A Piece of American History The American romance with the automobile is well known, as is our national fascination with speed and technology. Drag racing was born out of these passions when soldiers, mechanics, and engineers returning from World War II transitioned their wartime skills into amusing themselves by making better, faster cars in their spare time.
In family garages and back lots, young men and some women employed their technical know-how by "souping up" the family car. Then groups would gather on country backroads, unused airstrips and dry lakebeds to test their engineering skill and courage against others. Often, limited space would limit the races to quarter mile sprints.
It did not take long before drag racing captured the public's imagination and became an institution. Popular movies and songs of the 1950s through the 1960s used the sport as a symbol of youth, daring, and freedom. The Beach Boys, Jan & Dean, American Graffiti, Grease, Happy Days, 77 Sunset Strip and many other movies, actors and musicians found their inspiration on the asphalt. Teenage male hearts quickened at the revving of a V8 engine, and all of Hollywood's A-list movie stars wanted to be a part of the sport that epitomized American culture.
As interest grew, cars got faster. With virtually no existing manufacturers for racing car parts, racers began to make their own parts, building cars out of military surplus parts, welding up ever-sleeker chassis and building more powerful engines in the quest for speed. Many of these new parts were improvements on existing automotive technology that proved useful even for everyday cars. The performance aftermarket industry grew in the fertile soil of drag racing, encouraging generations of entrepreneurs and profoundly influencing mainstream automotive technology.
Legendary drag racing champion Don "The Snake" Prudhomme, describes the experience of standing by the track: "Loud isn't a strong enough word. It's so overwhelming your brain can hardly compute what it is hearing and seeing. It's damn near a religious experience."
Quarter Mile Foundation and its PROJECT 1320 will produce a series of television documentary films which will capture the historical perspectives of the sport and the cultural phenomenon it created using recollections of pioneers of the sport. The most immediate goal is to film first-person narratives of the heroes and legends to tell the stories of "Who, What, When, Where, Why and How." Then, adding still pictures and movies – many of them home movies of spectators – the documentary series will take its form.
The focus will be on the racers, manufacturers, associations plus the "behind the scenes" people... what it took to bring this great sport to the current level. The racers who will be a part of this series will include some of today's stars but the spotlight will be on the pioneering legends – those whose contributions and accomplishments may have faded but who launched and nurtured drag racing, made it a major motorsport and built a multi-billion dollar industry from it.
The birth and growth of drag racing and the spin-off of the performance automotive aftermarket is a story of the post-World War II American Dream. PROJECT 1320 will be an account of Can-do, Will-do attitudes, of hundreds of Horatio Alger-type stories come to life.
Press Release re Vintage Drag Race
Vehicle Designations
