Sox and Martin had two different Hurst hemi Cuda in 1968, the first one was a "early" car and the second one was better due to Hurst and Chrysler updating the construction of those cars as they where made. Dick Landy and Sox and Martin put on many dealership drag seminars, they got paid for doing those as well as being fully sponsored on all their cars, parts, haulers and employee wages and so on.
I was lucky enough to know several Mopar racers sponsored by Dodge and Plymouth that lived and raced out of SO CA, Dick and Mike Landy, Bob Lambeck, Joe Alread, Rudy Schling (SP?) John Dieanna and Dave Wren from the northwest.
I was at Landys shop in Northridge, CA on a Saturday morning in the early spring of 1971 or maybe in 1972, there was commercial car hauler unloading a bunch of new Dodges for them to build for some of there customers according to Robert Landy, I had ask him if those where going to be their new drag cars and he said no, they where for customers
I got to know John Dieanna well enough for him to sell me and a friend of mine some of his race parts after he quit racing full time and needed to work full time for Pertersen Publishing, he was working as the publisher, head honcho, for Motor Trend magazine and was spending a lot of time in Europe so he had to stop drag racing. I ask why he quit racing and it happen due to two of the Pertersen Sons getting kill in a airplane accident in Colorado while the family was on vacation and Pertersen gave him a choice, write and work full time for the company( he had been a part time editor, writer up until then) or go racing full time for Plymouth He chose writing.
I also ask him how much Plymouth paid him to race and he said his sponsorship include all the parts he needed and a unlimited credit card to race on as well as they paid for a full time employee working fo rhim taking care of the racing end, he didn't say he didn't get a salary but he was at every race national that NHRA put on back then as well as a lot of the Division 5,6 and 7 races He raced full time and wrote part time back then, racing at that level has never been cheap so it isn't hard to figure out who was paying him and how much he was making, he had a really nice house in San Fernando Valley, probably worth well north of $200,000.00 in 1977
I had the luck to be able to talk to Ronnie Sox at the 1975 Winternationals and again much later in 1991 at Rockingham , N.C. . Chrysler had made all the racers that they had been sponsoring in drag racing to quit racing Pro Stock for 1975 and go back to SS, Modified or Comp S&M had bought Judy Lilly original1968 Hemi Cuda to race in SS that year, that was when he told me about having two of the original 1968 Hemi Cuda. Chrysler supported many small time racers with parts back then, if you did good racing at the track and operated in a good professional manner at the track they would help you if you needed it
As far as that guys story about his Grandpa Valiant, me thinks he is making that story up about Sox and Martin not being able to get a Duster body back then. Plymouth wanted to sell Cuda, not Valiants so that is the body style they race with back then
Butch Leal was one of the first drag racers that I can remember going against the grain on racing a Duster in Pro Stock instead of a Cuda, he did win that years World finals in Ontario, CA but Chrysler protested something about the car after the race and I don't remember the outcome now
Time flys and stories get enriched or forgotten in time