"SuperMODELS"

Page 64

From Rick Falkiewicz















Comment from Rick: 
Flathead Model Pics attached from Reading 1958.  (Rick Falkiewicz Syracuse, NY)

Visitor's Comments To add your comments about THESE PHOTO - Click Here or email us at:  SuperModel_z64_101@3widespicturevault.com
Date: Visitor's  Name:

Comment:

12,24,14 Terry Fick Does this model ever bring back memories. Another popular car of "the day" was the blue and yellow 11 of Russ Smith. And of course my favorite, because he was a family friend, Hal "Hot Rod" Reifinger.

The noteworthy details include the skinny tires, street tries. In year to come M&H Racemaster drag tires were used on modifieds. No air filter, it cuts down horsepower. The tow bar. Few had trailers, just hook up a tow bar and drag the thing to the Fairgrounds. And the Ford truck steering box which if I recall was power assisted, two strong arms and blisters on the hands.

The Peach Bottom nuclear power electric generating plant was near or had just been completed and had come on line, the first in the country (still operating). Electricity generated from such plants was to become so inexpensive to produce it would be free. Electric heat, in those days resistance baseboard strip heaters, was sold as convenient (no fuel oil tank in the cellar) and clean (no soot like from coal or oil heat). It was also no maintenance unlike a forced air or baseboard hot water heating system.

Life was filled with promise at that time. It was predicted that future generations would work twenty-four to twenty-eight hour weeks and make more money in those reduced hours than in forty hours. We would have more time off. Of course the USSR had sent up Sputnik the year before and the Cuban Missile Crisis was yet to come, Reading was a first strike city due to a long abandoned AAC field (Spaatz Field if I recall) across the Fifth Street Highway from the Fairgrounds.

In spite of all those problems every Friday night we packed the stands and struggled to see the cars and breathe through the dust. I was five in '58 but I can still remember how excited I was when we went into the pits after the show to visit with friends. One night I shook the hand of the winner, Bobby Blatt, another friend of our family. I remember because I said, "his hand was hot," which got a big laugh from the grown ups, such things become etched in your mind surfacing in your later years.

I almost forgot, and who could ever forget, Rudy Genzell (I believe that is how his name was spelled) the Reading starter, running away from the cars as they approached, jumping into the air, and waving the green flag? I believe his name was Bob Warren, the announcer, "here they come, toward our starter Rudy Genzell, and there they go!"

Thanks so much for sharing your model and suffering my rose colored glasses view of days long gone by.
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     

Contact us below if you have a few "Super Model" pictures of your own that you'd like us all to see
"got pictures" of Super Models!

Back to SuperModels Homepage

Back to the Vault Index Page
Back to Homepage