LABOR DAY
September 5, 1955

Ray Clark

Winfield Daily Courier
Front Page, September 6, 1955

Lots of Thrills at
Labor Day Auto Races Here

    Fans who attended the Lions club sponsored auto racing program at the Winfield fairgrounds Monday had plenty of thrills and a goodly number of the drivers and racing owners had their share of hard luck.

     Although the property damage in several accidents was considerable, there was only one driver who was hurt badly enough to be hospitalized for a time for treatment of cuts and other injuries.  He connected head-on, at the south turn nearest the grandstand, with a light pole.

     In one race where there were about 22 cars in the starting lineup; there was a pileup at the southeast turn on the track, resulting in six cars being damaged so badly they could not participate further.

     One car connected with the board guard rail at one place around the track and the plank ran through the car radiator.  Another car got too close to the fence and ripped off a board which he dragged for some distance.

     Approximately 50 cars started out in the competition in the biggest racing program of the season on the local track.  Purse money, divided among the winners of the various races was $744.

     There were seven scheduled races on the program, and an added feature race for a group of "supped-up" racing cars.*

     Lions club officials reported 1,353 paid admissions to the races.  Together with those directly connected with the competing cars, made an estimated total of over 1,500 persons who attended.

     Announcer for the races was Jack Shore, Arkansas City, who did an outstanding job.

*The "supped-up" racing cars were from the Coffeyville, Kansas area and members of the Southeast Kansas Racing Club.

All four of the pictures on this page are from an 8mm film that was taken from the north end of the grandstand at Winfield, Kansas on Labor Day, 1955 by Maryann Heaton.  In the two pictures above, the cars are at the head of the front straight away on the pace lap of one of the races.  Car #28, in the picture at left, was owned by Bud Luther of Wichita, Kansas and driven by Maryann's husband, Orville "Inky" Heaton.  The cars are shown racing out of the fourth turn in the pictures below.

     The #18 was a 1933 Buick sedan with a 1952 Buick Roadmaster engine. The car was owned by Kenny Neely and driven by Don Fortey both of Wichita, Kansas. That is Don Fortey shown kissing the trophy girl below.  Neely sold this car to Jim McMillan for $125 just a few days after these photos were taken and McMillan named Kenny Huffman to drive the car.  Do you know anything about the #43 or #10 cars shown above?  If you do, please contact Bob Lawrence at:  sprintguy @ cox.net

Return to page one of the History of Automobile Racing at Winfield website.