25th Anniversary Midwest Mopars in the Park National Car Show and Swap Meet
Mopar Tribute - Special Guests and Featured Cars
May 30-31, 2009
Dakota County Fairgrounds – Farmington, MN
We are excited to announce our Mopar Tribute at the 2009 Midwest Mopars in the Park 25th Anniversary Car Show and Swap Meet. This will be a great opportunity for visitors to meet outstanding individuals who ignited Mopar interest by changing the course of Mopar history and see their history making Mopars.
Ronnie Sox represented by this wife Diane Sox
Winning 5 World titles and
46 National Championships Ronnie Sox was one of the greatest race car drivers
ever. His racing career spanned periods of six decades, beginning in the mid
fifties, driving an Oldsmobile out of his father's service station in
Burlington, North Carolina. Over that period of time, his success included all
major automotive makes, although the bulk of his success came in Chrysler
products. His success record during the time of drag racing's phenomenal growth
was incredible, and the Sox and Martin team set the standard in performance,
appearance, and just plain class. The cars were flawless in preparation, the
crews were professional in appearance, and the following was incredible. After
being on the cutting edge of the birth of the Funny Car, Ronnie led Chrysler's
charge back into the focus into more traditional type stock bodied race cars.
Touring Chrysler Plymouth dealers around the country, with a clinic program to
teach customers how to get the most out of the performance of their cars, they
dominated the late sixties. As the gasoline burning cars evolved from cars
fitting into different classes into a heads up Pro Stock concept, Ronnie was so
dominant that the rules were changed specifically to end his dominance.
Ronnie continued to dominate throughout the early seventies, until the rules
makers made it extremely difficult to win with a Chrysler product. He went on
the "outlaw" match race circuit, and remained semi retired until 1981, when he
came out of retirement to win the IHRA National Championship, this time in a
Ford. He teamed again with old teammate Buddy Martin for a couple of IHRA Ford
Pro Stockers in the late eighties, until a racing accident ended his full time
career. He was involved with Chrysler's Pro Stock truck effort in the nineties,
and when Chrysler resurrected the Hemi Ronnie was back in the saddle again, this
time with a reincarnation of his most famous race car, his 1968 Plymouth
Barracuda. With its reintroduction, the fans came with it, and he was in demand
for Nostalgia appearances throughout the country. Ronnie Sox, the quiet,
blonde-haired, southern gentleman known for his mystical mastery of
power-shifting a manual four-speed transmission passed away Saturday, April 22,
2006, at his home near Richmond, Virginia. Ronnie succumbed following a lengthy
battle with prostate cancer.
Ronnie can’t be with us but his widow Diane is happy to attend our show along with two of Ronnie’s race cars owned and displayed by Clark Rand. Since Ronnie’s untimely passing Diane has worked tirelessly for the Ronnie Sox Foundation raising money to increase awareness and early detection for prostate cancer.
Arlen Vanke
One of the nation's most outstanding drag racers, Arlen began his career at the age of 18 at a makeshift drag strip on a section of blocked off runway at Akron Municipal Airport. “Akron Arlen” Vanke’s involvement in drag racing dates back to the mid-1950s with flathead coupes, ’56 Chevys and one of the first blown gassers in Ohio. He first came to national prominence behind the wheel of a whole series of Pontiacs fielded by Bill Knafel and his Anderson (later Knafel) Pontiac dealership. He raced everything from station wagons to Tempests, winning Super Stock class honors at the ’62 NHRA Nationals behind the wheel of a ’62 Catalina. In a V8-powered Tempest, he set a ’63 A/FX mark of 11.89 seconds at 123.98 mph. Switching to the Mopar brand in the mid-’60s, from 1968 through 1970, Vanke was almost unbeatable. His career continued to build when he won the ’68 U.S. Nationals Super Stock Eliminator title at the wheel of a factory-backed ’68 Plymouth Barracuda. The Akron native added four more titles in 1969 and in 1970 he won over 80 percent of his match races and captured all five World Championship Series points meets - the first in the National Hot Rod Association to accomplish that feat. He became known as one of the masters of shifting a four-speed transmission at wide open throttle. He raced into the early ’70s as one of the most popular builder/drivers in the newly created Pro Stock category. As one of the “Hemi Heroes,” he was named an honorary starter for the Super Stock Hemi Challenge at the 50th U.S. Nationals in September, 2004.
Don Grotheer
Don Grotheer carried the Plymouth standard into the record books and at the same time hosted Plymouth Performance Clinics throughout the US. Don started out racing a black 1963 426 Max Wedge 3-speed stick car sponsored by Sparks Automotive – the local dealer in the city of his hometown Cushing, OK that won him the AHRA World Nationals Class Championship and Mr. Stock Eliminator runner up in 1963. His second car a white version of the ’63 and it took him to a AA/S championship in 1965 and grabbed the attention of Bob Cahill product manager and planner of Chrysler’s drag racing. Bob offered Don a parts contract – he would have to buy his own car and Chrysler would supply him with parts.
In late ’65 Don picked up his ’66 street hemi, sound deadened, radio delete, 2 door post, 4-speed Belvedere in a snow storm in St. Louis and his career as one of the prominent “Men of Mopar” was underway. He posted a ’66 and ’67 Winter National’s class win, Tulsa Gold cup win as well as the NHRA Division Championship. At Englishtown in 1968 Don won his class with his ’68 SS Barracuda and raced Ronnie Sox. Both broke out of their time bracket and Ronnie won but under a matter of who broke out the least! The NHRA rules were changed after that one. Don raced with a parts contract from 1966 to 1969 when Chrysler asked him to put on 75 performance clinics a year at dealerships throughout the US – all while still racing competitively! At the 1969 Winter Nationals at Pomona, California, Grotheer was AA/S class winner. He went on to become the NHRA Division 4 Super Stock Eliminator Points winner, further extending Plymouth's stronghold on the racing scene above and beyond the competition. In 1973 he retired from racing while Chrysler pulled out of Pro Stock as every success was followed by the NHRA “hanging another 100 pounds on them to even out the field”. Today Don can be seen at many shows around the Country spending his time amongst his fans sharing stories about Chrysler’s glory days.
Judy Lilly
Miss Mighty Mopar herself began a drag racing career in 1961 and left her mark on the sport in a big way. From 1967 to 1970 Lily Drove a Hemi powered Barracuda to Super Stock Elimination title in the NHRA Mopar Mile Nigh Nationals in Denver, CO. In 1972 Mopar became the primary sponsor for Lilly's Hemi Barracuda. The "Miss Mighty Mopar" moniker made it's debut with Lily at the NHRA Winter Nationals event that year. she went on to win the Super Stock Eliminator title at the event and followed up with a victory at the NHRA Spring Nationals later that same year. The victories put her in the history books as the only female competitor to win two NHRA national events in the same year. An original member of the Mopar Direct Connection Team. Lilly's most successful season came in 1975, behind the wheel of a Plymouth Duster. She earned victories in the Super Stock Eliminator series at the NHRA Gatornationals, the NHRA Fall Nationals and the Popular Hot Roding Championship, and she was the runner-up at the U.S. Nationals that season. Lilly's honors include being named Car Craft magazine's Super Stock Driver of the Year an unprecedented three times (1972, 1976 & 1977), and she retired in 1978, after spending 12 years on the NHRA circuit. In 1998 she was inducted in the International Drag Racing Hall of Fame.