Time to get back to this , I don't have January 1975 so I will start with February this week.
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Time to get back to this , I don't have January 1975 so I will start with February this week.
Since I don't have a January issue I will start with the February 1975 edition , here are pages 1-8
and pages 9-16
Here is the March 1975 edition pages 1-8
Pages 9-16
Here is the April edition pages 1-8
Pages 9-16
Time to get back to this after the USTS speedweeks. A thank you to Bruce Summers for sending me this January 1975 edition.
Pages 9-15
and finally 16-20
Thank you Bruce for sending this edition to Dale for posting. I have a complete copy except for the cover which is in one of my albums. Until recently there was no way to scan and get a good reproduction of a photo, magazine cover etc., so when I was putting my "museum" and compilation of photos and articles I had written for different publications I had to cut them out of the magazines. I really regret that now, but that was why I couldn't send my copy to Dale....and besides it was the only one I had.
1975 was a very special year for a number of reasons, and I will add comments as we go along.
Here is the May 1975 edition pages 1-10
Pages 11-20. While skimming through this I noticed an item circled on the last page , looks like Johnny may have been interested in some equipment.
Here are pages 1-8 of the june 1975 edition
Pages 9 - 16
While reading through this edition i read the story on Firebird Lake south of Phoenix , is this still existence and does it get used ??
While in Phoenix in the mid 90's it was still in use Steve and had expanded a lot according to original plans. While I visiting the lake there was a big motorcycle grand prix race going on across the lake on a road course. On the front side was where Bob Bondurant had schools on evasive and other kinds of car driving skills. It was March or April and some champ cars were there preparing for the Indy 500. That was a long time ago, and I don't recall hearing anything about it except about 10 or so years ago a girl joined BRF and said she had become marketing or publicity director for Firebird Lake. Don't remember her name, and don't think she ever really posted much more.
I said I would have some comments regarding 1975, so here goes. This was the year that the PRO category got the name it goes by now. Previously it had gone by the name Outboard. It was confusing to some people because the OPC category had grown a lot in the last ten years and they looked like the regular stock outboards that the public bought rather than our highly modified motors with no cowling. It looked like they should be named Outboard instead of us. Hence, APBA requested our division submit names and my Dad's entry was chosen. See page 7 of the January issue. OPC also soon modified it's category name. It was still OPC, but instead of Outboard Pleasure Craft, it was changed to Outboard Performance Class more in line with what the motors were all about now. I was chosen at the 1974 Meeting at New Orleans to be on the 1975 Pro Racing Commission. My Dad had been elected to the APBA Council at Cincinatti the previous year, and was again on the council for 1975.
On page 13 of the January issue I wrote a story about an OPC race in Texas which ended up causing a little ruckus of which I am not proud, but I found out I had a lot of friends. There are just a few lines in the middle column about a third of the way down about an SK and Jet boat heat. It doesn't make sense really because I didn't reference the class in which I wrote, but the guys in the race knew what it was about. It was about the merry-go-round. I was being flippant when I wrote it and I never was that way. Guess I thought I could be cute, but I ended up getting a letter from APBA General Counsel Al Smith. What happened at the race was there were two SK boats and two Jet boats. They were milling around after the five minute gun, and they were running the full course. When the 1 minute gun fired they did not all go back up the chute and come around to bear down in a line for a start, they just continued on like they were on the course and they were basically scattered all around the race course. Two of the guys had ostrich feathers somehow attached to their helmets. They went round and round and round. It was hard to figure out who the leader was because at the time of the start, there was no clear leader that broke out, and the boats remained about in the same place as when they first started milling. One had probably jumped the gun, but anyway the scorers lost count of the laps because it started out so confusing. They ran an extra lap or two just to make sure. So I wrote the story in a belittling way that I never should have.
Fast forward to January and the Houston Boat Show. Joe Rome and I were standing around talking to Darrell Beaulier and a couple of other OPC guys when three people I didn't know came up and said they were going to whip my A$$. I didn't know why, but one of them had the January 1975 propeller in his hand and shaking it in my face and yelling about what I had written. I was confused at first as to what I wrote. Then the guy told me who he was and the race, then I figured it was probably the two jet boat guys with the ostrich feathers and an SK guy. It was really getting hot when a crowd surrounded us. Me, Joe, Darrell, and then Charlie Baily stepped in. Then a tall guy behind me said "Is there some trouble Wayne?" I turned around and saw that it was Jim Foreman a Houston boat builder and OPC driver, then looked all around and we were all surrounded by my OPC friends. There were maybe twenty. They all stepped up and the three guys that came to bust my head shut up. The leader later attended our District 15 annual meeting and as the only inboard guy there my Dad appointed him District 15 Inboard Chairman. A few years later Joe Rome called me and told me to turn the news on the TV quick. I did and that guy with the Propeller Magazine was the Grand Dragon leading a KKK march in Austin protesting something.
Great story, Wayne. You should have fought the guy. Then your kids could have told stories about how their daddy fought a dragon. It wouldn't have made any difference if you won or lost--you fought a dragon! Kind of like me racing against you.
I'm a chicken Steve. If I would have fought the dragon I would have been a roasted chicken.;)
On Memorial Day 1975 we were racing at Baytown, Texas. The five minute gun sounded for D hydro. At three minutes we went to fire it off, but it was a complete dud. Jack Chance started to troubleshoot and the red hot wire from the coil to the battery fell off. The pit crew got into action and got the tool and a terminal, stripped the wire and just finished tightening the nut when the one minute gun fired. I stayed in the boat. Soon at the boats crossed the starting line I stuck my index finger in the air and made circles while looking at the referee. He gave me the OK so my Dad cranked the engine and I took off toward the safety bouy, hung a left and headed for the first turn. When I came out of the turn I saw the pack only just now getting to the bottom turn. Little did I know that they bump bump bumped past some heavy rollers. It was a short course so we ran an accelerating wheel. Man that D hit 95 in nothing flat. It took me five or six years to even remember that part, and that's all I have been able to remember until I was cold, in extreme dark and felt like I was the only person alive in the world. Very lonely. Then warmth and sunshine. Denny Henderson and everyone on the bank saw what was going to happen and he hollered NOOOOO! Denny said I was flying along then me and the boat just disappeared. No splash or anything. Just like I was beamed to someplace else in midflight. So that was the end of most of our racing season with me in the cockpit. I did get in the last race of the year at my Dad's house, but that's for later. The boat "Texas Tornado" only had some testing and four heats on it. It was a new design by Tim. Tim took it back and replaced the stringers, some of which were crooked, and we sold Texas Tornado to Jim McKean.
If I were at that boat show Wayne, I would of backed you up. Back in them days I liked a bar room dancing ✌️
Steve- You still could do some bar room dancing. I would bet I couldn't get one Tennessee Tea down and it would be over. Hope all is well amigo. And Wayne love the stories can't wait for more
I can't dance guys....or I should say ya'll.
In the May issue Region 7 News Ann Strang reported a number of people showed up to the Johnson Factory for an inspector and referee seminar including Mr. and Mrs. Corky Callahan. Mrs. Callahan's name is Sue and was the subject of the cover of the January 1975 issue of Propeller. In Region 8 Judy Smith reported that my Dad had secured UIM World Championship races for classes A, B and C hydro to be held in Missouri later that year. I'm not sure what happened in that communication, but my Dad did get the UIM OA, OD and OF Championships for 1976 to be held in Phoenix, Arizona at Firebird Lake. The championships are awarded a year in advance, and it may be that my Dad and the Smiths had talked about a central location for them previously. Bob and Judy Smith did an excellent job of putting together the Eastern Divisionals at Winona in 1974, and this year would be the first year away from DePue because of the shallow water in 1974. So Judy's predictions were probably premature, because I know my Dad would have preferred something closer to the center of boat racing in America. Firebird Lake though was a course that would not be blown out.
In the June issue Ann Strang mentioned that UIM accepted all APBA classes to be accepted for World Championship status. This was a result of my Dad's application for the successful 1973 UIM races at Alexandria, Louisiana. It has been mentioned previously, and Ann repeated it here.
I can't dance guys....or I should say ya'll.
In the May issue Region 7 News Ann Strang reported a number of people showed up to the Johnson Factory for an inspector and referee seminar including Mr. and Mrs. Corky Callahan. Mrs. Callahan's name is Sue and was the subject of the cover of the January 1975 issue of Propeller. In Region 8 Judy Smith reported that my Dad had secured UIM World Championship races for classes A, B and C hydro to be held in Missouri later that year. I'm not sure what happened in that communication, but my Dad did get the UIM OA, OD and OF Championships for 1976 to be held in Phoenix, Arizona at Firebird Lake. The championships are awarded a year in advance, and it may be that my Dad and the Smiths had talked about a central location for them previously. Bob and Judy Smith did an excellent job of putting together the Eastern Divisionals at Winona in 1974, and this year would be the first year away from DePue because of the shallow water in 1974. So Judy's predictions were probably premature, because I know my Dad would have preferred something closer to the center of boat racing in America. Firebird Lake though was a course that would not be blown out.
In the June issue Ann Strang mentioned that UIM accepted all APBA classes to be accepted for World Championship status. This was a result of my Dad's application for the successful 1973 UIM races at Alexandria, Louisiana. It has been mentioned previously, and Ann repeated it here.
Here is the July 1975 issue pages 1 - 8.
Pages 9 - 16.
Add finally pages 17-20
I'm in the process of moving to FL. and going through all my propeller magazine{I have a lot} I found a extra January 1975 if you would like it. Let me know what other ones you are missing.
[Flyer] Leigh
Here is what he posted he had back in May 9, scroll down for table
http://www.boatracingfacts.com/forum...magazine/page3
Leigh
It's not me who would need your list but the person who started putting the Propeller mags online. He is
http://www.boatracingfacts.com/forum...459-racingfan1
Pete
sorry I thought I sent it to him
Leigh , I sent you a PM and an email as well.
Dale