February 28, 2013
Your Books sound fascinating since I used to go to Seattle International Raceway in the 70s and saw Jerry Ruth and Mike Palmer [driver of the Looker, Keating, and Gogan dragster in 1980, formerly Palmer, Petty, and Keating] run top fuel dragsters. I was stationed in the Air Force in the early 80s at Norton AFB in San Bernardino and also saw Ruth and Palmer at the Winternationals at Pomona Fairgrounds and Orange County Int’l Raceway in Irvine, and saw Jim Barnard win the 1982 World Finals over Gary Beck in the final. Sometime in ’84 my father, who was in Tacoma, told me about Jerry Ruth getting busted in a cocaine ring, although I had no idea that “Barney” was actually the big wheel of the two… can’t wait to read them, and I can learn something about real
police procedures. I also recognized “Leland Beard” as decorated top fuel and funny car crew chief Lee Beard who started out with Ruth and then worked for Barnard.
I took a cursory glance this afternoon and like you said I recognized some more names from the drag racing community, Marty
Maltais, who ran a very polished and classy Pro Stock Vega up until late in the ’79 season with a first-class corvette AA Funny car. All the while I wanted to send this email of thanks since I put off going to dinner and buying some clothes for several hours once I started going through the volume!
Thanks again,
Joe Moore
