BYLINE: Story by Bob Batz

Date: June 4, 2005

Publication: Dayton Daily News (OH)


LEGENDARY DRAG RACER CHERISHES MEMORIES OF ROARING DOWN THE STRIP

For more than three decades "Ohio George " Montgomery was one of America's top drag racers. Seven times the Dayton native won National Hot Rod Association (NHRA) titles. In 1983, as he was winding down his racing career, he was inducted into the NHRA North Central Division's Hall of Fame. Nine years later, he was selected for membership in the International Drag Racing Hall of Fame. Now, at 72, Montgomery's taking life easier. He spends his days operating his 55-year-old Dayton speed shop with his only son, Gregg. Whenever he's in the mood for a little reminiscing, all he has to do is stroll to the front of the shop and check out the 12-foot-tall display cases filled with many of the more than 400 trophies, plaques and other awards he has received over the years.

George Montgomery — a 1950 graduate of Patterson Co-Op High School — developed his love of speed on the streets of downtown Dayton.


"I was a hellraiser as a kid, and even though I never drank or smoked, I loved my cars and driving fast," he recalls. "A bunch of us would cruise downtown, circle the Civil War monument, then take off and race down Main Street. It was American Graffiti, but it was for real. The cops tolerated us. In those days, WING Radio had its studios on the second floor of a building on Main Street. The announcers often watched from the window and did live broadcasts of our races."


Montgomery — best known for his success with supercharged "gassers" that included a 1933 Willys coupe dubbed "The World's Wildest Willys" — made his professional racing debut in the late 1950s at the Kil-Kare Dragway near Xenia after quitting his job as a journeyman toolmaker at Delco Products Division of General Motors.


"If you won a race back then, they gave you a $25 U.S. Savings Bond, but, if you lost, you got nothing," he says.


Montgomery quickly established himself as a winner. By the 1970s, he was one of the nation's most successful — and popular — drag racers. He was being paid $500 to $700 just to show up at a race with his car. In 1964, he was one of 10 drag racers chosen by NHRA to tour England to introduce U.S. style drag racing there. They raced for large crowds, mostly on airstrips at abandoned military bases.


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