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Re: Masten Gregory

To: vintage-race@Autox.Team.Net
Subject: Re: Masten Gregory
From: pmeis@bgsm.edu (paul meis)
Date: Thu, 18 Sep 1997 15:44:47 -0400 (EDT)
>Masten Gregory died in 1985, of a heart attack in his sleep, while
>living in Italy. There's a nice short piece about him in
>Denise McCluggage's collection "By Brooks too Broad for Leaping" ...
>[which, if anyone on this list has *NOT* read, I would tell you to
>stop what you're doing RIGHT NOW and find a copy (ISBN 0-9642309-0-9;
>you can probably get a copy through Denise, fax 505 982 5250).
>
>Read "Ring Around the 'Ring" first.]
>
>Anyway, Masten was best known for his habit of jumping out of cars
>that were about to crash; he did it two or three times. He more or less
>stopped driving in 1973 after LeMans when Jo Bonnier was killed.
I had the pleasure of seeing Masten run at Omaha, 1954, Iowa City 1955, and
see him win a great underdog victory with Lucky Casner at the Nurburgring
1000 Km in 1961, in an aging Birdcage Maser. One of Goodyear's first road
racing coups--Sticky Goodyears and wet, (sleet) conditions. Masten was
definitely a cool guy. He was quoted in an article that he was really
surprised that he survived that dangerous era of racing. Let's have a toast
to the bespeckled gentleman from Kansas City. He was always an underdog,
usually in less than the latest equipment, but he could race with the tall
dogs!
Paul Meis, Team Escargot
Our Credo: "Rub shoulders, not fenders".



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