Forum: Oklahomatidbits.com General Forum (go)
Moderators:  /  David Smith Jr

There was a modified midget track at the old Macarthur Park. It sat to the east of the water slide. I remember going out there once with my dad.

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Here's a picture of a track here in LeFlore county that I knew nothing about until I seen it on Hook"s 100 a few years ago.I never did get up enough nerves to make it down there.Called the # Hook gave and talked to the owner and he said said they did have 4 or 5 LM run there also.That place is in the sticks.Hearing that it is shut down now.Little River was it's name.Actually it's in Pushmataha county.You have to click on aireal view then zoom in and pan west on St hwy 144.

God made dirt,man made asphalt.

JD (Porter) what was that track you were tellin me about that ya'll raced back in the early 90's?

Was it one of the Ardmore tracks?

How much would could a wouldchuck chuck if a 
wouldchuck could chuck would

Mike, I wrote a long piece about OK history for Open Wheel back around '95, and there's a long article just about the midgets at Taft waiting for publication in an academic journal called The Chronicles of Oklahoma, put out by the state historical society. Had to provide footnotes and everything. Dayum! No telling when it will see the light of day. Funny thing is, history is a moving target....every time you write something, you find out something else you should have included or, would you believe it, you discover somebody fibbed to you. Unbelievable, I know. I found out that Barney Oldfield raced at the old fairgrounds, fine, but I just recently discovered he and a lot of the Indy drivers of the day ran on a two mile oval track in what is now the Linwood neighborhood in OKC. They made dirt turns to connect Linwood Ave and a parallel street and ran Indianapolis cars in about 1915. Whaddaya know, CART didn't invent temporary street circuits. Ray Harroun was scheduled to run at the Fairgrounds in 1910, with Joe Dawson, but his train never made it. Stuff like that is great, but there's just too much of it. That micro track off MacArthur was built by, among others, Dennie Moore, Buddy Cagle, and Leroy Wilson...they ran in the Stockyards coliseum in the winter and there during the summer. The first track in town was the Colcord Course, a half mile around the old ballfield at Reno and Classen, but it washed away. Oh, and did you know the first midget races were around the football field at Capitol Hill High School? Cars came all the way from Chicago to race there before WWII.

Oklahoma has an incredible racing history, probably starting with the Land Run. (Did anybody tech the buckboards?) If anyone really wants to dig, go to a city library, go into the Oklahoman archives online and start reading. Racing got a lot better coverage "back in the day." Don't believe every word of it, but it's fascinating stuff.

Yes,Galen that is fascinating stuff. I looked at the Floyd Seago collection and the collection of midget photos from OKC alone took almost an hour. I really think its cool the places everybody has brought up. My family was from down in Stephens county near Duncan. My Dad would tell me bout a track @ Hwy 81 & Hwy 7 between Marlow and Duncan,back in the late 40's-early 50's. He and a friend of his got kicked out of auto shop when the teacher realized the "class project" they were workin on was a race car that never got to turn a lap. I also remember a track that was 1/2 way between Duncan & Comanche on old 81. It is now back being a pasture/hayfield. I think the remains of Arbuckle Speedway are still there,west of I-35 on Hwy 53.Part of the grandstands were still there last time I drove down.

Galen, Spivey, et. al.,

Some pretty neat stuff you're bringing up, much of it I'd never heard of even though I grew up around racing in OKC. Heard many stories about Taft and even the old Fairgrounds at Douglas, but the Linwood deal and some of the tracks Spivey mentioned, well I had no idea.

Was at the Dewey track once for a Super Modified race as a young kid in the late '70s. All I remember is we got there later than planned and ended up sitting down low off of turn four and getting drilled in the feature in the right shoulder by a dirt clod off the right rear tire of Terry Doss, hurt like a mutha'. A few years later (probably '84 or '85), Doss gave me a black eye when a rock propelled off his right rear tire on the half-mile at OKC. While I always enjoyed watching him race, I could only breathe a sigh of relief for the sake of my own well-being when he decided to put the driver's gloves aside lol.

And JD, I assume the Quartz Mountain you refer to is the one near Altus that was still running as late as, I believe, 1985?? Went down there once when an uncle of mine was running stock cars, he managed to get his only flip there at Quartz Mountain. Seems that a fire shut the place down a year or so later.

Anyway, interesting post. Good stuff guys and gals.

The first race I went to as a child was at Taft, I was scared all night at how fast and dangerous and loud it seemed. As I recall a man was critically injured in one of the crashes.

Another track no one has mentioned was at Anadarko...we sat on the front row and our chests just simply pounded with the vibrations of the cars as they came out of turn 4. A tire came over the chainlink fence and hit the grandstands really close to us....that was a hundred years ago!

I never went to another race till I started racing myself in 2000

Unfortunately, we can't go look at the old stockyards coliseum as it burned down several years ago. I like to go to where tracks use to be and just sit and try to imagine, to see if I can see some sort of glimps of the track.

My friend Chris Smith told me once while we were passing through on I-35 that Thackerville had a track and he says you could still see part of the lighting and stuff.

As discusssed several years ago when this topic was posted and discussed, I had always heard that there was to be a track built in Guthrie but didn't think it ever broke ground.

Sozo, guess it was 2001 when ASCS sooner region was scheduled to race at the track way down southeast. I had stopped there at the track on my way to Paris Motor Speedway on the ASCS national tour at the time and that track you were talking about wasn't that bad of a track and not as redneck as you would think. It was pretty well banked, especially in turns one and two. But two weeks later they had cancelled the show.

With all that has been written to this point and hopefully more to be written, can you name the oldest, active track in the state of Oklahoma?

David Smith Jr.
www.oklahomatidbits.com

Sozo, guess it was 2001 when ASCS sooner region was scheduled to race at the track way down southeast. I had stopped there at the track on my way to Paris Motor Speedway on the ASCS national tour at the time and that track you were talking about wasn't that bad of a track and not as redneck as you would think. It was pretty well banked, especially in turns one and two. But two weeks later they had cancelled the show.

With all that has been written to this point and hopefully more to be written, can you name the oldest, active track in the state of Oklahoma?

Wow,thanks for the info David.

Tri-State has been racing for 35 or so straight years,but that probably isn't the oldest.

God made dirt,man made asphalt.

If you are talking about the track just east of Nashoba, it was still running a couple of years ago. Boy, that's grass roots racing.

Galen that's excellent stuff. Footnotes! How do you footnote whoppers? That midget link was womderful. I liked the one of Joltin' Jud Larson. I'll bet he was the Tim Richmond of his day, if you know what I mean.

If you are talking about the track just east of Nashoba, it was still running a couple of years ago. Boy, that's grass roots racing.

Yep,that's the one.Someone from that area at work say that it closed down,maybe last year.I'm not saying for sure though.I don't know personally.Was thinking about going to just check it out.Big Foot country!LOL

God made dirt,man made asphalt.

Okay here's one you don't remember. Around 1958 there was a track between Springer and Ardmore on the northwest side of Caddo Bottom. 1/4 mile, but a security guard got his legs cut off whyen a car hit the flatbed truck he was sitting on. Word has it you can still see one of the banks.

I still have some old pics from Taft. Back in the old coupe days, also called super modifieds just before the move to the fairgrounds. My dad (Babe Gordon) owned a car driven by Rusty Towe & some by Clemon Humphrey. I can barely remember Taft. I do remember my mom helping me build model cars of racers cars & presenting them to them during throphy presentation! One of my all-time favorites was C.J. Ruckman out of Tulsa!

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Do any of you remember a Don Vandiver from Tulsa?I remember him racing at Tri-State in the mid 70's on pavement.I think his number was 21 but not sure and I think he drove a chevelle.

God made dirt,man made asphalt.

David Smith my guess would be State Fair Speedway. But I doubt that is it because it would almost be too easy. So my young a$$ is looking forward to the answer.............

It's not BEAVER is it? lol. maybe Lawton could be a possibility. Don't know bout Salina.......but it's not active. Don't know much about Pocola or Coffeyville or Ardmore.

That track you are talkin about in the sountheast was that what was known as Road Runner Speedway?

I think I'm almost too young for this post. Thats ok.........I've been going to races for almost 20 years do not know too much about state history of it.....mostly just went to SFS, Tulsa, and Devil's Bowl. Went to Hutchinson and Wichita once too.........sure I've been to more but was too young to remember. I'll learn more about racing from the past the more I hang around James, JD, and Mike.........you know......the OLD guys. lol.

How much would could a wouldchuck chuck if a 
wouldchuck could chuck would

Word has it that before they flooded the place for the lake, they bolted all the stuff down in the schoolhouse so it looks just like it did. I have a lot of family in Altus. My uncles used to scuba dive in Lugart. One time when the lake was real low you could see the school house, so my uncle decided to drive as close as we could to see it and we got stuck. This was before cell phones so we were there for a long time until they walked and got help. Spent many summers and holidays in Altus.

As for the oldest track,SFS,Enid,or the Muskogee Fairgrounds track.I remember going to Muskogee in the late 60's.Also there's Caney although it's not in Okla.

My vote is for Lawton. Lanny was barely out of High school when he rented the track . Word has it he rented the track on the weekend nights his landlord wasn't running! One old man claimed to me he was running there in the early 50's. I'm thinking Okc came in the late 50's.

Wait a minute! No one has mentioned "Jackrabbitt Speedway" in Colbert!

The answer is:

Enid Speedway. Enid was built as its current 3/8th shape in 1948 and has been running ever since.

Lawton Speedway was built in 1961 while SFS (Fairgrounds Speedway to be politically correct for those of us who know so) was built in 1954.

But the track that is still hanging in there and said to be opening for 2008 if things go as planned (former track promoter Charles Fulton at the helm) is Muskogee Speedway. Muskogee was first built as a 1/2 mile dirt oval back in 1915 and ran until 1941. I presume it closed down due to World War II as alot of tracks did at that time (right Galen?) Anyhoot, Muskogee opened again in 1946 and had been running ever since until the 2001 season I believe.

David Smith Jr.
www.oklahomatidbits.com