Legends of Boat Racing Reunion

[Ron Hill]

DePue, Illinois is pretty much MID AMERICA. Not every great boat racer ever raced at DePue, but I have decided that DePue is where we should have The Legends of Boat Racing Reunion. DePue, 2011, will be 50 years of Boat Racing at DePue.

I'm appointing John Schubert as Chairman. We need to be making plans.

Let this Reunion will be called The Legends of Boat Racing Reunion....Drivers, crews and families are welcome!

[Master Oil Racing Team]

Tim Chance called me last year about putting together a book. It takes some time, and we planned to get info, statistics and photos from racers in time to put it together. We talked a couple of times and were supposed to get together around April last year when he was coming to Texas. Since then, for my part I have been solid at trying to protect our company from Obama's onslaught. I have not talked to Tim, and only until the last few weeks has my E mail been complete. I had to get a new address also. I will get ahold of Tim and ask him about being able to go forward with our project. We planned to do 100 books, and before the roostertail hit us in the turn, we had planned to query how much interest there would be in purchasing a book. Don't know that we have time now....but thought I'd throw it out.

I'll give you a call next week Ron.

[ferv888ipba]

We planned to do 100 books, and before the roostertail hit us in the turn, we had planned to query how much interest there would be in purchasing a book. Don't know that we have time now....but thought I'd throw it out.

I'll give you a call next week Ron.

Wayne,
Count me in for a book if not two of them, may have to keep Alan up to date on the west coast with things, you know how old that guy is.LOL Hopefully we can coax him back on a plane again and get him out here.

Ray

[Tim Chance]

Tim Chance called me last year about putting together a book. It takes some time, and we planned to get info, statistics and photos from racers in time to put it together. We talked a couple of times and were supposed to get together around April last year when he was coming to Texas. Since then, for my part I have been solid at trying to protect our company from Obama's onslaught. I have not talked to Tim, and only until the last few weeks has my E mail been complete. I had to get a new address also. I will get ahold of Tim and ask him about being able to go forward with our project. We planned to do 100 books, and before the roostertail hit us in the turn, we had planned to query how much interest there would be in purchasing a book. Don't know that we have time now....but thought I'd throw it out.

I'll give you a call next week Ron.

The book kind of ended up on the back burner. I never did get down to Texas. Depue will be here before we know it and I don't think there is time to put something of the quality expected in such a short time. Wayne, I'll PM you and maybe we can collaborate on something for a more distant future.

[Tim Chance]

This is 2010, 2011 is a year and a half off. Let me think about the book, I'll get in touch with Wayne.

[Ron Hill]

I like books....ESPECIALLY The Catcher in the Rye, Alexander and Terrible Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day, Tex, The Outsiders, Old Yeller, Where The Red Fern Grows, Armand Hammer, Ribsy AND A FEW OTHERS, BUT A BOOK......IN THE INTERNET ERA?????

I feel the BOOK is called www.boatracingfacts.com AKA BRF!!!

I have never heard of a boat racing book even breaking even.

I think if we wrote about each person that signed up to come, and made a "PROGRAM" rather than a BOOK.... We might could sell avertising to cover the "PROGRAM's Costs....

Jimbo and I discussed writing a book and we figured out that the only ones to read it would be us...and HELL we already know the story!!!!

I would like to run the SILENT AUCTION DIFFERENTLY this time. One change would be to start taking DONATIONS NOW. The second change would be to have the table numbered and HAVE ONE TABLE AUCTIONED OUT LIKE EVER thirty MINUTES.

I recently attended a silent auction, and doing one table at a time, allowed you to know if you won one thing or not...Then, you could re-group for your cash the next table...

Shirts with pockets and PRE SALE ONLY and NO FREE BEER! And maybe have about three days of activities planned. Like giving awards to boats that are displayed. Maybe reserve time with APBA approval for some water time for some of our CLASSIC BOATS....

These are the changes I'd suggest for 2011!

Assuming I'm here in 2011! Physically......I know my mind is already gone.....Dave Bryan often asks me how it feels to have lost my mind????? My answer is simple..."You talking to me??"

[F-12]

I hope you guys keep me in mind during this process. When I am in the country, I would be more than happy to do what ever I can. I had the best time at the last one and renewed friendships that I thought were long lost over the years. Anyone that was ever involved in outboard racing would really regret not making this event. Let's make this one the biggest and best.

[Master Oil Racing Team]

I don't watch TV Ron, except Fox News. If I'm home....I read books and BRF. BRF IS THE RECORD OF BOAT RACING!

I like the idea of a program with a couple of caveats. No solicitations of sponsors of the Nationals or the local community that would normally be putting money into the nationals. We don't want in any way to take money that would go toward that event. The first reunion, our group graciously contributed $1,000.00 to the sport we all love, but we don't want to compete for the precious sponsorship dollars these days. Still...the idea is with merit. There are potential donors out there to help fund the underlying costs of putting the thing together, and a program would be an excellent way to honor them.

As far as getting people to sign up early and give a writeup...forget about that. There will be a hard core group that will....then as we get closer and the hype drives up interest we will start to get a flurry of info...then there will be a bunch at the last minute that will send in stuff. The biggest group will be those that commit only in the final weeks and the ones that just show up. There would never be time enough to put together a program even months out. Not something that we would want to honor such an event. This is the sign Steve Jones and I stared at many, many times sitting in the lobby of Grunwald Printing in Corpus Christi with our program notes and ads while waiting on John Grunwald to see us. "YOU WANT IT QUICK, FAST, AND CHEAP?....PICK TWO AND CALL US BACK!". I do think though that we could do a program. just have to put our heads together to see how to make it work.

The only silent auction I have ever seen was at DePue, but I think your idea on that is dead on.

As far as the book goes, with today's digital images, quality internet transmissions, computer enhancement with quick editing, sizing, etc., printers, ease of looking at proofs and making changes alters the equation when printing. When Tim first contacted me he wanted to start on 2011 very early. For those who are too young to know Tim Chance, he worked on several publications before he started his Hydroplane Quarterly magazine. So Tim is the go to guy. I think it was November or December 2008, long after the first reunion and WAY before anyone considered the universally accepted date of the second reunion in 2011, that Tim E mailed me and asked me to give him a call. I was very excited about his proposal and we planned for him to come to my house, or possibly meet in San Antonio. The plan was to spend some hard time laying out the foundation for the book. We discussed some absolutes that must be included, such as motor builders, boat builders and what was the bedrock of alky racing from the early sixties to in the seventies. We both had a lot of similar thoughts, but the main thing about the individual racers, classes, boats, motors, states, numbers.....the things that racers want to read about themselves and exploits was the toughest. Sometimes, the guys that won the most are the hardest to get info from. It's really hard to get any meaningful information from 95% of racers. Some don't want to take the time, but for the most part...racers just don't know how or what to compile about their racing careers. So it takes a lot of hounding, follow up, then putting it together in an order that makes people want to read it.

That's just what I have found out on my own. As far as the mechanical part...I don't know. Tim does. And that's why he contacted me so early in the game so we could at least flesh out the general direction. We would both contribute photos and copy, but I kind of figured I would play the major role in financing (get it printed) while Tim did the layout and find the best print shop. Neither one of us got into this to make money, because we know Ron and Jimbo are right. We wanted to put together a class publication that people would want to own and look at and read...and pass on to their heirs. We wanted it to be independant of the reunion's drag on expense. Time is the factor now. I figured after this fall we were behind before we started, but if Tim thinks there may still be time....I'm all for it.

Tim....I may have to make a quick 400 mile round trip tommorrow. If I can I'll give you a call.

[John Schubert T*A*R*T]

DePue, Illinois is pretty much MID AMERICA. Not every great boat racer ever raced at DePue, but I have decided that DePue is where we should have The Legends of Boat Racing Reunion. DePue, 2011, will be 50 years of Boat Racing at DePue.

I'm appointing John Schubert as Chairman. We need to be making plans.

Let this Reunion will be called The Legends of Boat Racing Reunion....Drivers, crews and families are welcome!

Ron,

Just saw this post. I'd be willing to Chair this event, but would need quite a bit of help doing the registrations, name tags, etc., etc. It burned up too uch time doing it by myself. But, in retrospect, the end result was very much worth the effort.

[ferv888ipba]

John, Wayne, Tim
Should the good Lord let this fool live long enough, I would volunteer to help as well. Would love to do interviews during downtime with all of you guys during the weekend. The fans of boatracing at Depue are some of the best informed ever and would love to hear from you guys whos names they still remember and I have forgotten. We could do a meet and greet near the VFW with a booth set up. This would then help with the auction if it were up that way as well, as we could get more fans to come that way.

I think we should get Jeannie Tennell involved as well, she made up some fan cards for our current USTS drivers and they have gone over really well. Then we could get a table set up and do some autographs for the fans with the cards.

rayr@marvin.com easiest way to get ahold of me.

Ray