Kay Harrison collection

[racingfan1]

A few years ago I received a collection of racing history compiled by Kay Harrison. Kay originally gave the collection to Tim Chance and Tim has passed them on to me. The unfortunate part of this story is that some the items in these binders have been damaged by a flood and are unsalvageable. Some of you may have seem them as they were at one of the early DePue reunions.
Its time to dig into the binders and post what is still able to be posted. There are early pictures , the history behind some races and even race results. When I start posting, they will be here on the BoatRacingFacts website as I feel this is the best platform to post them to. I hope you enjoy the posts.

[Ketzer]

Looking forward to the posts. Interesting number on that boat. The first boat we acquired (not bought, but traded for) was a Neal D hydroplane, a boat raced in the late 50s by Dan Futrell. It came with the existing number, which was: Lo-113. When we showed up to race, people told us they didn't uses numbers like that anymore. Not sure what the "o" signified. Someone suggested the L was for District 9, and the "o" for Louisiana.

[racingfan1]

Just a guess here . under APBA the S was used by racers from Ohio , any chance it was another way to identify what state the boat was from???

[racingfan1]

There was a time when college racing was a big thing, but it has long since gone away. Here is a saved program by Millie Harrison from a 1932 race at the Queen City Yacht Club in Cincinatti.

I will preface all the posts in this thread by saying it has become difficult to post pictures in exact order. I apologize for this, but the owners of the site have investigated this issue and there is no resolve for it. I do encourage people to reply to these posts if you have information regarding any of these posts.

[racingfan1]

schedule

[Master Oil Racing Team]

On post number 4 on the blue poster for Regatta on june 18-19 is a contestant Mabel on an orange ribbon. Millie's wife was Mabel so I'm sure that's her. That is so cool. Racing against you're future wife.

[racingfan1]

These documents were included in the Kay Harrison collection. Kay took part in this race.

[racingfan1]

2nd set of documents

[racingfan1]

3rd set of documnets

[racingfan1]

4th set of documents

[Master Oil Racing Team]

Brought back a lot of memories Dale 'We worked so hard on this race. This was supposed to be a "breakout race" where we deviated from the normal Pro format to a one heat per class winner take all format. The idea was to have a short, but solid action of performance where the spectators would know who exactly won. Get the boats out on the course for some heavy competition then back into the pits for the next class. Marshall Grant was the inspiration behind this idea. He said the public gets weary of sitting all day out in the hot sun and leaves before the fastest classes come up. There was no room or time to conduct elimination heats and each captain was to come up with his own method of selecting his team. Remember, this was an experiment that, if it worked, We might start to pick up some sponsors and that required sharp boats, team uniforms, and an attempt to look professional in the pits.

This was just the start, but it was very promising. The toughest thing was what drivers to select, and not to cause resentment among others. I never heard any gripes from anyone and a lot of racers came that would not be competing. But, I think they knew the stakes, and if this worked out, it could lead to some very exciting races in our future.

Unfortunately, the worst memory of my racing career also came during that race. The tragic death of Jerry Waldman hung a heavy pall over that race. The spirit and hope that race promised for the future was gone, and never fully recovered.

[racingfan1]

"Remember, this was an experiment that, if it worked, We might start to pick up some sponsors and that required sharp boats, team uniforms, and an attempt to look professional in the pits."

Even though this race was contested in 1972 , I believe this is what Kay Harrison , Todd Brinkman Sr and Tim Chance was shooting for 1982 when the United States Title Series was formed. The professional look was part of what they wanted. We have lost Todd and both Kay and Tim have had their medical issues, so perhaps the guys who were racing back in the early 80's may comment further, i just ask to keep the discussion civil. I do know it wasn't the most popular decision back them but here we are 40 years later and the USTS is still going.

[racingfan1]

This was the race that we lost Jerry Waldman. Just 9 months earlier, at DePue , he took home APBA National Champions in A, C, D, F and C service II hydro. I am missing a couple years of NOA results, but Jerry had won 17 APBA Nationals and 9 NOA Outboard championships. 26 titles in an era of great racers , awfully impressive. I know he also raced stock but I don't have those results.

[Master Oil Racing Team]

The professional look was one of the primary assets we planned to work witn. In planning this event as a long term goal of picking up key sponsors Marshall told us a story. In 1965 ABC Wide World of Sports aired the NOA World Championships at Lake Spivey in Georgia. (I watched it on TV). In the late 60's or very early 70's A group of racers or maybe a racing commission asked Marshall if he could get them to cover a nationals or world championship again. Marshall knew Roone Arledge so he agreed to give it a try.

The answer was Arledge told him that his audience wasn't interested in watching a bunch of men with no shirts, junky hats, launching boats in classes that they didn't understand, and did not know the scoring system. That was when we in the APBA PRO Commission decided to go from ABCDF classes to CC because the public did watch motorcycle racing.

Kay Harrison was in the middle of all this when it was coming about and was part of our group promoting it. I thought that what we tried may have influenced Kay and his involvement in the USTS.

[Master Oil Racing Team]

The pits were too small to accommodate a lot of boats. The ckubouse overlooked the race course and the elevated hill was great for spectators. you could see the whole course, and at the first turn boats were coming toward the spectatorss.

[Master Oil Racing Team]

Reply from Rich Fuschlin after he took over from Harry Bartolomei and Letter from Fun Festival organizers

[Ketzer]

I still have my plaque from the second race, a "Memorial Race" for Jerry Waldman in 1973, that Wayne and his dad gave to all the racers. At night, up at the clubhouse, my dad sat in with the band and sang, "Gee, Baby, ain't I good to You," and brought down the house.

[Master Oil Racing Team]

I would have liked to have heard that Steve.

These are the results published in Motorsport Magazine. It was the second issue and the first time I ever set about getting my boat racing pictures published. The pictures in the article are not mine. They are stock photos from Baytown Boat Club photographer Zambrini. The cover photo in Motorsport of Richard Petty is mine however. Neither Joe nor I wrote anything on this race, we just gave the info to editor Harry Echols and he did the rest. He put Joe and I on the masthead though because, as a start up, he needed names. The staff photographer HC Clyde was a pseudonym of Harry.

[Master Oil Racing Team]

I'm going to load these backward and see what happens. Note: didn't work. out of order. But it's okay for this work.

[Master Oil Racing Team]

This was on page 17 of Motorsport Magazine

[Master Oil Racing Team]

I found a notepad I kept. I didn't start taking notes yet for race coverage for my photos or a story. Harry Echols taught me a lot, but I didn't have any Journalism skills at all then. I used the notepad to record a brief summary of what happened at a race for reporting to the IRS.

This brought back memories. I don't recall what the trouble was with one cylinder in the A Konig, but I remember B Hydro very well. It was a surveyed mile and a quarter course. I broke out into the lead and was never challenged. I had a big lead, and was runnning all out. I saw Dan kirts go wide in the bottom turn of lap three, and as I was lapping him, I figured his motor was not doing so well and just making laps to finish. I took the inside track. Just when I got into the turn, Dan turned a quick left to hug the center pin and knocked me into the bouy. It was like he never even saw me. I don't think he did it on purpose, it seems like he just picked out a line to close on the center bouy and slide out on the exit pin. For some reason my motor died, and Dan kept going. I never mentioned it to him and I don't think he ever knew it happened.

C Hydro is self explanatory. A good race.

D Hydro I got a good start. It was a restart from Jerry's accident. Nobody realized how serious it was yet. I had a good lead, but on the front straight about halfway down on the second lap my motor started to vibrate very seriously. I instantly backed off, confused. I applied the throttle again and big time vibration. I sensed lower unit problems, but something was different. I had never broken off a propeller blade before, but that's what is was.

F Hydro, first up. Good start, big lead. Front straight beginning the third lap the motor just quit. Coasted to a stop. No sense or a fuel problem, lower unit OK...just quit. We had a 10 gauge stiff wire for a ground to the motor. The recoil of small waves echoing the wakes off the island made a washboard of ripples along the front straight. All that jittering up and down of the stiff wire broke off at the terminal at the motorl.

All rememberd from a little note pad.

[racingfan1]

Thank you for posting these Wayne. I know this is a thread on Kay's collection, but it is good to close out the story of this race. I've always referred to these years, 50's, 60's and early 70's, as the glory days of Outboard racing and looking at the names in the results how could anyone argue!!!!!

[Master Oil Racing Team]

Thanks Dale. 1972 was also a time of transition. Only a month earlier at Gravois Mills AOF sanctioned a race called the Gulf Canadian Series. The first big AOF Pro race. About 20 or more of us met , I think in Ralph Donald's room. We discussed which way we should go. rather than divide up, we should stick together and have one strong organization instead of three splitting up the teams. The NOA was going down, AOF was upcoming and APBA was solidly established , though not in much of the south. We wanted to see what AOF was about, and although they put on a good race that was well attended, they had just started up. Nobody knew how long it would last, so except for the midwest most of us chose to go to APBA and let NOA collapse. How wrong we were about AOF. It has been around now longer than NOA existed.

Kay Harrison was at that meeting and was a big supporter of our experiment at Hot Springs. It is no wonder that he was one of the founders of USTS. So let's see some more of Kay's collection.

[racingfan1]

Here is a recap of the 1965 Eastern Divisionals. The first post will be the lead up to the race and the following post will be some of the results.

[racingfan1]

The C runabout results.

[racingfan1]

X Hydro scoresheets

[racingfan1]

C-1 Runabout scoresheets

[racingfan1]

C Hydro scoresheets

[racingfan1]

B Hydro scoresheets

[racingfan1]

D Hydro scoresheets

[racingfan1]

A Hydro scoresheets

[racingfan1]

X Runabout scoresheets

[racingfan1]

A and B Runabout scoresheets

[racingfan1]

A variety of newspaper stories

[Ketzer]

I got a kick out of the last article that described sleeping in the pits, either in tents or station wagons, cooking on charcoal grills, and that, as Mrs. Collins was quoted as saying, "The pit was no place to wear good clothes." I recall crawling from the back of a station wagon one morning to count over twenty mosquito bites on my legs before getting into wet jeans. So, while it was a good idea, for the sport's sake, to "look more professional," it was sometimes difficult. Our boats certainly looked more professional and always better than we did; although, we did take heed, cleaned up a bit and invested in windbreakers with patches.

[racingfan1]

Misc articles

[racingfan1]

3rd set

[racingfan1]

Last set

[Ketzer]

I appreciate reading these old newspaper articles and running across the names of people like Tommy Goslee and Bill Henderson from Arkansas, who were founding members of the Razorback Boat Racing Club that was established several years later. Bill Henderson was said to have had a scare when he flew a D-hydro as high as a telephone pole. I doubt he went that high, but having been off the water myself, I can imagine it felt like it.

[racingfan1]

Here are some more misc racing documents

[racingfan1]

2 programs

[racingfan1]

Here are a variety of 1965 race sanctions

[racingfan1]

the first of 2 posts of the drivers booklet

[racingfan1]

continued

[racingfan1]

Special event rules

[racingfan1]

I am not sure if these are in Kay's handwriting or somebody else's.

[racingfan1]

I was having a difficult time today deciding if I wanted to post anything after finding out about Wayne's passing. He may have been the best guy at replying to people's posts , if not the best certainly in the top 5. Wayne always encouraged me to post on BRF when I received a new collection. His thought was always it may not be important to me or you but somebody may read a post and it could stir a memory for someone to reply. I only hope that as I continued to post the Kay collection , and others I receive, people will take Wayne's advice and , if something stirs a memory , reply. Who knows , it may start a conversation. Rest in peace and God speed Wayne. I will miss our phone conversations , be at peace with Joe!!!

[racingfan1]

Anybody know who the author of this letter might be.

[racingfan1]

documents regarding Michigan Outboard year end points and banquet.

[racingfan1]

documents regarding Michigan Outboard year end points and banquet.

[racingfan1]

NOA documents

[racingfan1]

TOC info

[racingfan1]

We will close out the 1965 Kay Harrison binder with the APBA Nationals from DePue. Anyone remember why there was a delay in the results for C Service Runabout???

[Ketzer]

I really appreciate the letters of sixty years ago, no doubt banged out on a manual or electric typewriter and some handwritten. No spell check, no grammar check, no autocorrect, and yet the grammar, spelling and writing are better than what we're getting today. But then, I'm a hopeless Luddite.

[racingfan1]

Here we go with the 1969 binder of Kay Harrison. FRont to back and it starts withthe 1969 APBA Nationals on Lake DePue. The first post is the WHATSUP booklet as produced every year by Charlotte Queen of the Outboard Club of Chicago.

[racingfan1]

Rest of the WHATSUP , pages from the 1969 Nationals program and the race sanction

[racingfan1]

Wish these hadn't faded over time. I tried to enhance them as best I could so they were readable. These are the Friday elimination heats.

[racingfan1]

Here are 2 different copies of Saturdays final heats. The final that catches my eye is D Hydro with Peterson , Schubert , Seebold , Baldwin , Anderson , Hauenstein , Waldman , Kirts , Schoch , Stahl , Hulgan , McFarland - oh my , nobody giving an inch in that race.

[racingfan1]

Here are a couple different copies of Sunday's finals heats

[racingfan1]

So looking through the elimination heats I don't see the K-4 listed in any class , I wonder if Marshall Grant didn't make the trip to DePue in 1969? I imagine Dickie Pond was still driving for Marshall in 69.

[racingfan1]

Here is the next set of documents from the 1969 binder. The NOA world championships including the elimination heat sheets.

[racingfan1]

Here are the Saturday and Sunday final heats and winners and an article from the NOA Roosrtail.

[racingfan1]

Just some misc. documents from the 1969 binder

[racingfan1]

More misc docs and newsletters

[Ketzer]

Hope that wasn't the end of the Kay Harrison collection. Sure was enjoying it.

[R Austin]

More misc docs and newsletters

Sure looks like something is wrong with the results.
Two listings for A Outboard Hydro and none for F Outboard Hydro.

[racingfan1]

Hope that wasn't the end of the Kay Harrison collection. Sure was enjoying it.

Plenty more to come , just taking a break.

[racingfan1]

Sure looks like something is wrong with the results.
Two listings for A Outboard Hydro and none for F Outboard Hydro.

Given the names on the AOH on Saturday it is more likely that may have been the FOH race , wouldn't you think Richard.

[R Austin]

The only thing I now for sure, is that they always ran the F Hydros as the last event.
I guess as not a penalty to the teams but to keep the people at the event.
We were always to last to get packed and on the road.

[racingfan1]

1969 newsletter with high point champions

[racingfan1]

misc newspaper articles

[racingfan1]

10 more pictures

[racingfan1]

Here is the last of this set of newspaper stories

[racingfan1]

misc racing documents and program

[racingfan1]

misc docs

[racingfan1]

docs

[racingfan1]

were you at any of these , comments???

[racingfan1]

circular

[racingfan1]

more circulars

[Ketzer]

Kay Harrison and Wayne Baldwin kept everything!

[racingfan1]

A bit worn and tattered . a ribbon from 1960 Nationals.

[racingfan1]

need help identifying these guys , no labeling on it. Is the 3rd guy from the left a young Freddie Goehl??