scranton to the line” (the current Gov of PA)!  The next time I pulled up, he piped, “Son, does your Father know what you’re doing to his Cadillac today?”  It was hilarious!

The first round I ran heads up, four across.  I came in second behind a 62’ Impala (white with silver-blue bottom – its funny how you remember things like that!).  He was the G/SA class champ just about every week.  My uncle and I had a ton of fun and I made several time trial runs to boot.  I recall we were running in the mid-16s?  I still have home 8MM videos of that very day.  I’ll try and post them later!   Oh, and “Unk” said, “Lets leave the shoe polish class markings and numbers on the windshield.  We’ll surprise your parents when we get home!”  I was petrified!  But because he was the “Auto Expert”, he smoothed things over – no harm no foul!  Whew!

See the Video of the Cadillac at the Drags

Click Here!

Good "Old Fashioned" Drag Racing

But the best part of Drag Racing back then was the pure heads-up factor.  No breakouts, no lifting your foot - it was go as fast as you possibly could.  You never shut off, unless you were headed for the wall!  But NHRA was right.  The little guy had pretty much zero chance of winning unless he was the only car in the class. I pitied the competitors I saw racing in “I/S” around the East Coast.  That class was owned by one of our hometown legends, the “Monster Mash”!   There was absolutely no way a normal “weekend racer” could hope to beat someone as professional as the Spanakos Brothers from Coatesville/Christiana PA in their white ’55 Chevy (I remember when it was green!) and their tuner Bill Jenkins.

But, being a “weekend racer” myself, I knew that I didn’t have a chance of winning, but I still went to the drags every weekend to race and really didn’t care.  We still had a bunch of fun running time trials and eventually the eliminations.  And, if you were lucky, you got a shot a running Jr. Stock Eliminator!  Oh, the noise -t he noise!

Most weekends, I would have to limp my poor ’58 Chevy home!  I can still remember the rolling Pennsylvania hills along Route 10 on the way to/from Maple Grove, and I can still smell my Powerglide slipping as it tried to make it to the top of those hills!  Finally, after two transmissions, two broken motor mounts, four rear ends and ten bent pushrods, the “Storm Warning” was officially cancelled.  As in - headed for the junk yard!  I was only 17, and I ran that unit into the ground in a hurry!  Damn, I should have saved that back seat and had it bronzed!  Any of you young whippersnappers ever heard of a “Drive-In” Movie?

Being There with the AWB Funny Cars

Anyway, I’ve always missed the original “Storm Warning”, and still remember racing her from 1964 through 1966.  But the most vivid and mind-blowing memories I still have of drag racing "back in the day" were of the new breed of “Stock” cars - the Altered Wheel Base “F/X’ers” – the Original Funny Cars!  When I first laid my eyes on these Monsters at Cecil County in 1965, I was in awe. They looked stock, but they looked so “Funny”, and they put on a tremendous wheel standing show as they ran into the 10’s. A few months later, running on Nitro, these “Stock” cars were running in the low 9’s and high 8’s!

Because of my memories of the “I've-never-seen-this-before” original Altered Wheelbase Cars, this is the story of the resurrection of “Storm Warning”.   No, it doesn’t wear the disguise of the 1958 Chevy any longer (thank goodness).  And yes, it's a still a Privateer operation with no GM backing - just like they were in 1965!  But now it rides aboard a 1965 Altered Wheelbase Nova Funny Car!

Our new “Storm Warning” is a tribute and memory to the original, and to the pioneers of Funny Car Racing as we know it today.

There's a Storm a Brewin'!

Funny Cars Forever!