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I heard it is a great movie
My daughter's boyfriend will be in town this weekend so I'm taking Sunday afternoon off and we're going to see it.
I hope he makes a few cities on a book signing tour when it comes out. Maybe he'll make it down to Houston.
Marshall and my Dad were good friends. They talked on the phone and corresponded quite a bit. It was Marshall that had the biggest influence on my Dad's approach to putting on races. Some of the things they did could help with race promotion these days. In spite of the ties that Marshall had with Roone Arledge of ABC Wide World of Sports, they would not air alky races. I saw the NOA World Championships on Wide World of Sports the year I started racing, but never after that. The program was too long for ABC.
The driver in all these photos was Billy Seebold. It was 1972 and Billy was already driving tunnels. This I believe was his last year to race alky. Billy and his dad Bill had already stopped fielding their own V-45 Seebold Racing when Billy started driving for Marshall. I think that was around 1968. Have to check some old programs. Billy won just about everything he raced for Marshall at Alexandria that year.
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Billy Seebold driving Marshall's Ring of Fire
I don't have any photos of the race at Rogers, Arkansas. It turned out very rough. Don't recall much about the races. Only a few funny stories, but one of the things that clearly stands out in my mind was three of the girls in our pit crew talking with Marshall's wife Etta and her sister Alice. We were pitted next to Marhall and when the girls found out he placed bass for Johnny Cash they couldn't pull enough information from Etta.
The year was 1969. Bob Dylan's "Nashville Skyline" had been recently released and on it was one track, "Girl From the North Country", that Johnny did a duet with Bob Dylan. Of course "Lay Lady Lay" was topping the charts then and when the girls found out that Marshall and Etta were at the recording sessions they were non stop questions. "What was he like. What did he do. Did you talk to him. etc." It was probably at this time that Bob Dylan was spending time with Johnny Cash and co-wrote "Wanted Man" with Johnny Cash.
The photos are from a 1972 AOF race at Gravois Mills, Missouri. Billy Seebold is driving, Marshall is holding up the boat with his back to us and his brother-in-law Jerry Pennington has the other side.
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Marshall Grant and Carl Perkins
I remember a story Marshall told me not too long ago. We were talking about how much Carl Perkins liked boat racing. I remember that the last time I saw Carl here in Houston, we would talk about boat racing and the good ole days with Marshall, who he called "Gramps." Carl's band members did not know that he use to go to the boat races. On one occassion, his bus was traveling down 165, Carl happened to wake up just as they passed Ft Bulow Lake. Carl said, "Worlds Fastest Water." Everyone on the bus looked at him like he was crazy or either on some wild drugs because they had no idea what he was talking about. Carl just looked back at them and laughed.;)
The Johnny Cash Show was rehearsing for the upcoming TV show and all Carl could talk about was the upcoming trip to the 1970 Championships in Alexandria. Since Carl loved to go to the races so much, he helped Marshall out in the pits. Marshall got his money's worth out of Carl. They won 6 Championships and might has won one more, but Billy Seebold jumped the gun in one heat and was disqualified.:confused:
As you can see in this picture in Hydro Plane Quarterly, Carl is putting the equipment away after the races were completed. Carl told Marshall "I guess we are going to have to take these trophies back so they will believe that we won all this." I always liked it when Carl came to the races and the only thing that made it better was when Fluke came too.:)
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Alexandria World Championships 1971
Duke, Bill Seebold Sr, Bill Seebold Jr, Jerry, Marshall Grant, 2 friends of Marshall's & Carl Perkins