The Great Danbury State Fair Boat Races

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:02):
Go behind the wheel, under the hood and beyond with
car Stuff from house stuff works dot Com. Find Welcome
to car Stuff. I'm Scott and I'm Ben. We are
joined today with our super producer and colleague in arms,
Matt Madman Frederick. He takes that nickname from another show,

(00:24):
The Man the Madman, really the Man Dare. I asked,
where should we just let it go at that? Believe
it is his story to tell. I see, I understand,
which is odd because I made it up just now?
All right, all right, Well, today we're going to kind
of wade into some waters that car stuff normally doesn't
wait to do and night, and we're going to talk
about boats today and a specific type of boat and

(00:45):
a really interesting bit of history. As you might expect.
I mean, we seem to find kind of the unusual
angles to all this stuff and and we have found
a really interesting one here and we're definitely gonna talk
about it today. We've we've touched on boats in the past.
You know, We've talked about um offshore racing in the past,
we talked about yacht racing, cranio planes, traveling the world

(01:06):
by cargo ship, Yeah, exactly. We we've we've touched on
boat racing in the past and boats, but we've never
done a sailing episode. Uh. There's probably a good reason
behind next neither neither one of us are sailors. But um,
we're going to talk about something called the Danbury Boat
Races today. And before we get to that, though, I
would like to read a little bit of listener mail,

(01:27):
if that's okay, please all right. We don't normally do
this either. This is this is not on the on
the same subject, but I felt like it was a
good time to do it. Uh. So this comes from
Glenn Beck. And Glenn is just returning from the Big
Sky Rally and uh, you know twenty sixteen rally where
he's out west and we talked about that on this
show as well. And oh, by the way, they raised
more than they had hoped for in the for Camp Sunshine,

(01:50):
and they ended up raising one hundred and eighteen thousands,
seven hundred and eighty one dollars to date for that cause. So, um,
an excellent, excellent showing there by everybody who donated to
that cause. And uh, he sent along this this note
that says the subject was a couple of good stories
and of course I'm interested in that always, but this
is really interesting, he says. A fellow rally participant, his

(02:13):
name is Mike, arranged for several of US Mustang drivers
to join him and a friend named Rich Jr. For
a breakfast after I start from Kelogo, Idaho, and Rich
Junior brought along his father, who was of course Rich Senior,
and he shared a couple of very interesting stories with him,
you know, at the breakfast there he said he was retired,
he's retired now, but he worked at Ford in the
department that built their prototype cars, you know, back in

(02:36):
the day. So this is, you know, a long time ago.
And I'll tell you how long ago in just a moment.
The first story is these are both very short. Um
in nineteen sixte Rich and his team were busy building
the first Mustang and we're not talking about the Midage
and Mustang one, but the very first of the nineteen
sixty four body cars they put in. They had just
finished putting in a fourteen hour day to get the
car finished. And when they were finished, somebody suggested suggested

(02:58):
that they go out for pizza, and in a few beers,
another one said, well, who's driving, and they all simultaneously
turned and looked at the Mustang and decided that was
the car they were going to take out for the
for the pizza and beers. I can't believe they did that.
I mean, first of all, taking a prototype car out,
you know, out in the town, I guess, but they did. Um.
He says that at the at the pizza shop, the

(03:18):
crowd gathered around the car, and a picture even appeared
in the local newspaper. He said that they took a
lot of heat over that one the next day of
work because or soon after whenever the picture appeared. It's
like the early days of the spy photography, you know,
like without the camouflage. Um boy, I'll have to look
that up. I'm gonna see if I can find that

(03:39):
some micro fish somewhere in some you know, in some newspaper.
The second story is um, Well, of course we know,
LEEI Coca came up with a minivan idea while he
was still afford and he and Rich he Will I
Coca along with Rich and his team built a prototype
of the minivan while they were at Ford Well. Henry
for the second saw it and hated the idea, and
he and hy Coco were already on the outs already

(04:00):
and this was the you know, like the final straw.
So he Henry the second fired, I Coca. Coca left,
but he took the minivan blueprints and the prototype itself
with him to Chrysler and the rest is history. That's
how Chrysler came, you know, had came to have their
first events because of Lee I Coca, who was working
at Ford. Wow. Interesting, huh. I mean that's just two

(04:22):
of the tales here from from this rich senior over
breakfast with with Glenn and the guys from the rally.
That's so yeah, very cool. So it's, you know, right
from a guy who was actually there. I love stories
like that, you know, when you're talking to old timers
about you know, what they were up to during their
working days, and you find some interesting things they come across,
some interesting characters along the way, first hand witnesses to

(04:44):
history in the making, you know. So thanks Glenn for
sending that. Yeah. I always great to hear from Glenn,
and of course, long time listeners you are probably familiar
with Glenn. Now we're moving to something a little bit different.
As as you said earlier, Scott and I really appreciated
your way into New Waters. I usually leave that stuff

(05:06):
up to you, but today I felt like I had
a solid felt the calling. Right. So we're going to
start our story in the US in the northeastern part
in New England, in in a place called Danbury, UH,
specifically Danbury, Connecticut, Western Connecticut, at the UH at well,

(05:29):
the former Danbury State Fairgrounds. Right. Yeah, we have to
say former because as of what nineteen eight one, I
believe they don't hold that fair there any longer. It's
it's moved somewhere else, right, Yeah. So the Danbury Fair
was a an annual exhibition that started in eighteen twenty one,

(05:49):
So there's a lot of history behind this as what
an agricultural agricultural fair at that time, right, Yeah, just so,
And they didn't really have a schedule that they consistently
stuck to UH for the first couple of decades. It
wasn't until eighteen sixty nine that they actually got their
schedule of ten days every October once a year. Yeah,

(06:12):
And that was because a couple of hat manufacturers by
the name of Rundle and White UH stepped in and
decided that they were going to make the Danbury far
Danbury Fair rather part of the Farmers and Manufacturer Society.
And that's uh, it just grew the fair exponentially because
the fair took up one hundred acres of what they
would hope would be called the Danbury Pleasure Park, which

(06:34):
just I think and later on it just became known
as the Great Danbury State Fair, right, Yeah, the biggest
best show in town. Admission was cents for adults, fifteen
cents for the kiddos. You would go here, and if
you've seen a state fair, then you probably have a
pretty good idea approximately what this was like. You would

(06:56):
see a lot of local um produce, right, fruits, probably
some some locally made like wines or or ciders, beverages.
Then they would also be selling hats, leather goods. Yeah,
there's like the livestock. There's you know, people trying to
grow the largest tomatoes and watermelons and pumpkins and things

(07:17):
like that. And you know all the stuff that goes
along with the state Fair. Plus the midway plus and
this is my favorite part of about fairs. They have
things like demolition derby's, they have you know, the auto
thrill shows. They have motorcycle stunt shows. One thing that
they had here was car racing. Well initially they had
horse racing. Right then they moved on to um, you know,
midget car racing, stock car races on on a small

(07:38):
dirt track that they had on the fair grounds, like
a quarter mile track around nineteen thirty two, nineteen thirty two,
and so they've been doing that for a while. And
then right around I think it was like in the
nineteen forties when the guy that uh, you know, we'll
get to uh, the guy that runs the place in
just a moment, but right around nineteen forty is when
it switched hands, when when there became an owner of

(08:00):
the fair one single person. We'll talk about him later,
but um, moving past that, about ten years after this
guy took over, uh, in the nineteen fifty something very
unusual happened at the Danbury Fairgrounds and something that only
existed for one year. They only ran for one season. Right,
we're putting on our missed in history caps today, my friends,

(08:23):
because let's see, how would they have pitched this? Do
you think, Scott, if we could what if a little bit, yeah,
how would you how would you tell the decision makers
at the fair because now there's one owner, right, but
there were easily around a thousand or more people who

(08:44):
worked on this thing. Yeah, well there's a thousand employees
by by what year was its Yeah, so it's a
it's a huge fair. It's probably grown, you know, even
bigger than that at that point, maybe let's say or
something like so, how do you how do you get um?
You know, well, they're hoping to get one hundred thousand visitors,
are you know even more than that to come through
this place? Well? I don't know, Ben, I mean, what

(09:05):
do you what do you do? You just you I
guess you'd put posters all over town, you know, proclaiming
what you're what you're about to do, because it's it's
sort of I'd say it's revolutionary, really, I mean, it's
we see versions of this now in the modern times.
I mean we see um, like with jet boat racing
where they put the giant V eight engines into small
boats and they flood um, you know, low dugout trenches

(09:27):
in a field somewhere. That's that's sort of like this.
But what do you do? And you tell them that
you're going to create the nation's first aqua way, right,
you heard it correctly, folks. The nation's first awkward way,
meaning a marine race track. Yeah. So and on the
grounds where there was formerly the dirt track the car

(09:50):
racing Church, which is an like a quarter mile oval track.
They decided they were going to flood that, so they
called it the former horse racing track. That they were
going to flood that. So they had to build walls
on the edges. You know, I think it looked like
tile walls to me that they've built, and they were
going to somehow and keep water in this track area

(10:10):
for uh deep enough for boat races they're gonna run,
you know, like these little hydroplane type boat races. Um
and amazing undertaking really when you think about it, just
to think about the logistics of doing something like this,
and they're gonna keep that for at least one season.
I think they had plans to go farther than that,
but we'll find out what happened later. Um In this
is early in nineteen fifties, So Ma, nineteen fifty It

(10:33):
was a Saturday that was the very first, you know,
the the opening night of these of these speedboat races
at the Danbury Fairgrounds. Yeah. So, as you said, the tracks,
uh about fourth of a mile long oval, thirty ft wide,
three ft deep, three ft deep. They're gonna keep three
feet of water on a dirt race track. Now that's

(10:54):
I mean, I'm sure they're continually adding water to this thing,
you know, you know, not only evaporation but also you know,
just water soaking in and seeping in. They did this
for a full season, ben They they did this every
Saturday for a full season. So it's a it's a
really fascinating thing. And not only not only did they
do this, they decided that they were going to build
their own type of boat to race any graces because

(11:15):
it's a it's a it's an unusual course. It's very small,
very very narrow. As you can imagine, most boats aren't
gonna just aren't gonna be able to fit in. Yeah,
what do we say? It was thirty ft wide, a
quarter mile around, thirty ft wide, three ft deep. The
depth really doesn't matter because these boats runs so shallow.
But you can imagine what we're talking about, except or
maybe you can't. I don't know. They're very small boats.

(11:36):
They're about ten what ten ft five inches in length,
and the beam, which is the widest part of the boat,
is about fifty five inches. So you get two or
three of these side by side on the course and
that's all the width you've got. Really, it's not it's
not there's not a lot of elbow room, I guess
in this case. Um yeah, these are these are tiny,

(11:56):
one person outfits and they were built by the fair.
Is um carpenter, the master carpenter at the fair, and
his name was Cohler. I forget his first Harold's Cohler,
Harold color, that's the guy. And so the owner of
the fair commissioned him to design and build these boats
and he did. I think he probably had others that
helped him. I don't think he built every single one
of them. Yeah, we we have, just we didn't really

(12:20):
discuss how many there are either. Yea. There's some speculation
that there were as many as twenty nine, but as
few as twenty one. So you can see there's gonna
be some you know, some number uh discrepancies here as
we as we talk about this, and we'll just be
upfront about this that you know, from different sources, you
hear different things, and the speculation is that there was

(12:40):
between twenty one and twenty nine. Most of them were
wooden hull boats. However, Yeah, there were two, there were fiberglass,
and one of the two fiberglass boats still exists. There's
only a few still around. And that's why we're talking
about them today because they had a reunion recently in
two and by recently, I mean two thousand ten. And
I just kind of numbled across these these news items

(13:01):
and pulled together some info from here and there, and
we found out about this thing. But in two thousand
and ten, three of them came together on one one
lake to uh, you know, just kind of get together
and race again against each other for the you know,
the first time in sixty years that they have been together, right,
And we need to emphasize that part, Scott. They were
still in racing condition. They've been kept up. This is

(13:24):
boat twenty four and thirty eight, right, Yes, And there's
another one that is supposedly seaworthy that it is in
Wisconsin somewhere, and we'll get to where these all dispersed
you later. But there's one more that didn't make it
to this event that we're talking about, and I think
it's in Massachusetts, the lake on Massachusetts. And they said
the only other reunion that these boats have had was
back in the nineteen eighties, and and that's significant. Well,

(13:46):
I guess maybe not as significant as the two thousand
and ten event because in the nineteen eighties, that was
just after they were kind of rediscovered, right because we
we said that it was only one season, and I
feel like there's so many were skipping over so much here,
but um, there's only one season to the season. And
after that they were they was put into dry storage.

(14:07):
They were they were put away in some warehouse on
the fairgrounds, you know, um, in a shed somewhere, a
big building. But the amazing part is that the owner
of the fair and of course the carpenter that that
worked on these things, they had an interest in keeping
them in good shape and good condition that whole time,
thinking then maybe someday we're gonna run these again, or
there's another plan for these maybe, Yeah, especially because there's

(14:29):
such unique craft. You know, they're they're handmade. Um, we
should talk a little bit about the specks, and you
mentioned the beam and and the fact that they were
building these watercraft specifically for this track, right, yeah, because
they're very very small again ten and a half or
ten ft five inches long, and I already have some

(14:50):
questions regarding uh performance and equality, because you know the
thing about racing is that ideally the rules make it
such that whether we're talking about a car, a truck,
or even in this case a speedboat, they're supposed to
all be very close in performance. But some of the
engines were different on these and then you know, the

(15:11):
material was different in a couple with the fiberglass. So
like these engines might be forty four cubic inch inboard
crossley engines or forty eight cubic Well, the difference is
the forty four was a tin block and the forty
eight cubic inch was a cast iron and iron block
and it was more reliable. I guess the tin block
was unreliable, and they uh not quickly, but they decided, well,

(15:35):
we're gonna start swapping some of these out, and I
think that's what they did. So I don't know if
they all eventually stifted over to forty eight or they
had a mix of the two. But they also had
um different classes. Now I saw somewhere that um, this
was actually an an American power Boat Association or a
p b A sanctioned events, So uh, they ran under

(15:56):
a p b A official rules, and I think that
you know, their their class designation. I don't know if
it was because of the uh, um, the fiberglass hall
or because the wooden hall, or if it was because
of the engine size or what it was. But they
had different classes, so races would be you know, anywhere
between eight or ten laps in length, depending on the
class that you were in a P B A class.

(16:17):
So this, this whole thing is really fascinating. I mean,
there's there's so much about it, like and it was
so so temporary. It only ran again for that one
season in nineteen fifty. Uh. Starting in I've got the uh,
I guess the opening uh poster or bill that was posted.
It really is I got to print out in front
of me and in a big, you know, bold red

(16:37):
letters said speed It says speedboat races on the Danbury
Fair Water Course, the first water speedway it's kind in
the United States. And opening night Saturday fifty and then
every Saturday night thereafter so um, you know, the grand stands,
for instance, would open at seven pm the time trials
would begin at seven thirty, and then the races would
start at eight thirty. And there were seven events, you know,

(16:59):
over the over the the course of the evening, and
they would have, you know, nationally known pilots. They had,
of course, these specially built race boats. They were really fast.
They were thrilling, I guess from what I've heard, um
just really an interesting thing. And I was wondering, how
how rough do you think that that water would be
after one lap around this thing? It's got to be
I mean, the you know, just the action of the wakes,

(17:21):
you know, going back and forth between those those tiled walls,
and you can get you can get a feel for
that in some of the pictures of the racist because
there are pictures available online a very few, one, very few,
a handful. One thing I forgot to mention that we
that I'm sure you guys are dying to hear, how
fast did these go? They went in an excess of

(17:41):
forty miles an hour, which may not sound like that much,
but when you consider the tight quarters and you consider
the tiny again, the tiny size of these boats, that's
pretty fast. These single seater boats that you're I mean,
you're right on the water, and you know the guys
that own them, now how they say, you know, I
can I've pushed this one up to fifty miles an

(18:02):
hour in the lake before. But he said, when you're
going thirty five, it feels like you're going sixty. When
you're going, you know, forty five, it feels like you're
going one hundred miles an hour. It's just it's an
unbelievable sensation of speed when you're that low and in
such a small, loud craft. And that's what they say
is it's a lot like um, it's a lot like
go karts on the water, you know, in that in
that same sense, you know, it's it's very agile, it's

(18:24):
it's not very smooth at all. It's a rough ride.
It's it's abrupt, it's uh, it's loud, it's it's it's
just a lot of fun. There's so much sensation to
these boats that you don't have to go, you know,
faster than forty miles an hour. And if you like,
you're really really traveling fast. And of course when you
get into that tight you know, the confines of that
tight course and with other boats all around you, I

(18:45):
can't imagine what that was like. And some of these photos,
you know, there's all I see at the most any
and any photo that I can find is four boats together,
but there are shots of it. Um of these boats
at the uh I guess the the launching dock as
the as the it's a prepping yeah, and they're kind
of holding them back getting ready to start the boats.
And we'll tell you about that in a second too.
But they're holding the both back. And there's more than

(19:06):
four in a row there, so there's a chance that
there was many a six or seven on the course
at one time. We didn't mention this yet, Ben, but
these boats don't have any gears. Yeah, yeah, there's no
clutch in these, so they just go. Yeah. So you
you know, you're waiting at the doctor start, they power
it up and that's it. That's the start of the race.
So it's it's off and on and that's about it.

(19:28):
Of course you got throttle control right, you know for
speed variation, but uh there's no neutral, there's no reverse.
There's just on or off and that's it. And these
are these are time trials. Oh and one thing I
want to take a quick side note here. Listeners, several
of you probably caught this earlier. We said that originally

(19:49):
this fair ran for ten days every October, but then
we said this the dan Berry Water Racing ran for
a season which was every Saturday starting in May that year,
and that is because the fair expanded. We should point
that out. Yeah sure, and you know when they're running
the midget cars of the stock cars, that's the same thing.

(20:10):
You know, you've got you go to the fair grounds
in order to watch the races on Saturday, right, And
it's just the local track really at that point. And
so the fair is not operational, but the track is.
And we we have to ask Scott what what happened?
You know, because they put these they put these boats
in dry storage for what three decades, But but it's

(20:31):
not like they were stowed away and forgotten because employees
for the fair were still taking these outperforming regular maintenance,
turning over the engine and stuff. I find that incredible,
you know, I mean we we said earlier that they
had an interest in keeping them in good shape, and
and I find that amazing that that they would, you know,
have employees oil the machines, you know, maintain them so

(20:52):
that you know they're in relatively good shape. I don't
know if they were even you know, water worthy at
that you know, after thirty years, probably not in seals
dry out and things like that. But um, but but
mechanically they were sound, and so I guess what happened
was they realized that it just wasn't the money maker
that they thought it was going to be. And it
was probably very difficult to keep the water in the track.

(21:13):
You know, they probably were just continually battling that that
that situation. So um, I think they just decided that
it was a better fit for them to, uh, you know,
go with the car racing again for the season, and
which is what they did. They removed the aqua way,
you know, all the walls and all that and uh
and they put down a paved course. This time they
made a little bit bigger. I think they went to

(21:34):
a third of a mile and a paved course, a
paved oval, and h then resume stock car and midget
car racing and they did that for decades. Again. It's
just if we can imagine, you know, the logistics involved,
to your point, are probably what sank the race, you know,
just having to continually support that sort of infrastructure. Oh,

(21:56):
I'm sure it did. Yeah, it can't be easy. It's
got to be a pretty big drag on the on
the staff. There you know, to have to uh and
not I mean to drag as far as like it's
you know, a task they don't want to do. I mean,
it's like it takes a lot of man hours to
do something like that, to put something like that together,
and then to maintain the track and to maintain the machines.
And because you know, these these boats as there, it's

(22:17):
it's part of the property. It's part of the uh. Um,
the whole thing, I mean, the whole show is is
run right there from the from the fairgrounds. It's like
all um, all under that umbrella. Maybe I'm I'm over
describing this thing because it makes sense. It's like instead
of having people bring in their own individual race cars
to race in the track, they've got these vehicles that

(22:38):
stay there at the track. And of course you know
they have teams that come in and raise them. But uh,
they're the property of the fair And now for a
interesting question at least I I think it's interesting listeners.
I hope, I hope it interests you as well. Scott.
This question is for you and for everybody out there listening.
Will you raise some one of these when I race
some one? Oh? Definitely, yeah, I think especially in comparison

(23:03):
to several other types of races that were around this time,
stock cars, midgets, etcetera. It's strange. I know, it only
ran for one season, so we don't have a good
sample size, but it seems somewhat safer. Yeah, we didn't
hear of any you know, tragedies happening at this ferry
an right, So this wasn't something that got shut down

(23:25):
due to a catastrophe or an accident. No, it wasn't
like the both were launching themselves into the crowd or something.
You know, it wasn't It wasn't like that. It's just
that that the fans seemed the fan base for stock cars,
and the profit margin for stock cars seemed more consistent
and reliable. Yeah, that's probably it. I'm sure there was
a lot of interest in this, and I'm sure they
had a regular crowd that came. Sure, but I don't

(23:46):
think that it was quite the draw as you say,
you know, for you know, for the stock cars in
the midget race. But you would you would race, and
I would race as well. Oh yeah, have you ever
rented a small boat like this? I've I've done this
at resort locate before, Like Uh, let's see Silver Lake,
Michigan where the sand dunes are out on the west
side of the state. Uh. They used to. I don't

(24:07):
know if they still do or not, but they rent
little boats like this, single seaters, maybe it's two seat,
I can't remember, but very small. And what's great about
it is that you know, they're not like tether to
a track. You know, you don't have to remain in
one simple little are. You got access to the whole
lake and going where you want. If you get a
couple of people that rent them, you can do some
some wake jumping with you know, the other boats there.

(24:28):
And they're fast. It's not like they're you know, like
powered with electric motors or anything. They've had a pretty
fast outboard motor on them. And there's a few places around,
at least around in the States that you can still
do this kind of thing. I don't know if Silver
Lake still does it or not, but because I was,
you know, twenty five years ago, maybe even more. UM.
But man, it's a lot of fun. It's so much fun.
I had an uncle that would race race both like this,

(24:50):
UM semi professionally. I guess probably in the A p
V A UM on Lake Orion in Michigan, and uh,
it's he and his kid. He was an engineer at
General Motors. He had a blast doing this type of thing.
He talked about it all the time at trophies had
um you know photos of you know, the small little
um I don't know, kind of like sea fleet type
boats that you know, they put these enormous outboard motors

(25:12):
on and I just have a blast. I don't know
how fast it would go, but it was really fun.
You know. I have not I have not had the
pleasure yet. It's officially on my bucket list. When I
was when I was much younger, there was a thing
that some amusement parks would do where they would let
kids and adults, uh rent in kind of an enclosed

(25:33):
space watercraft that were essentially like tiny bumper cars. Oh yeah,
you remember those? Yeah? Sure, I think there's still some
some places around to do that bumper boats, I think, yeah, yeah,
So I had had had that experience, which I think
is totally different. One time I got in an escapade
on a jet ski that did not belong to me.
I think the statute of limitations has passed. Uh this

(25:57):
this we're back in high school days. Was this a
stand up jet ski or was it one that you
sit on? Oh? It was. It was all classy, man,
it was. It was you sit on it and you
have the you have to tie the key to your
wrists so that if you don't fall off. I fell
off several times in the course of stealing this vehicle.
I think, I think that's stealing the vehicle. I see,

(26:18):
it's borrowing if you give it back, I see, you know.
I was. What I was thinking was if it was
long enough ago, it would be the original. Um, the
official jet ski, the Kasaki, I think, yeah. Yeah, and
the stand up ones those are those are a lot
of fun too. Yeah. It's really tough to to, you know,
handle the first time you try it, but man, they're man,
they're fun. Personal watercraft are a blast, and this is

(26:39):
kind of like it's a version of I guess it
is a personal watercraft, but it's a different type of
personal watercraft. You have to see the photos to understand
the type of boat we're talking about. And then before
we get too much further, because I want to talk
about what happened to the boats eventually, but um, the
owner of the fair that we didn't get to mention lay. Yeah,
John Lahey he owned the fair from the nineteen forties
until he died in nineteen seven five, and he left

(27:01):
behind and I know this because I found some some
official court documents later off. But he he left behind
in the state that was valued at seven million, two
hundred and thirteen thousand, six hundred and four dollars. So
he did all right with fair over those years. And
I think that there was a lot more to it
than that, because I saw the documents that had numbers
in the like in the twenty five million dollar range

(27:21):
when they sold when the family sold off their interest
in the fair, which was a little bit later, but
I guess once uh, once he died in nineteen seventy five,
the whole organization just kind of fell into disarray. And
the last day of the fair was October twelfth of
nineteen eighty one, and they stay in nine. Four hundred
thousand people attended the fair that year, so it was still, uh,
it's still very popular, but the organization itself was crumbling

(27:45):
because the guy that was at the top was really
keeping everything together. Um, he was no longer there, and
it just sort of crumbled from the top down. And
it's sad. I mean, it's really sad. Um and then eventually,
you know, the fair in one so just maybe what
six years later, six or seven years later, they decided
they were not going to uh not gonna hold the
fair anymore. They shut it down, which was a very

(28:06):
sad day for a lot of people. And they directed
a mall I think on that location. Right, there's the
the Danbury Fair Mall, which I don't know, Ben, that
seems terrible that you know, there's a shopping mall now
on the on the property that was this with um well,
what they thought was going to be called the Danbury
Pleasure Park, you know, back in the sixties. But it

(28:29):
was the site of a very famous and and um well,
by all accounts, a lot of fun state fair for
many years. Yeah, it's iconic. One of the other things
that you might hear of, especially the folks who are
familiar with this, uh, those of us out in the
Danbury or Connecticut area, Scott. We have to mention another

(28:51):
thing that made this fair so famous were these gigantic statues. Yeah,
Paul Bunyan and Uncle Sam and there there were more
than just those. Those are two of the big ones.
But they're like thirty eight feet tall. That at least
Uncle Sam was, And when the fair was closed down,
a lot of these were purchased by you know, local

(29:13):
businesses and continued continued on Lake Well, like Uncle Sam
went to the Magic Forest and Lake George, New York.
And I think the other one the Paul Bunyan statue,
which is, uh, there's there's more to the Paul Bunyan story,
but the Paul Bunyan eventually, this is a weird twist
on this. The one from the fair was painted like

(29:36):
a hippie and then moved to the Max Yeager's farm
where they held they held the woodstock Um Music Festival
back in so that one has kind of a strange
history to it. But the Paul Bunyan figure itself was
was mass produced by the company. So there's more than
one of this Paul Bunyan figure out there in the
world somewhere. I don't know how many of them they made,

(29:58):
but they sold these identical sculptures to tire shops and
muffler shops, and so sometimes when you see this Paul
Bunyan character, it's actually the muffler man. So I think
a lot of people can picture what the muffler Man
looks like because that they have that the giant statue
of what in some cases with Paul Bunyan in some
cases as the muffler Man. So interesting. It's it's it's

(30:20):
funny to find out where these things end up, right,
And this is something that this is something that we
have seen before. Happened two things are considered Americana or
pieces of American history. Maybe the property values in the
place go up. That's what happened to Western Connecticut, and
you see a lot of bigger businesses moving in which

(30:45):
you know, it has its pros and its cons It's
it's good for the economy when that stuff happens. But
then also you know you're losing a piece of history.
Well yeah, that's and that's what I meant by you know,
it's kind of sad to hear that, you know, a
mam moved in there. It's just like, I guess the
nostalgic part the whole. Yeah, you know that that you know,
there was a sight of this, Uh this really fun
fair and a lot of people have some uh you know,

(31:06):
great family memories there and now it's a shopping mall.
That's all I meant. I didn't mean that, you know,
it's it's bad for the local economy or anything like that.
I wasn't trying to get any political or anything like that.
I just mean that, Um, you know a lot of
people have some really good memories and you'll hear some,
you know, great stories that people tell online about you know,
going to the Danbury Fair and you know I met

(31:27):
my wife there or you know stuff like that. I was, yeah,
I guess I I feel bitter sweet about it because
there's an article from one in the Times, in the
New York Times that talks about, um, the last hurrah
of the fair in October, the four the final ten days. Yeah,

(31:48):
and uh it reads almost like an obituary, you know,
but that is not the end of the story for
the dan Barry Racers. As a matter of fact, we
have a little bit of a potential mystery. Yeah. Well,
so you know, nineteen one was the last year of
the fair, and they knew that they were going to
have to get rid of a bunch of their assets,

(32:09):
I mean everything, you know, the rides and whatever they
could get rid of. Right. So the boats, Yeah, the
boats are in in storage, in dry storage, and uh,
they all went up for auction, or at least nineteen
of the boats went up for auction. So again this
is this is already a mystery because if there were,
if there were twenty one to twenty nine of these
as we as we have heard, why did only nineteen

(32:31):
of them go for auction? Maybe at that time that's
all that were there. I don't that could be the case,
but we do know that um of the nineteen nine
of them were sold at auction for each so they
all went for kind of a flat price per boat
of two different people. It was like one person bought
all of them, and no one every no one really

(32:52):
remembers what happened to the other ten boats. They don't
know if they were eventually sold, they were just destroyed.
They don't know, if you know, somebody just carded them
away after the auction. No one knows what happened to
the other ten, you know. And that's not saying what
what happened to the other nine that weren't in the
original auction or ten that weren't in the original auction.
So um already a mystery there. And we said that

(33:13):
you know there were there are four that are known
to be seaworthy today as far as they know. Anyways,
you know these people that got them together the last time.
I think it was a group called the Bay State Woodies,
and that is the Massachusetts chapter of the Antique and
Classic Boat Society or a CBS. And you can look
up some information on their site if you want to
to find out, um, you know what happened on that

(33:35):
day or you know what you know the occurrence. I
guess that they bringing together of the original uh Danbury
Racers and you know what it was all about on
that one day. But and then also give you some
hints about, you know, where the other boats are, because
I I have so many questions here about the number
of boats remaining. I thought I had it down to
either they're either nine total or twelve total. But then

(33:55):
there's that other, you know, hidden bit of information that
says that there might have been end that never went
to auctions. So that kind of throws a wrench in
the whole thing. But I guess they're they're supposedly three
in Connecticut to in New Hampshire and then four in Wisconsin.
Doesn't mean they're all, you know, seaworthy. It just means
that they know that those went there in nineteen eighty

(34:16):
and they don't know where they are now. I mean,
of course, the ones that that were brought out this
year were from different places. I think. Um, one of
the owners that came out for the two thousand ten
event was from Connecticut, another one was from New Hampshire,
and then another one again a second second one from Connecticut.
So uh, two out of the three were from Connecticut
on that day and the one from New Hampshire. And

(34:37):
then they knew of the one in Wisconsin, but that
the owner of the Wisconsin boat didn't make it to
the event. So um, it's just it's all kind of
a mystery to where these are. But I like stories
like this as you know. Uh, if you take a
look at the boats online, if you look at the
photos of just search Danbury Racers, you're going to find, um,
you know, boats that are examples of what all the

(34:59):
boats look really. They have a distinctive style to them,
a distinctive look. So if you ever run across one
of these things, you know, at a boat at a
boatyard somewhere, you know someone who has um antique or
wooden boats on the property and don't really know what
they have, Uh, you know, this would be something interesting.
It's a piece of history really, and I think there's
a bunch of them out there, maybe still that um

(35:20):
or just undiscovered or maybe you know, no one knows
what they have. They're just sitting in a garageerors shed.
You know that their their grandfather left them right exactly.
That's also something wondering. This is where you come in,
ladies and gentlemen. If you have access to or know
of someone who has a like unidentified pretty small looking boat,

(35:42):
single seater, looks like a race boat. Could be would God,
it's not likely fiberglass, well mainly likely to be. Would yeah,
because the fiberglass one, the one that showed up to
this event, there's one that was fiber glass number thirty eight.
There were there was one other one and I think
that one was just stroid. They know that it was.
It was I think it was a fire maybe or something.

(36:03):
It was destroyed. So they do know that that one
is out of the mix. But the rest of them,
I think are wouldn't And again they have a very
unusual design. You'll you'll be able to spot them immediately
if you know what to look for. Yeah, so give
it give it a look if you if you have
an inkling that there might be something like that, we
we love to know about it because these boats are

(36:25):
out are out there somewhere. The odds are also overwhelmingly
likely that there are a few people probably in the
United States right now, who have access to something like
this and maybe are not aware. And you know what
been I just wanted to mention this too on the
front of this, uh, this poster that I'm looking at

(36:46):
for the original season, the first race really uh it
has the admission prices. You want to hear what the
admission was to get into the Danbury Races for the
first race for the Danbury Races specifically, Yes, because the
fair was a quarter. Yeah, the fair as a quarter.
This is it's a little bit more than I guess
for this um. Children under five were free, of course,
it seems like that's usually the way. Children under twelve

(37:08):
years old were forty two cents plus eight cents tax.
It it's fifty cents for them to get in. It's
funny how they have right and adults eighty three cents
with with seventeen cents tax. So it's a dollar for
adults to get in and then after that. But this
is the thing, like this is unheard of. Now, after
you pay that admission fee of either fifty cents or
dollar or free if you're half I guess there were

(37:31):
no other charges. Now you have to buy your own
food of course, but by no other charges they mean
for you got you've got to park for free. There
was a free race program that went along with it.
Of course, all the entertainment that you could absorb. Yeah
that's free. Yeah, not really, I guess that's so that's
what costs you a buck. Well, it was all night,
all night thing too, because it starts at seven. That's
when the doors open, the grand stand opens, and then

(37:53):
they do the time trial seven thirty and then after
that that's when the race begins at eight third. I
wonder if they're raced under the eights or if it
was if it was just simply until dark or something
like that, because um, later in the year it would
be getting may. Well this is May. But as they
got later in the racing season the autumn, the sun. Yeah, yeah,
they might have had it might have had lights. I

(38:14):
bet that had a really cool look to it and
it would have been really cool. Course, you know, you're
sitting in a state fair grounds grandstand, so it's you know,
concrete and wood and you know, probably bench seats. If
I had to guess, man, it just it was probably
a really fun evening out. This land locked water course
is constructed directly in front of the big Danbury Fair
concrete and steel grand stand. The shape of the race

(38:35):
course forces the daredevil pilots to drive with the highest
degree of skill, creating excellent competitive racing. I think. I mean,
I love these older ads workmen. Oh hey, you should
do the you should have done the radio ads for that.
But a little before your time, it was. It was
a bit before my time. It's probably before your dad's
time even huh, well, you know maybe I don't know

(39:00):
fifty he would have been a youngster. He uh. He
listens to this show and I will not compromise his
personal I understand. But but you know what, um man,
what a time to be in Connecticut. I had to
be able to see something like this. I would have
loved just seeing something like this. I like stuff like
this anyways. I mean, they're racing of all types, but

(39:20):
you don't want it's on a tight circuit like this.
It's almost like as we said earlier ago, like go
kart racing on water. Yeah, it had to have been
fun to watch it. It just had to have been
a really like a an action packed, a thrill packed race.
And you know, this also makes me wonder what other
current local races are out, not just you know, like

(39:41):
local racetrack races, but what other maybe unorthodox or slightly
slightly I don't want to say weird out there, but
you know, a step away from the mainstream kind of
races are out in the US or abroad. Right. We
had years ago we did an unusual racist podcast and

(40:04):
we dug into racist all around the world, that we're
anything but the normal, anything out of the ordinary. And
I don't even recall what was in that podcast, but
there was a big mix of stuff, I mean, oh yeah,
really really strange stuff like cheese wheel racing downhill, cheese
wheel chase stuff, which is way more dangerous than I
hope we mentioned that in that podcast. I think about

(40:26):
it because it was. Yeah, but there's some really interesting
fun things in that podcast. So and it's old, so
you know, be kind if you listen to it again,
probably probably back in the high speed stuff days, probably
but yeah, there's a lot of really interesting races out there.
I'd love for you know, some fans to write in
and and tell us about stuff sort of like this,
you know, like one off type stuff that happens around

(40:47):
the u S that we just don't hear about because,
you know, because it's a local thing. Absolutely. And with that,
we are going to we're going to head out. I
don't know if we're going to get into a speedboat
race when we leave the studio, but I doubt it,
I know, but it it's cool to dream. It's cool
to dream me I have man, you know. Okay, last

(41:08):
thing and the promise, we did do that podcast a
long time ago on I think it was can you
build your own boat? And some of the some of
the craft we talked about. In fact, I know the
ones that I was you know, most favorable towards where
they were the small hydroplane type, both like this. I
would still love to build something like this, but I
just I don't really have a place to put it anyways.

(41:30):
I mean, like to race it, because there's not a
whole lot of lakes down here that are you know,
easily accessible, not like when I was up in Michigan.
They were everywhere or in Minnesota. Um. But yeah, it
would be so much fun to build and build and
drive something like this, and or maybe even find one
of the original Danbury racers. Huh. I mean that's like
you know, finding a diamond out in the field somewhere
or something. You know, it's a it's a it's a rare,

(41:51):
extremely rare, fined. It has happened before. But that's about
all you can say. Yeah, I mean, and again, you know,
if we get enough listeners that are looking for this
these types of boats, maybe they'll start turning out. You
never know. Heck, man, while we're talking about local races,
you know what this makes me think of is the
soapbox Derby that Atlanta holds at the street right outside

(42:15):
of our office. Dude, we could totally do that. Yeah.
We could build the car here and and walk it
over to the race course. Yeah, that's that close. Yeah.
I mean, honestly, in terms of driving, and I say
this with no disrespect to either of us, you are
a more skilled responsible driver. I am a more skilled

(42:36):
daredevil driver, you know, because I I, uh, I do
my own stunts. So sure, so maybe we could, uh
maybe when this is coming up. We could we could
build something because listeners, ladies and gentle out there, you
guys probably have some experience and some tips and tricks
for us. I'm I'm gonna get some more information on

(42:57):
this and maybe see if we can follow it up.
This is this is like the big red Bull event, right, yeah, yes, sir, Yeah, okay,
So that's a that's a that's a big deal and
it's kind of it's gotta be kind up soon. It
happens end of summer, I think at least. Yeah, that's right,
we better get our key stars in gear. But I
wonder what the prize is. If the prize is just
a lot of red bull, I don't know if I
want to do it. Hopefully get the red Bull before

(43:20):
you racing that way a little more, a little more intense.
It's a big it's a it's a big time though
they closed down the street for it, did not attend
last year. So I'd be interested in seeing what's going
on out there, and so let us know if you
have any experience or tips with Soapbox Derby's, and of course,
of course, if you're primary tip is guys, don't do it.

(43:42):
We will respect your opinion, but I'm getting more and
more into the idea of seeing how fast they can
go with or without ranking very that's always something dude
for We could each build a car and race each other.
We just do that on our own. We don't need
any we don't need any event. We don't need no
stinking events. But the thing is, Scott, we wouldn't have

(44:03):
the street closed down, so that would complicate things through.
Just have to you know, trust the flagman. Okay, so
now we're looking for a flagman as well. We hope
you enjoyed this episode. If you want to check out
more episodes about racing, we have some stuff that is
right up your alley or square in your lane, and
please please please keep your eyes open for these Danbury racers.

(44:26):
And if you do see one, tell us which don't
know about it. Yeah, well first buy it and then
and then tell us about it, because I'd love to
know where the rest of these things ended up. And
if you do buy it, because we are serious about this,
we will reimburse you gladly. Just send the bill via
email to Jonathan dot Strickland at how stuff works dot com.

(44:48):
I'm sure I'll appreciate that I'm sure. I'm sure he
will hard of gold. Of course, anything for the cause,
anything for the cause. Oh man, we might be in
hot water when he hears that one. If you are
already on the computer you want to hear more about
these races, go ahead check out our previous podcasts at
our website car Stuff Show dot com. Follow us on

(45:10):
Twitter and Facebook, where you can see some of the
things that we talked about every week, including stuff like
this vintage ad for the Danbury Racers. And most importantly,
if you have an idea for an upcoming topic, if
you have some feedback, if heck Scott, I don't know,
there might be somebody who has some experience having seen

(45:30):
this all the you know, entirely possible, and if you're
one of those lucky If you or if you have
a story related to a similar event, we'd love to
hear it, and maybe your fellow car Stuff listeners would
like to hear it too, You can email us directly.
We are car stuff and how Stuff works dot com.

(45:51):
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