04.11.03_999_HAR_UNK_0056_1.jpg (59170 bytes)

Photo ID # 04.11.03_999_HAR_UNK_0056_1
Car #: #999
Driver (s) : Otto Harwi
Location: Alcyon Speedway, Pitman, NJ
Date: 1956
Photographer: Walter Chernokal
Photo provided by: Russ Dodge
Comments: (Comment provided by Russ Dodge) Pictured is Easton's Otto Harwi behind the wheel of Sonny Dornberger's #999.  Sonny along with Dutch Maulk operated South Jersey Speed & Sport Shop.  The cream/yellow and red colored #999's were always strong runners. The cars always had Mortified on the hood instead of Modified. This photo was taken by Walter Chernokal at Alcyon Speedway in Pitman, N.J. in August, 1956   Thanks, Russ Dodge
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04/12/03 Tom Bilger I  wish to express my deepest appreciation to Russ for adding this picture to "The Vault" Russ, you'll never know how much this means to me. I spent so many days as a kid(i'm 61 now) sitting in the corner of the "South Jersey Speed and Sport Shop" watching in "awe" and listening to some of the "Greatest" racing people God put on this earth. Thanks again. Tom Bilger,Spokane Washington
04/12/03 3-Wide I would also like to thank Russ and also Walt Chernokal for taking a picture that has so much impact after all those years...
05/02/03 Jim Murrow Thanks again, Russ. All of my pictures were lost by my moving company about ten years ago, (along with about 40 Alcyon Programs), so it's wonderful to see some of these cars again. In 1965-66, Sonny was building a Sportsman car for me at his shop on route 47. This was after the Speed shop was closed, and Sonny was renting a house with a 2 car garage from Walt Kinsley. Kinsley's race shop was next door, so it was quite a hub of racing activity at the time. Sonny was building Stan Ploski's cars, and Jackie Hamilton's # 16, which Sonny later bought and campaigned at Reading with Rags Carter as the driver. Budd Olsen was a regular visitor to the Dornberger shop, as he was building the #83 car, and had a lot of questions. One night he popped in and told Sonny he just bought a lift from a gas station, and wanted to know where he should mount the axles to make a race trailer out of it. Sonny took a piece of chaulk, and calculated it on the floor of the garage. I later bought the trailer, after Jackie got killed, and that was the best trailer I ever owned. It would pull straight, with no swaying at 85 miles an hour, EMPTY! Sonny was a genius. At that time, Bobby Allen had just come up from Fla. with a super modified, and he wasopperating out of Sonny's shop, Fellow Floridans, Bobby Brack, and Pee Wee Griffin were based next door at Walt KInsley's shop, along with Kinsley's own # 325 car, soit was almost like Gasoline Alley! What a time! Thanks Again, Jim Murrow

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