Deuce Week at the Petersen Museum March 2012
Celebrating The 80th Anniversary of the 32 Ford !
Petersen Museum, Los Angeles, CAThursday, March 1, 2012
The annual Deuce Week celebration put on by the Petersen Museum was really revved up this year, because it’s the 80th Anniversary of the 32 Ford ! The schedule is always great for this week of Deuce fun... but this year it was exceptional. Hotrodhotlines’ Mary Ann & Jack Lawford arrived in town on Wednesday night, and were raring to go on Thursday. |
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Okay.... back inside for the serious stuff ... the Hot Rod Roundtable ... did I say serious ?? In our hobby even the serious stuff turns to fun and games.... The roundtable started off with a discussion of Hot Rodding “Past” with a panel of true notable in our industry. Alex Xydias, Founder of So Cal Speed Shop, Greg Sharp, curator of the NHRA Wally Parks Museum, Tony Thacker, Director of the NHRA Wally Parks Museum, and Ed Iskenderian of Isky Cams. ... a group with many great stories from hotrodding history ...all moderated by Ken Gross.
When Greg Sharp spoke about Alex’s dry lakes records, Alex reminisced about his 198 mph run in 1948 ... someone in the audience asked him to relate how it felt to go 198 back then, and Alex asked him if he wanted to hear him scream in fear the way he did back then ! HA !
Ed Iskenderian talked about starting his business with a $10 ad in Hot Rod magazine in 1948 ... it was a 2 inch ad and he was thrilled when he got a call from North Carolina from someone wanting a cam ... someone who asked no questions about his experience or the quality of the cams .... HEY .... that was great.
Alex told about how Vic Edelbrock got orders from East Coast bootleggers for his high performance parts in the early days.
In the early dry lakes days they drove their cars to El Mirage.. not trailer them like they do now ... then Alex said, they pulled off the windshields and headlight and ran them on the drylake.
Ed Isdenderian related a story about how he broke an axle at Muroc and so had no way to drive his car home so he and the guys lifted his front end up onto the rear of a friends car and they towed him home that way ... Can you picture that ....
Greg Sharp related how nitro became a fuel for the racers. Seems that there were guys running tether car races who developed a fuel to make their little tether cars go really fast .... It was the Dooling Brothers who owned a big machine shop in the San Fernando Valley and who were big into tether car racing. Well a lakes racer happened to be friends with the Dooling Brothers and got a glimpse of what they were doing and took this new fuel into the lakes racing arena.
This story telling could have gone on for days.... these guys are really great fun and the whole audience was just really enjoying the night.
The two following roundtables were just as engaging ... with industry icons, Pete Chapouris , Roy Brizio, Troy Trepanier and Dave Lane talking about Present Day Hot Rodding.... followed by Chip Foose, Troy Ladd and Larry Erickson. All of these guys are an intricale part of both our history and our future.
This was an amazing week .... and what Pete Chapouris said about the 32 being a Classic blank canvas is just so true.... look at these hundreds of 32 Fords and not one is like another... they are all the same car... but they are not the same car .... each has the distinctive touch of it’s owner, it’s builder, and those who contributed to it’s creation.. each is a masterpiece all it’s own. The 32 Ford .... an icon in our industry.
We want to thank all of the great people at the Petersen Museum that we worked with .... our good friend Dave Boule, who we also worked with on the 75th Anniversary of the Deuce Event, Karpo Murkajanian who helped keep all the vendors running smoothly, Larry Erickson who we also worked with on the 75th Anniversary, Chirs Brown who we worked with in the Petersen Marketing department and all of the others at the museum who did such a great job in putting on a spectacular event....
We’ll see you NEXT YEAR