Soap Box Derby
Yesterday I walked on the abandoned soap box derby track that I rode down 58 years ago. The course is located in Ernest Debs Park, and sits on a hill above the Arroyo Seco, a stone's throw from the Pasadena Freeway. It seems unlikely that this barren knoll was where thousands of spectators once came every summer to watch kids trying to qualify for the Nationals. The winner of the western competition moved on to the U. S. National Championships held in Akron, Ohio. There is nothing that remains of the grandstands that were once set against the Montecito Heights hillside but some of the racing surface is still in place.
The soap box derby took place at the end of the summer and competitors were aged 11 to 15. The cars were powered by gravity alone and moved their way down a straight sloped track when released from the starting line. The various local courses across the USA were all different in length and slope. Some courses, such as the one in Debs Park, were barely 500 feet in length. When the local winners came together in Akron, they competed on a course 900 feet downhill that changed past the finish line to an uphill section about 300 feet long for the cars to come to a stop. Cars reached a speed near 35 miles per hour by the time they crossed the finish line. The downhill slope of the course gradually reduced from 16% at the start, to 6% at mid course, and to 2% for the last third.
All entrants were required to make their own cars and undergo an inspection and weigh-in prior to the start of the race to ensure the construction and equipment complied with the official soap box derby rules and specifications. Cars were made either from official kits available from the soap box derby organization; or from an original design.
On August 16, 1954, Richard Kemp of Los Angeles won the 17th running of the National Championships at Akron and became the first to do so from west of the Mississippi River. On the fourth and final day of racing, Dinah Shore, Robert Cummings along with Abbott & Costello entertained a crowd of more than 67,000. In addition to a trophy, Richard received a $5,000 scholarship.
Richard had designed his own car and had spent 6 months building it. 1954 was the third year in a row that he had built a car and competed. He had taken third place the first year in Los Angeles and then second place the following year. He had built a new car from scratch each year with improvements he had determined from competing the prior year. The changes enabled him in his third year to finally win a trip to Akron. He had eliminated 512 competitors in the western trials to qualify for the National Championships. In Akron he defeated a total of 151 competitors who were all winners of local trials across the USA.
Richard said that the car he had built had cost him $9.40 and his sponsor for the event was the Los Angeles Daily News. At Akron he had won every heat he entered and had by far the fastest time in every round. He wore his favorite red leather moccasins and when he received his trophy for the win he kissed the lucky silver dollar he had carried in his pocket. Pictures taken of Richard on the winner's podium reveal a typical innocent 1950s teenager. The night following the race at the awards banquet, Richard broke down in tears explaining that he was overwhelmed by all the attention and his good fortune. Richard later went on to a career as a Chaplain in the U.S. Navy.
If this sounds like an episode of The Andy Griffith Show you must realize that for the most part, the 1950s was The Andy Griffith Show. In my opinion, rather than Viet Nam or the Kennedy assassination, the catalyst for the 1960s was the 1950s.
The fact that somebody from Los Angeles had won the National Championship caught the attention of kids in my Eagle Rock neighborhood. It wasn't long after I read about it in the paper that my dad began making a car for me. At first the only wheels we could find came off a wagon and kept the car at a slow crawl no matter how steep the road was that we tried. A year or so later we got word that someone on the other end of Norwalk Avenue where we lived had a set of soap box derby wheels for sale. He claimed they had come off a car that took fourth place at Akron and he was asking $32 for the set of 4 wheels. This seemed like a lot of money at the time but my dad paid it.
The wheels were the official soap box derby version and were technologically light years ahead of the wagon wheels we had been using. They had an aerodynamic shape very similar to that of a discus used in track and field, or the objects often shown in those grainy black and white UFO photos. The tire or rubber part of the wheels was narrow, perhaps only ¾ of an inch wide. Once a wheel was mounted on an axel and given a spin with your hand, it would continue spinning seemingly forever without slowing down. The first time I tried the new wheels on my car I started at the west end of Yosemite Drive at College View. Coming down Yosemite, despite applying the brake, I blew straight through the intersection at the bottom of the hill where it crosses Ellenwood.
We also tried the new wheels out on a long driveway we used to travel down with the wagon wheels. It had a hairpin turn near the bottom that never presented a problem with the old wheels. The new wheels had the car moving so fast that my Cousin Donnie was thrown out of the car. He slid across the driveway's asphalt surface on his butt and was unhurt but it tore off the seat of his jeans. He insisted on my pushing him home with him sitting in the car so no one would see his bare ass.
One afternoon we put the car in the back of my dad's pickup and went over to the soap box derby course. This was long before Debs Park had been established. The entire area was open space with no fences and we drove up the hill and parked next to the course. The course had been shut down a few years before we arrived and it showed. Weeds had sprouted up through the concrete all along the track but you could still take a car down the course. The course was short, straight and uneventful; not anywhere as interesting as running down residential streets. The best part was knowing that a few years earlier Richard Kemp had driven his car down the same track on his way to Akron.
Twenty years after Richard Kemp won the soap box derby there was a very different story coming out of Akron. The winner of the 1973 National Championship was Jimmy Gronen of Boulder, Colorado until 3 days later when he was disqualified.
Officials had been suspicious from the beginning but despite repeated inspections and weighing of his car, there was no evidence that anything was out of line. Official's eyebrows were first raised when prior to a practice run they observed Jimmy's Uncle Bob applying something to the tires of Jimmy's car. The something turned out to be a chemical that caused the tires to swell, reducing the area of the tire that made contact with the ground, thus reducing resistance. Uncle Bob was told that this was a no-no and to discontinue the practice.
Later, when the competition began, Jimmy's car consistently came off the starting line with a 2-foot lead and no one had any idea how this was accomplished. Many of the key parts such as wheels and axles are required to be standard equipment approved by the soap box derby organization. There were also weight limitations for the cars. The rules, equipment and the running of a race were tightly controlled to provide all competitors with an equal chance. Any difference in performance would theoretically be miniscule. The winning margin in a race had been between 1 to 3 feet for decades, yet Jimmy's car was winning each heat by 20 to 30 feet. Over the 4 days of racing the crowd, suspecting shenanigans, began booing loudly when Jimmy's car came down the track. It was obviously Colonel Mustard in the library but no one could prove it. At least not until 3 days after Jimmy won the championship when officials took the trouble to x-ray his car.
Uncle Bob was Jimmy's guardian and was described by news articles at the time as a "wealthy engineer." He had installed a mechanism in the headrest that served as an on-off switch. When Jimmy would lean back at the start of the race, the contact of his helmet against the headrest would activate the electromagnet concealed in the front nose of the car. At the beginning of a race, each car's nose rested against a metal plate that held the car in place on the starting line. The race would start when the metal plates holding the cars in place, all fell forward in unison making for an even start. The electromagnet in Jimmy's car was attracted to the metal plate and would pull his car ahead as the metal plate fell forward.
Once Jimmy was disqualified
the championship was awarded to the runner up.
Uncle Bob was charged with contributing to the delinquency of a minor
and the matter was settled after he paid a fine of $2,000. The metal plates were replaced with aluminum ones
the following year.
Officials were pleased that
they had solved the mystery of Jimmy’s car but questions about the previous
year’s race remain unanswered to this day.
In 1972 Uncle Bob’s son (Jimmy’s cousin) had won the National Championship
at Akron