Cotton Perry

[Alan Roehrich]

They brought that car up to the legendary "Union Hill", or "the Hill", AKA Music City International Raceway 1/8 mile track many times to run in "Combo I" which was the "no breakout" class where class cars ran off their index with no breakout. It was indeed a 0.060" over 292 Chevy six. I think I saw at least three different induction systems on the car, 3 Holley two barrel carbs, 3 Weber side draft carbs, and a single Holley four barrel. The engine was radically modified, Jim Headrick even milled the head bolt columns out of the intake ports to allow access to the ports for more radical porting, then used a stud and nut in the intake port to hold the head down, and a pipe plug in the valve cover area to seal off the intake port. I think the weight break for H/MP was 11 lbs per cubic inch. When NHRA killed off Modified Eliminator, H/MP was one of those classes that did not get moved into Super Stock or Comp, that weight break was eliminated, and they were told to "just move to another class", but the car just could not make a competitive weight in another class with their combination, so the Pocket Rocket simply got parked. At one point, Cotton ran in Comp with a six cylinder dragster, but eventually that got parked too, and Cotton stopped drag racing.

Cotton does still run a shop in Ringgold. Jim Headrick died several years ago, in a car accident I think. Cotton's son runs a dirt car, I think. Rumor was that Cotton was building a replica of the Pocket Rocket, and was also looking to find the original.