BlacktopTV presents: An interview with owner Jim Gililland and driver Wally Pankratz about the 110 Offenhauser powered 1947 Kurtis-Kraft Midget racecar at The Depot, as they test run it at Irwindale Speedway in Southern California.
I have great interest in what these guys do but for me this is a sad name Irwindale . It is where my uncle Jimmy Knight (Randerson) was fatally injured and pulled out of his burning cockpit by Mel Kenyon in 1967 not many days later he passed. He raced the Black Knight Special and was very succesfull in Chicago and Indiana area. Springfield , Hammond speedway and SantaFe Park in Tiedtville Ill (check that on google)Back in thoses days they my two uncles and father would run the midgets down the Chicago streets on the south side and no on would bother them. It must have been a great time. My father said he was headed home on the south side and there in the corner gas station was Jim and my dads younger brother they had flipped a Harley side car and it was on top of Wally . Jim and my dad Robert turned it over and got Wally back home in the side car he was really badly hurt but survived. Three tough guys that were brothers it doesnt get much better than a family like that!!! Towards the end of Jimmys career he lived in Worth Ill and had four midgets/Sprint cars in driveway ready to go...iam glad to say one was my father.. God Speed uncle Jim..
California midgets had two main engines in the late 1940s and early 1950s Half the field ran Offys and half ran Ford V-8 60 flatheads, and they were close to being even. The Ford was cheaper.
