Connecting Highway

[Ed Fernandez]

Originally Posted by hemicop

I ran around a few of those places back then--Connecting, conduit, Francis Lewis & the World's Fair Marina. I had a '71lime green Pinto that today you'd call it a "proStreet" car. It was caged, tubbed,etc. with a mild smallblock Chevy. Got it from a guy who worked at Corvette City in Elmont. I knew John D'Andrea pretty well back then. He lived off of 150th in his parent's basement. At the time he was a Housing Authority cop and it always amazed me no one seemed to know that. Like alot of others he'd work on the Gremlin in the street in front of his house.One day a guy goes by his house smoking the tires & John threw a wrench through the guy's back window! The guy comes around & John Badges him & tells him to get the **** outta there--end of discussion!!! He was the first guy I knew that had an automatic for racing, from Vitar Engineering as I recall. He knew a guy that had an original S/S AMX and wound up using its top-end for a little while. He eventually bought the car from the guy and kept it in a garage near RP. I saw him years ago, he was working for Scott Schafiroff and still working on cars in front of his parent's house. It's been a long time since I spoke to him but I'm guessing not much has changed. He said he'd never get rid of the AMX (don't blame him!) . I have my own "war stories" about those places & miss the whole scene but I never was one of the "big dogs" and generally ran against my own "locals" that lived in Flushing....

John's AMX wasn't one of the 53 Hurst cars.The T/F in his car may have been one of
Vinnie's early T/Fs but Vinnie had a bunch of Turbo's out at that time.
The one I got off John was one of Vinnie's units.

[Paul Ceasrine]

Max-Wedge-Tony,
Post those pictures you have of The Mutt Brothers,
the 1968 Black Hemi Dart (the ex-S & K Hemi Dart).
Some mis-information out there on some internet pages.
They got the car in the Spring of 69'.
It did run on the track also, and did hit a 10.97, in SS/B.
PC

[herbjr]

I talked to dad today and The Smallwood Brothers bought Ronnies 71 Cuda but they also purchased a few more Shop cars, cars built by them that werent driven by Ronnie or Herb.

Herb Jr

[Lew Silverman]

Anyone remember running West Shore Road in Port Washington in the late 60's? We used to choose-up at the Wetson's on Northern Blvd. The stretch of road in front of Bar Beach was straight and flat and the top of the hill did help slow you down. There was a primered 55 Chevy coupe (driven by John Balch?) that used to clean-up, and assorted 409's and Max-Wedge's. One night Eddie Akem brought the A&P Auto T/F down and made a short pass, but right after that the Nassau Co. police shut us down.

[Carl Juliano]

Originally Posted by Lew Silverman

Anyone remember running West Shore Road in Port Washington in the late 60's? We used to choose-up at the Wetson's on Northern Blvd. The stretch of road in front of Bar Beach was straight and flat and the top of the hill did help slow you down. There was a primered 55 Chevy coupe (driven by John Balch?) that used to clean-up, and assorted 409's and Max-Wedge's. One night Eddie Akem brought the A&P Auto T/F down and made a short pass, but right after that the Nassau Co. police shut us down.

I work in Port Washington frequently and always wondered if they raced on West Shore Rd. I mentioned it to my father, but he raced in Queens, Bklyn. He told me they also ran on Crossbay Blvd. in Broad Channel, the FDNY used to come and open up the hydrants so they couldnt race.

[Ed Fernandez]

Originally Posted by Carl Juliano

I work in Port Washington frequently and always wondered if they raced on West Shore Rd. I mentioned it to my father, but he raced in Queens, Bklyn. He told me they also ran on Crossbay Blvd. in Broad Channel, the FDNY used to come and open up the hydrants so they couldnt race.

Carl your old man used to race a Studebaker buckboard at Connecting.One HP.They had to sweep the road down after he made a pass.

[Carl Juliano]

Originally Posted by Ed Fernandez

Carl your old man used to race a Studebaker buckboard at Connecting.One HP.They had to sweep the road down after he made a pass.

LOL, he never showed me pictures of that one!.......never heard about it either!.....lol

[hemicop]

the FDNY used to come and open up the hydrants so they couldnt race.[/QUOTE]

AHHH I remember that tactic well! The cops used to do that at Connecting. They'd open up the hydrants on the access road & let it run down onto the highway--got rid of both spectators & racers in one shot. My friend tried to shut a hydrant off one night & the cops arrested him for "Disrupting Governmental Justice". Never heard of it before or since. My sister who was a NYC Prosecutor said there is such a charge--kinda CS if you ask me.

[Jim B]

Originally Posted by Lew Silverman

Anyone remember running West Shore Road in Port Washington in the late 60's? We used to choose-up at the Wetson's on Northern Blvd.

Nothing like a "big W" and a couple of runs on a Friday or Saturday night. It's been years since I even thought about that.

[cammer427]

Someone mentioned to me that some of the roads around JFK, including 150th/S. Conduit, were changed around in the '90s (?). Is 150th/S. Conduit itself any different than it was back in the '70s, or has it been re-routed/moved around since (I'm not talking re-paved, I'm talking it's location actually "moved" to some degree)?