hemicop, your resizing seems to be working, but what's up with the upper radiator hose ?

That upperradiator hose split that day. . I was happy to post ANY picture, so even one with busted parts makes me happy!

BACK TO THE STORIES----------
SO one night I'm sitting at the World's Fair Marina and a guy comes in with a BEAUTIFUL triple black '70 Hemi 'cuda on a trailer. This is a big-tire car & looked like it could easily be a nice S/S car. A real young guy (17 or so) gets out of the tow car & simply walks away & melts into the crowd. People start crawling all over the car----still no one owns up to owning the car. After a short time the cops show up & start chasing everyone out until there's just this 'cuda & a handful of cars. The cop starts yelling: "Who owns this car, gentlemen?!?! I'll tow it off, I really don't care!" he's shouting like this several times, then finally this kid shows up doesn't say anything & gets in the tow car & drives off.
Now what strikes weird about all this is, as far as I know, no one set up a race, the cop didn't do or say anything more to the owner & I never saw the car again either there or at any of the surrounding NY/NJ tracks. Rumor had it the kid's big brother built the car so maybe the brother took it & actualy used it somewhere.

Not racing, more an "exhibition of speed". 1979 me and a buddy head up in the hills for some target shooting and little beer drinking. On the way back I am driving his 1969 Chevy 396 wagon on I-90 in Issaquah (known speed trap) and got it up to 109. I then slowed down and about a mile down the road I am pulled over.

State bull said he was on the eastbound on ramp watching for speeders in the other direction. Said he had to drive 115 to catch up with me.

He was not impressèd with the guns on the back seat. Another reckless driving ticket. I was pretty good at getting them back in the day.

Kind of a streetracing story...........
An older friend of mine back then had a real nice '69 Nova big-block car. For its time it was a nice street/strip car somewhere in the 11-second range.
Now back then many of us didn't know as much as we thought (or should have) so it was unuasl for the engine mods to far outpower the rest of the car. My friend had partially welded his axle tubes to the centersection & thought a rosette weld & some beads along the ouside would suffice---WRONG! he's running slicks & a 4-spd, goes to launch it one time & the car looks like its doing everything it's supposed to---slicks wrinkle, front-end lifts, then-------- BANG! we go running to see what's up. Well it seems the car squatted a bit too much , the welds broke & he spun the centersection putting right through the floorboards! . Sadly, after that the car was pretty much a street-only car & he built a milder motor for it......

Cross Bay Blvd in Queens, '81. Had my 440 Dart it was slow night, nobody racing just hanging. Decide to make a solo pass, make U-turn and while waiting for traffic to clear some truck stops behind me. Thinking he wants to watch, I do a 1st and 2nd gear burnout. He pulls next to me and throws on his lights, yes NYPD EMS truck. I shutdown and get balled out by him for being a wisea##. Meanwhile a group of bikes stop in front to blast and wheelie. Cop throws papers back in my car and warned me to go home. Which I did.

Very nice, hemicop.
Too many to list but one I backed away from. Friend of mine with a pretty hot '68 Firebird and I (I'm in my '65 Valiant 340/727) were headed to a local cruise spot (circa '71-2). We jump on I-285 (3 lanes wide at that time) and my friend spots a '71 RR in the middle lane. He catches the guy and I ease up on the other side. As I'm coming alongside I notice the callouts on the hood- "HEMI". I slowed down and I'm guessing my buddy noticed the callouts also as he slowed back down also.

A Hemi was about the only car I'd readily back-down from ----- I just figured them as unbeatable, pretty much.
I remember one night driving my '67 big-block 'vette & a white '69 or so 'vette pulls up beside me. I'm out on Long Island somewhere & the roads are kind of twisty so I wasn't too sure about all this. The light goes green, he gets the jump on my & I go after him. Reeling him in wasn't tough at all but as the road starts getting curvy he stays in it & I'll be damned if if I'm gonna lose (yeah, stupid, I know. WEll, I guess he wasn't as sure of the whole thing either as we got to the apex of the first turn in a small series of "S"s, he backs waaaaay off. I stay in it, lose sight of him until the next light, a mile or two down the road. He looks over at me & just turns off the road sheepishly idling away. Truth be told, I'm sure he could've beaten me, but it was one of those things where the driver, not the car got beaten.....

I know the general consensus is they only made 4 or so '66 Hemi Belvedere, but I beg to differ as Suffolk County N.Y had more than that themselves. I wonder whatever became of those cars as I've seen plenty of 440 ex-police cars. My guess is they either went back to the factory due to the specialized engine. or some well-connected people were able to get them at auction.

Every Thursday night, at 12 midnight we would run like heck out of Belvidere Assembly Plant with our paychecks in our hands.

Since most of us were young (twenty something) we would get in our R/T's, Bees, Dusters and E-bodys of every color and Engine combination.

Burn rubber to get to downtown Belvidere (Worf's Tap).
Cash our checks and drink as much beer in the hour till closing,(1:00 AM) that we could.

Then race to somebody's apartment or mobile home and play euchre or Dirty Clubs till sunup.

Not to smart or legal, but we were young and dumb.

The end-of-the-night rituals always seemed fun. If we were at the Marina or Connecting we'd stop by a "Dunkin Donuts" on the way home. Of course some of us were drunk (yeah, it was stupid) so we'd mess with the waitress or other drunk customers then go to my friends house (his parents would be gone for the Summer!) and raise Hell, spend time (ahem!) with our girlfriends or simply pass out.
Now on more sober occassions we'd head out Northewrn Blvd (it ran almost the length of L.I.) and cruise through some of the smaller towns 'til the local cops either chased us off or simply followed us out of town. One night a Nassau County cop pulls me & my friend over, figuring we were casing businesses. After awhile he starts to loosen upp & starts asking us about our cars. He was maybe 10-15years older than we were, so with a new family he just kept saying how he wished he could have cars like we did.

This isn't a racing story per'se but back in 1966 a guy I knew who worked at a Chrysler plant here in Indy purchased a new HEMI Coronet, very sweet car. I lost contact with him somewhere around 1968. This spring a friend asked if I could help him load a 72 challenger on my trailer along with many, many extra parts that he bought from a guy on the east side of town. When we got there I saw the guy walking out to meet us and it was the same guy that had the Coronet. He still has it and it looks almost as good as it did back in 1966. Original drivetrain, interior, paint, etc. It was like being back in 1966. I was hoping that he might be ready to part with it but he said "I don't think so." Joe did quite a bit of street racing back in the day, just wish I could have ridden with him.

Funny you should bring that up. I sometimes wonder whatever became of the old streetracers we held in such high esteem back then. A friend of mine kept his '65 GTO for years in a barn then finally gave it to his nephew who supposedly re-did it. Don't know whatever became of the car but if he still had it, I'd love to re-do it for him.....

the baddest car I remember in the nyc/nj area was a 64 LeMans owned by a guy named 'elliot'... the car was an animal...until... he raced some brothers from jersey on a sunday nite who trailered in a 69 chevelle... he got spanked real bad that nite on arden ave on staten island.. couldn't race on south ave that nite as the cops where patrolling..

the rumour was the chevelle had a transplanted 'worked' all alum. 427.. the race wasn't even close...

Growing up we used to head down to the "A+M" on Sundays. It was called that because of the business at the end of the road. The road led into an industrial park with the A+M being the only building on the road. The pavement was new so the street was marked off at a 1/4 mile. Back then everything was closed on Sundays so there was never any traffic. On a good day there could be 200+ people there and a lot of fast cars from miles around. Eventually it ended around 1986 because of a few accidents that prompted the police to constantly patrol the street. Once in a while I can still hear a car there on a Sunday but the road is really beat up now and the street is home to 6 or 7 busunesses now. Great memories

here is a facebook link https://www.facebook.com/pages/I-raced-at-the-AM-The-unofficial-Marlboro-drag-strip/314663969429

While not a Mopar, this Chevelle was up to the task of many a street race back in the early 70's around Delaware County PA and carried a tuff reputation. Car was also frequently raced at Atco and Cecil County. Driving around PA with slicks on had its own risks back then... I recall the cops haveing eagle eyes for the slightest infractions.