Jay's Book Club - Where They Raced DVD - Jay Leno's Garage

Harry Miller and the Cars That Raised Speed Demons in Los Angeles

The Miller cars were designed and built by Harry Miller in Los Angeles, and that was significant about that. When we spoke with him, it was fascinating because he showed up and said, "Look guys, I got 45 minutes okay, and we said all right, we were ready to go. We started talking, we got the whole episode done, and he got passionate about what he was talking about." He went on for hours, and in the end, we were apologizing to him because we had used up our time.

Harry Miller's passion for his work is evident, and it's refreshing to see someone who is so dedicated to their craft. The fact that he spent 45 minutes talking to us is a testament to his enthusiasm and expertise. It's not often that you get to meet someone like Harry Miller, and we felt fortunate to have the opportunity to speak with him.

The Cars That Raced

We also talked about the cars that were featured in the episode. We featured cars that were raised speed demons in the city of Los Angeles, and it was amazing to see how these vehicles could go so fast on the streets. The Miller cars were designed for speed, and they were built with a focus on performance.

When we recreated the racetrack using San Vincenti Boulevard and Wilshire Boulevard, it was a thrill to experience what these drivers must have felt like when they were racing. To be able to know that you're on a racetrack is exhilarating, and it's amazing to think about how fast Barney Olmstead and Eddie Pullen must have gone when they were racing.

The Racetracks of Los Angeles

We also talked about the racetracks in Los Angeles. The late 1940s saw a rise in popularity for drag racing, and several tracks sprang up around the city. One notable track was the Lion's Drag Strip, which was located just outside of Los Angeles. The track used to be a parking lot, but it became a popular spot for speed enthusiasts.

We also visited Paramount Ranch, which is now a state park. In the past, it was used as a road racing track, and some of the original courses still exist today. Visitors can walk along the course and get a sense of what it must have been like to drive at high speeds on this track.

Drifting and Sports Car Racing

In addition to drag racing, Southern California also saw an increase in drifting and sports car racing in the 1950s. One notable event was the Container Yard Sports Car Racing, which took place in a warehouse parking lot. The event featured some of the most iconic cars of the era, including the Jaguar XK120.

We also talked about the Pomona Drag Strip, which was another popular spot for speed enthusiasts. The track used to be a parking lot, but it became a staple of the racing community. Today, the Pomona Drag Strip is still operational and hosts numerous events throughout the year.

Paramount Ranch and the Rock Store

When we visited Paramount Ranch, we were surprised to find that it was overgrown and difficult to navigate. However, as we made our way through the winding roads, we stumbled upon a figure-eight course that had been built in the 1950s. It's still possible to drive on this course today, although it's not officially open to the public.

We also visited The Rock Store, which is located in Malibu. This is a famous spot for motorcycle enthusiasts, and it's rumored that some of the original racing tracks from Paramount Ranch still exist in the area. When we went riding motorcycles in this area, we were able to see some of these hidden tracks and get a sense of what it must have been like to drive at high speeds on these roads.

The Significance of Los Angeles Racing History

One of the things that's fascinating about Los Angeles racing history is that many of the original tracks still exist today. While they may not be as well-known as some of the more famous tracks in other parts of the country, they offer a unique glimpse into the past and a chance to experience the thrill of speed.

The fact that many of these tracks were built on the outskirts of Los Angeles also gives us a sense of what the city was like 100 years ago. It's amazing to think about how wide open and empty the streets must have been, with no traffic or development to speak of. Today, Los Angeles is one of the most populous cities in the country, and it's hard to imagine that it ever had such a wild and free spirit.

Where to Get More Information

If you're interested in learning more about this fascinating topic, we recommend checking out the We They.com website. This site has a wealth of information on Los Angeles racing history, including articles, videos, and photos. You can also find some excellent auto books and other resources that explore this subject.

Conclusion

We hope that our video provided you with a unique glimpse into the world of Los Angeles racing history. From the thrilling speeds of Harry Miller's cars to the winding roads of Paramount Ranch, we explored many different aspects of this fascinating topic. Whether you're a speed enthusiast or just someone who loves to learn about new subjects, we think that our video is well worth checking out.

"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: enthis is where they race I'm on what would be the backstretch of Carol Speedway guarding of B Los Angeles and the automobile were born and grew up at the same time this is the original book from when we first started lion strag strip we call it the Bible I can walk right down the strip we're looking at and I can see I can see the whole deal to me back in you know back in the day this is a dramatic reenactment with Oldfield himself reliving years later one of his great speed rcks and I asked my mom if there was a hat there that my dad had worn she gave it to me and she said let's use this one for the trophy 100 milph right here meet me at Third and Fairfax means come on out to Gilmore Stadium this would have been the second turn here and it FR straightaway going down here so this very car is really the the Holy Grail of all modern Automotive racing design and when they got to the end of the drag strip they turned left came along underneath this bridge right here made this left turn and headed off in this Direction Over by this big pile of debris now that's where the hay bales were oh they're only going 80 90 100 m an hour but if you had a hot rod in those days that could go 100 miles hour on the dry Lakes you were something special this is where all the Innovation was this was the hot bed of activity this is where every everybody who who wanted to race came to cut their teeth one another episode of Jay L's book club now you might remember a couple of years ago one of the first book clubs we did was on this book here where they raced Harold osmer is uh the author and uh look real racing railroad racing and uh oh he's got a bunch of things out here there's another Saga Speedway he probably knows more about the history of racing in Southern California than anyone well he got together with Harry palberg very talented director and producer to make this DVD where they raced as much as I enjoy reading the books it was actually a lot more fun watching the video the thing I like about it is you know if you're a car guy you tend to buy every car video and you take them home and they're like 41 minutes or they're like 28 minutes and it's just a series of Stills and I always get burned on these things whereas this is really well done it's a good documentary it shows you where the racetracks were when they existed all kinds of great history I didn't realize it's Santa Monica was able to stay Santa Monica because uh of all the financial success they had with the races so tell us about racing in Southern California so people get a feel for this well what you hit on there with Santa Monica was absolutely true when the in the very early days just 100 years ago actually um Santa Monica was struggling to stay autonomous from the city of Los Angeles which was annexing all the property around here and so they held Auto races in order to attract attention to themselves and they would try to get the biggest name drivers of the of the time Dario resta Ralph dama terrible Teddy tetl Barney Oldfield all these guys raced out there and of course when all the new people would come to Southern California they would go to places they' heard of and they drew a lot of headlines and attention with all of the racing that they held there and so that's where it came about and nowadays we think 30,000 Spectators is a lot they would get 100,000 spectators at some of these races and well a huge portion of the population of Los Angeles we're talking you know 20% 25% of the entire population of Los Angeles be coming out there and that was a long trk to get all the way out to Santa Monica from the thing I found fascinating is famous Rodeo Drive where you think of Beverly Hills and all the high-end stores well right where the Beverly Wilshire Hotel is that was the biggest board track or one of the biggest board tracks in the United States it's sad it went downhill and turned into a big shopping area it should have stayed a race track but I mean it's fascinating I think that right there was one of the biggest fastest tracks in the world and that's that's something that that Harry brought to the project that I couldn't do I'm a book guy I I look at pictures I write stories I do these kind of things well what Harry did was he was able to find all this different archival footage and what not we have actual footage of motorcycles racing on the board track and cars racing on the board track and you you can see as they go through the turns how they would get up in the hill or up in the the banking and then they would level out across it and it's just stunning and again with with the size of the crowds that come out and and there was again the board track at Beverly Hills was there from 1920 to 24 and there was no television there was no radio there wasn't any other sort of major form of entertainment so everybody in town came out to these things it was fabulous that was actually one of the ones that Drew me to this project when I saw that picture of Beverly Hills track and I saw where Wilshire and Santa Monica cross I could not believe that there was a racetrack that was made out of wood that was a mile and a quarter round right there and it was frightening because the motorcycles at race had no throttles just wide open and no braks you would just kill the ignition but the worst part is when guys fell off yeah they would literally roll and get thousands of splinters yes oh yeah and nurses would spend weeks picking I mean just horrible oh just frightening stuff and of course board tracks are soon banned because well they deteriorated quickly because they were made a wood and they warped and they were really really dangerous oh yeah yeah and you know it was 2x4s on edge 35 degree banking this kind of stuff so you can get up to really big speeds the cars that were racing there twice a year um were the same cars that were running at Indianapolis at the same time at Beverly Hills they're running 15 to 20 miles hour faster and they were learning about they called it Towing the Rope which we would call drafting in NASCAR today they learning about aerodynamics and all of this also in this period um in the 1920s and for and forward you were having purpose-built race cars the Miller racing cars came about in this time so these weren't the old strip down stock cars like your Mercer is beautiful but you can imagine stripping the the fenders and off and stuff off to lighten it up and go racing well these guys were making purpose-built race cars extra power in the whole bit let's show the post here's a poster from the period this is an actual poster 1912 speediest race meet ever held short Snappy Races by great speed Kings and that was at the the motor drone which was the first board track in America and you know Los anges out of the 20 some odd board tracks that were in United States of America three of them were in Los Angeles proper yeah and it's not just uh 100 year ago racing you cover stuff right up to the modern Corona races and in the 50s and in the 60s and the cool thing is when you get the video you'll notice there are a lot of actual cars that still exist from the period uh the national and a couple others are in there as well we well I mentioned the Miller earlier and the cars that we feature we again it's where they raised speed demons in the city of Los Angeles and we're looking at Los Angeles based things the Miller cars were designed and built by Harry Miller in Los Angeles and that was significant about that and when we spoke with that gentleman it was fascinating because he showed up and he said look guys I got 45 minutes okay and we said all right we were ready to go we started talking we got the whole episode done and he got passionate about what he was talking about he said oh wait excuse me do you have an extra couple of minutes let me tell you another story he went like this for hours and in the end we were apologizing to him he was apologizing to us for using up our time but it was again you know you never see Harry or I in the video at all interviewing people so you don't have to listen to us ask questions we tried to get those guys Story the thing I also liked is when you recreated you drove around because all those roads exist to this day San vincenti Boulevard a Wilshire Boulevard that was the racetrack and you recreate it in in modern time course that's my favorite part is to be able to know that you're on a racetrack so you know as you're sitting in traffic on Wilshire Boulevard you know down by the beach imagine that you know guys like Barney olfield and Eddie Pullin were going you know 90 mes hour ripping around the corner and you know that's just amazing I guess the last races you talk about are probably Ascot right that would be the late we talk a little bit about Lion's drag Drift We have Lion's drag strip I enjoyed that and also container yard a sports car racing in Southern California as well in the 50s you have a nice piece on that yeah out at Pomona drag strip they used to use the parking lot for the the road races and there was a place called Paramount Ranch y it's when we go riding motorcycles we go to the place called The Rock Store it's up in Malibu and I had always heard about this Paramount Ranch and I never could find it and then one day oh I just going down a fire roads oh oh there it is I it was I i' driven past it on the freeway it was so overgrown but it had a it was like a figure eight if you can imagine how many crashes in a figure eight well it was yeah pretty bad but you can still see some of the road there there was across but yeah still it's fascinating because that's one of the few places where you can still see the original coures still out there and you can as you walk around they won't let you drive on it now it's a state park but you can you can certainly go out there and walk along it and and that's that's part of What's um what I like about this kind of history is that it's still here you can go out and you can still connect to it and there were so many people pouring into this area that a lot of the existing culture and history just got squashed by the sheer influx of the people coming in because you realize how wide open Los Angeles was a 100 years ago I mean there was no there was nothing you know it was but you had the same weather with no traffic it was fantastic all all the pictures of that are you know we have the pictures where the RAC tracks were usually built on the sort of the outskirts the edges of where the town was so when we have a picture of like Beverly Hills to the left of it it's literally nothing like it's just wide open spaces you know it was fun because I uh I read the books before the video came out so it's kind of fun to look at the still pictures but then to see in the video recreating the track with with using the actual cars of the period is really good where can people get this uh you can get it on the website which is just www.we they.com okay and uh you know some of your finer auto books and things like that even the even the crummy auto book stores you have to go to a finer one even a really lousy one will will hopefully have this but I thought it was really uh enjoyable and I like I said I didn't feel I always feel ripped off when I cuz most car videos are just quick slash dep you know I mean you did a nice job directing it and producing it and you get a real sense even if someone doesn't know anything about it he takes you through it in an easy way so you kind of you kind of learn about the period even it's the first thing you ever saw on this subject it's well done gentlemen thank you very much thank you sir thanks guys nice job it's called where they raced check it outthis is where they race I'm on what would be the backstretch of Carol Speedway guarding of B Los Angeles and the automobile were born and grew up at the same time this is the original book from when we first started lion strag strip we call it the Bible I can walk right down the strip we're looking at and I can see I can see the whole deal to me back in you know back in the day this is a dramatic reenactment with Oldfield himself reliving years later one of his great speed rcks and I asked my mom if there was a hat there that my dad had worn she gave it to me and she said let's use this one for the trophy 100 milph right here meet me at Third and Fairfax means come on out to Gilmore Stadium this would have been the second turn here and it FR straightaway going down here so this very car is really the the Holy Grail of all modern Automotive racing design and when they got to the end of the drag strip they turned left came along underneath this bridge right here made this left turn and headed off in this Direction Over by this big pile of debris now that's where the hay bales were oh they're only going 80 90 100 m an hour but if you had a hot rod in those days that could go 100 miles hour on the dry Lakes you were something special this is where all the Innovation was this was the hot bed of activity this is where every everybody who who wanted to race came to cut their teeth one another episode of Jay L's book club now you might remember a couple of years ago one of the first book clubs we did was on this book here where they raced Harold osmer is uh the author and uh look real racing railroad racing and uh oh he's got a bunch of things out here there's another Saga Speedway he probably knows more about the history of racing in Southern California than anyone well he got together with Harry palberg very talented director and producer to make this DVD where they raced as much as I enjoy reading the books it was actually a lot more fun watching the video the thing I like about it is you know if you're a car guy you tend to buy every car video and you take them home and they're like 41 minutes or they're like 28 minutes and it's just a series of Stills and I always get burned on these things whereas this is really well done it's a good documentary it shows you where the racetracks were when they existed all kinds of great history I didn't realize it's Santa Monica was able to stay Santa Monica because uh of all the financial success they had with the races so tell us about racing in Southern California so people get a feel for this well what you hit on there with Santa Monica was absolutely true when the in the very early days just 100 years ago actually um Santa Monica was struggling to stay autonomous from the city of Los Angeles which was annexing all the property around here and so they held Auto races in order to attract attention to themselves and they would try to get the biggest name drivers of the of the time Dario resta Ralph dama terrible Teddy tetl Barney Oldfield all these guys raced out there and of course when all the new people would come to Southern California they would go to places they' heard of and they drew a lot of headlines and attention with all of the racing that they held there and so that's where it came about and nowadays we think 30,000 Spectators is a lot they would get 100,000 spectators at some of these races and well a huge portion of the population of Los Angeles we're talking you know 20% 25% of the entire population of Los Angeles be coming out there and that was a long trk to get all the way out to Santa Monica from the thing I found fascinating is famous Rodeo Drive where you think of Beverly Hills and all the high-end stores well right where the Beverly Wilshire Hotel is that was the biggest board track or one of the biggest board tracks in the United States it's sad it went downhill and turned into a big shopping area it should have stayed a race track but I mean it's fascinating I think that right there was one of the biggest fastest tracks in the world and that's that's something that that Harry brought to the project that I couldn't do I'm a book guy I I look at pictures I write stories I do these kind of things well what Harry did was he was able to find all this different archival footage and what not we have actual footage of motorcycles racing on the board track and cars racing on the board track and you you can see as they go through the turns how they would get up in the hill or up in the the banking and then they would level out across it and it's just stunning and again with with the size of the crowds that come out and and there was again the board track at Beverly Hills was there from 1920 to 24 and there was no television there was no radio there wasn't any other sort of major form of entertainment so everybody in town came out to these things it was fabulous that was actually one of the ones that Drew me to this project when I saw that picture of Beverly Hills track and I saw where Wilshire and Santa Monica cross I could not believe that there was a racetrack that was made out of wood that was a mile and a quarter round right there and it was frightening because the motorcycles at race had no throttles just wide open and no braks you would just kill the ignition but the worst part is when guys fell off yeah they would literally roll and get thousands of splinters yes oh yeah and nurses would spend weeks picking I mean just horrible oh just frightening stuff and of course board tracks are soon banned because well they deteriorated quickly because they were made a wood and they warped and they were really really dangerous oh yeah yeah and you know it was 2x4s on edge 35 degree banking this kind of stuff so you can get up to really big speeds the cars that were racing there twice a year um were the same cars that were running at Indianapolis at the same time at Beverly Hills they're running 15 to 20 miles hour faster and they were learning about they called it Towing the Rope which we would call drafting in NASCAR today they learning about aerodynamics and all of this also in this period um in the 1920s and for and forward you were having purpose-built race cars the Miller racing cars came about in this time so these weren't the old strip down stock cars like your Mercer is beautiful but you can imagine stripping the the fenders and off and stuff off to lighten it up and go racing well these guys were making purpose-built race cars extra power in the whole bit let's show the post here's a poster from the period this is an actual poster 1912 speediest race meet ever held short Snappy Races by great speed Kings and that was at the the motor drone which was the first board track in America and you know Los anges out of the 20 some odd board tracks that were in United States of America three of them were in Los Angeles proper yeah and it's not just uh 100 year ago racing you cover stuff right up to the modern Corona races and in the 50s and in the 60s and the cool thing is when you get the video you'll notice there are a lot of actual cars that still exist from the period uh the national and a couple others are in there as well we well I mentioned the Miller earlier and the cars that we feature we again it's where they raised speed demons in the city of Los Angeles and we're looking at Los Angeles based things the Miller cars were designed and built by Harry Miller in Los Angeles and that was significant about that and when we spoke with that gentleman it was fascinating because he showed up and he said look guys I got 45 minutes okay and we said all right we were ready to go we started talking we got the whole episode done and he got passionate about what he was talking about he said oh wait excuse me do you have an extra couple of minutes let me tell you another story he went like this for hours and in the end we were apologizing to him he was apologizing to us for using up our time but it was again you know you never see Harry or I in the video at all interviewing people so you don't have to listen to us ask questions we tried to get those guys Story the thing I also liked is when you recreated you drove around because all those roads exist to this day San vincenti Boulevard a Wilshire Boulevard that was the racetrack and you recreate it in in modern time course that's my favorite part is to be able to know that you're on a racetrack so you know as you're sitting in traffic on Wilshire Boulevard you know down by the beach imagine that you know guys like Barney olfield and Eddie Pullin were going you know 90 mes hour ripping around the corner and you know that's just amazing I guess the last races you talk about are probably Ascot right that would be the late we talk a little bit about Lion's drag Drift We have Lion's drag strip I enjoyed that and also container yard a sports car racing in Southern California as well in the 50s you have a nice piece on that yeah out at Pomona drag strip they used to use the parking lot for the the road races and there was a place called Paramount Ranch y it's when we go riding motorcycles we go to the place called The Rock Store it's up in Malibu and I had always heard about this Paramount Ranch and I never could find it and then one day oh I just going down a fire roads oh oh there it is I it was I i' driven past it on the freeway it was so overgrown but it had a it was like a figure eight if you can imagine how many crashes in a figure eight well it was yeah pretty bad but you can still see some of the road there there was across but yeah still it's fascinating because that's one of the few places where you can still see the original coures still out there and you can as you walk around they won't let you drive on it now it's a state park but you can you can certainly go out there and walk along it and and that's that's part of What's um what I like about this kind of history is that it's still here you can go out and you can still connect to it and there were so many people pouring into this area that a lot of the existing culture and history just got squashed by the sheer influx of the people coming in because you realize how wide open Los Angeles was a 100 years ago I mean there was no there was nothing you know it was but you had the same weather with no traffic it was fantastic all all the pictures of that are you know we have the pictures where the RAC tracks were usually built on the sort of the outskirts the edges of where the town was so when we have a picture of like Beverly Hills to the left of it it's literally nothing like it's just wide open spaces you know it was fun because I uh I read the books before the video came out so it's kind of fun to look at the still pictures but then to see in the video recreating the track with with using the actual cars of the period is really good where can people get this uh you can get it on the website which is just www.we they.com okay and uh you know some of your finer auto books and things like that even the even the crummy auto book stores you have to go to a finer one even a really lousy one will will hopefully have this but I thought it was really uh enjoyable and I like I said I didn't feel I always feel ripped off when I cuz most car videos are just quick slash dep you know I mean you did a nice job directing it and producing it and you get a real sense even if someone doesn't know anything about it he takes you through it in an easy way so you kind of you kind of learn about the period even it's the first thing you ever saw on this subject it's well done gentlemen thank you very much thank you sir thanks guys nice job it's called where they raced check it out\n"