Mike
Saw your bit on the movie and noticed your comment about the woman race
driver concept being a bit ahead of its time.
Actually not so. There resided in southern California a women's racing
drivers club that had a fair number pretty good women racers. I think at one
time there were at least eight of the ladies that held senior licenses and
could race in the senior events. Other than that they had a women's race at
most of the sanctioned events on the west coast during the fifties.
Mary Davis, Ruth Levy, Ina Balchowsky, Linda Scott, Lauraine Wood, Janet
Lake, Sue Mathews, Josie von Neumann and Barbara Windhorst to name a few.
Denise McCluggage and Ruth Levy were active on the national scene and
later Donna Mae Mims was the first SCCA woman Champ driving her pink Sprite
to a national title in, I believe, 1961.
I had to mention this as the "Frigid Princess" hinted that if I didn't
say something I might get to eat in the garage by myself - - again.
Cheers
Ron Yates, Editor
Dipstick Digest
mailto:dipstickdigest@ctaz.com
----- Original Message -----
From: Michael Frank <mfrank@westnet.com>
To: <vintage-race@autox.team.net>
Sent: Monday, February 07, 2000 5:09 PM
Subject: RE: Speedvision Movie
> Shifting topics a bit. We just picked up a fun movie on video. It's the
> 1954 film, "The Fast and the Furious".
>
> The heroine, played by Dorthy Malone, is driving her XK120 in a race from
> California to Mexico. She crosses paths with an escaped convict played by
> John Ireland. He kidnaps her, and commandeers the car, joining the race in
> a bid to escape the cops by slipping across the border. Of course, they
> fall in love, he's innocent, and they have to prove that to the cops. Ok,
> not great theater, although a female race driver was a bit ahead of it's
> time. The race scenes are INCREDIBLE. There are XK120's, Jowett Jupiters,
> Nash Healeys, MG TC's, Ferraris, a cornucopia of early '50s sportscars. At
> one point, they attend a Vintage race...now, vintage racing in 1954 is
> something to see.....Mercers, Stutz's, a Stanley Steamer...the race is won
> by "Benny's Maxwell"....you'd have to be of an age to understand the joke.
>
> The video is available from TVideo: http://www.tvideo.com/
>
> It's worth the price of admission...
>
> Mike Frank
> New York
>
>
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