Caption: 'The Ol' Hay Barber, Earl Kouba, at Lakeside
Speedway (CO) In his new
Kurtis Offy in 1947. He called it 'Baby' and it is still in the
family and is
currently being restored in Minnesota. (A Leroy Byers photo.)
(Click picture to enlarge!)
A
story about Earl Kouba - The Ol' Hay Barber - Part I
In
1938 a young rancher by the name of Earl Kouba, who lived about
20 miles south of Denver in Sedalia, Colorado, took his first
ride in a midget racer at Merchants Park in a car owned by Buz
Bussard out of Littleton, Colorado. When he went out to warm up
and hot lap, he got upside down the first crack out of the box.
Bussard and his crew rushed over and put the car on its wheels
again and asked if he was hurt and he said no. So they sent him
out for the time trials and before you knew it, he was on his
lid again! Once again they put the car back on its wheels and
asked if he was hurt and he said no; they straightened a couple
tings and sent him back out for his heat race. You guessed it.
He promptly got upside down again and this time he wasn't hurt
either. That's some beginning in the midget racing business and
it lasted over 50 years! He rarely got upside down after that.
He was a likable fellow who soon turned into a first class race
driver that everyone knew that you could race with him, wheel
to wheel, and never square person with everyone - on or off the
track. When you made a deal with him, a handshake was all that
you needed because he never backed out of a deal with anyone and
when he told you something, you could take it to the bank.
Kouba was a fast learner and he learned his lessons well during
his first season. It was only his second season in 1939, that
he won the Mile High Racing Association Championship at Merchants
Park by just beating out the second place driver, Roy Sherman.
Sherman was out of St. Louis, Missouri and operated a garage in
Denver while racing at both Merchants Park and Lakeside Speedway.
By now Kouba was really 'hooked' into auto racing and because
1939 was the last year for midget racing at Merchants Park, it
moved across town to Ben Krasner's Lakeside Speedway. The speedway
was now a fifth-mile paved track that enjoyed a long life with
midget racing from 1935 through 1988. It drew most all of the
big names in midget racing at one time or another. Drivers stopped
by to test their skills while going from the Midwest to the West
Coast and vice versa. Most of the time, the out of town drivers
missed the feature and ended up running in the semi-main.
A
story about Earl Kouba - The Ol' Hay Barber - Part II
The
Lakeside Speedway (Denver, Colorado) was a deceiving track with
one flat turn, one banked turn, and one uphill straightaway. The
races where always competitive and as many as 11,000 fans packed
the stands on occasions. The purse was always good as the track
owner, Ben Krasner, knew that the midget races were keeping his
amusement park in the black - times were tough in the late '30s.
There where many times that Krasner would buy a car owner an Offy
motor, or a complete car, because he knew that if he kept the
races competitive the crowds would be good and he could keep paying
a good purse and the car owners could pay him back soon. It worked
out good for everyone concerned.
With Earl Kouba being a farmer and rancher he had the dirt track
at Merchants Park figured out, but now he had a paved track to
figure. It turned out that soon Kouba was a top runner on the
pavement and landed a ride in Vic Felt's Norberg-powered midget.
The Norberg engine was built by Vic Felt and Oscar Norberg in
Denver at the Norberg Garage on 8th and Lincoln Streets. It was
a 4-cylinder DO - a lot like an Offy but it had a detachable head.
There were only seven or eight of these engines built. At times,
the Norbergs would finish first and second in the features ahead
of the Offys. It wasn't but a short time later that Kouba had
his own Norberg-powered midget which he ran until about 1947,
then switched over to an Offy.
At Lakeside there was an announcer, Mat McEniry, who was on KOA
radio during the day and he came up with nicknames for all the
drivers. Since Earl Kouba was a rancher and raised cattle and
grew alfalfa that he cut three or four times a year, he got referred
to as 'The Ol' Hay Barber'. It stuck from then on.
Right after the war when we had two-car trophy dashes for the
fastest cars, Kouba in his Norberg, and Lloyd Axel in his Offy,
lined up for the dash. After about five attempts to get the trophy
dash started, Axel's Offy couldn't keep up or get the jump on
Kouba. Axel gave up, pulled out, and loaded his Offy and headed
home to work on the Offy. That didn't happen very often but the
Norbergs were a tough engine to beat. Although Earl Kouba had
been running Offys for years, he still has his Norberg engine
to this day.
A
story about Earl Kouba - The Ol' Hay Barber - Part III
Earl
Kouba drove for lots of car owners including Vic Felt, Ray Koch,
Buz Bussard, Loren Bennett, Burt Krause out of California, Bob
Lively, and Warren Hamilton. He was a car owner's driver and they
all loved him. He didn't have to have every new things that came
on the market to be competitive. Hell, if some one would come
up with a new tire that was supposed to be better and 90% of the
drivers just had to have those new tires, Kouba could look at
those new tires and see that they had several of the old tires
that they had been running and instead of junking the old tires
to buy the new ones, he would tell his car owner that they could
just live with the old tires instead of spending good money for
the new ones. His car owners sure were glad that he was driving
for them. Kouba in his no. 55 Offy and Lloyd Axel with his No.
5 Offy used to race on the AAA circuit in the Midwest and always
made a living at it. In the '40s the AAA man could ride with the
racers; they'd travel one week with one owner and then one week
with another.
One time Kouba got upside down at Soldier Field and he said he
was in the hospital for three days before they had the doctor
look at him. He soon had his opinion of the AAA accident insurance.
Kouba had a reputation of taking care of the equipment, so when
out-of-towners came to town many of them hired him to drive for
them. No one was sorry for their choice as Earl Kouba was usually
up near the front when the checkered flag dropped. He drove the
No. 10 Loren Bennett v8-60 at Lakeside right after the war and
later drove the No. 7 Burt Krause Offy and did a good job in both
of them.
A funny thing happened down at the ranch when they were getting
the midget ready to go to a race. A neighbor called Kouba to come
over and fix his tractor and since he never let a friend down
he told one of his pit men, Wayne Arner, to go ahead and change
over about six tires onto other wheels and marked al of them before
leaving to help his neighbor. He told Arner that they were short
on time and not to do any chores for his dad if he asked him.
Well, what do you know.... Kouba returned and Arner was up on
top of a rickety old windmill. He asked him what he was doing
up there and Arner said he was trying to fix it for his dad, Joe.
Kouba told him to get down and finish up with the tires and then
he sent his dad up to the house and asked Arner why he offered
to fix that windmill when they were so short of time. Arner said
he didn't ask me, he pulled out a 45 caliber pistol and said,
'Son, you had better climb up there and fix that windmill right
now.' Arner said, 'Yes, Sir!' And up he went. Kouba didn't say
much more but headed from the barn to the house and returned in
about ten minutes. He had the 45 in his hip pocket. There were
some that say his dad was a character all right.
A
story about Earl Kouba - The Ol' Hay Barber - Part IV
When
Earl and Ethel got married in about 1949, the engine in the midget
was tired so they didn't take it to California on their honeymoon.
But when they were in California there was a big stock car race
at Del Mar. So Earl took the front set out of the Hudson and put
in a bucket seat and safetybelt and raced the family car and got
about sixth in the feature.
Earl had just bought the new Kurtis Offy from Buz Bussard and
was doing a good job with it. It had parallel torsion front and
rear; there weren't too many of these chassis around. Wayne Arner
was along time pit man for Earl and he was setting quick time
regularly and when it was time to change gears Earl never let
anyone but himself change the gears. He would get under the rear
of the car and take the end plate off and ask Wayne to hand him
the gear box. He'd open the lid, take out one set of gears to
put in the car and immediately put the other set back in the box
and close the lid. No one ever knew what gear he was using, not
even his pit men. People would ask Wayne what gear Earl was using
and he would say that he didn't know. They thought he was lying
to them, but he wasn't.
Earl ran the new Kurtis Offy from about 1948 on and had real good
luck with it. But in last race of 1951 he drove the No. 12 Tea
Kettle for Bus Osborn. It was powered by a Clay Smith V8-60 engine
in a Kurtis chassis which was built especially for Johnny Parsons.
It was the only chassis exactly like Earl's and it handled like
it was on rails.
I was home on leave from the Army and I bought the rapid running
little V8-60 from Bus Osborn. Lloyd Axel said, 'I want to drive
that car.' So I said, 'OK', I have to go to Indiana for the summer
of 1952 so I'll leave it with you, but the club is running only
flat head motors and the DOs weren't allowed.' Osborn wasn't allowed
and they told Axel that they didn't want him to run because there
couldn't be any competition for him. So he just went about building
his new house and didn't race at all in 1952.
The club ran mostly flat heads for a couple of years on a weekly
basis but there were a few AAA midget races that were open to
the Offys at several tracks around the state.
A
story about Earl Kouba - The Ol' Hay Barber - Part V
At
one of our meetings at Western Spring they where trying to figure
out how to get a better field of cars since they were running
low on cars. Earl Kouba got up and said, 'Hell, that's easy to
figure out. Have the promoters and track owners put up a better
purse. I've never been to a race yet that had a good purse that
there weren't plenty of drivers there to get it.' That sure made
a lot of sense and is still true to this day.
In 1955, along with our AAA midget races, a group was formed called
Ten Spect and promoted weekly races at the Englewood Speedway,
a 1/3 mile dirt track. At one of the first racesof the season
they watered the track real good, right up to about two feet of
the top, and it was really slippery when the trophy dash started.
It was like they were on ice, running about 35mph, when Kouba
decided to check out that spot up next to the top. He got a bite
on the dry stuff and went by them so fast he almost turned them
around. They couldn't get to the top quick enough. But it was
too late. Kouba was long gone and won going away.
He was good at picking a spot on the race track that would run
the best. of course, I guess that why they called him a thinking
driver. Most car owners wanted him to drive for them.
We were having a meeting just after a 100-lap feature at the Englewood
track and someone said that maybe if we started the Fords up front,
ahead of the Offys, we could put on a better show for the fans;
the Offys were clearly superior to the Fords. Kouba said, 'I'll
be danged if I'll let the Fords get their own spots. That Dang-burned
Buddy Taylor finished ahead of me in that Ford out of El Paso,
Texas.' Kouba was right because at Englewood, on the dirt, Willie
Hunziker started 18th in the feature in his rapid No. 11 Ford
along side of Lloyd Axel in his No. 5 Offy and Hinziker won that
50 lapper from the rear. He had the Offy owners talking to themselves.
In 1955, Kouba was driving the No. 12 Bob Lively Offy out of Salida,
Colorado. Lloyd Axel usually out qualified everyone by a full
second. Don Malone was driving the Kouba No. 55 Offy and was starting
right behind Axel in the trophy dash and Kouba told Malone to
watch Axel and do exactly as he does. THey got on the green flag
and went through turn one and two and were really 'carrying the
mail' into turn three when Axel went fairly high and drifted right
up next to the fence, got off the throttle and shot right down
on the pole coming off turn four. He made a diamond out of the
corner and Malone did exactly as Axel did - He looped it twice
and ended up in the infield. Kouba asked Malone what happened
and he replied, 'He don't know. It looked easy when Axel did it.'
Of course Axel didn't get all of that experience over night.
A
story about Earl Kouba - The Ol' Hay Barber - Part VII
Lots
of the AAA races in 1955 were held at Arapahoe Fairgrounds in
Littleton, Colorado. Earl Kouba won every race that he entered
there and won the 1955 Rocky Mountain AAA championship. A lot
of big names ran at Arapahoe that year including Jimmy Reese in
the John Zink Offy out of Tulsa, Oklahoma and several cars out
of California.
Driver Don Malone was killed at the Arapahoe Fairgrounds driving
Earl Kouba's Offy when he drove over the back of another car while
signaling something to the flagman and facing into the late afternoon
sun.
In 1956 the club moved back to Lakeside for the season and Earl
was out front all year long. As the season ended Bert McNeese
won the 50-lap championship main event in the No. 12 red Riley
Special V8-60 by lapping every car in the feature. Second place
Tommy Rice in his own Offy and McNeese laped Wayne Hoffman three
times (he was driving the Morris Musick Offy). Musick sold that
Offy within a week to Tim Sullivan.
One Ford and four Offys were tied for the treveling-trophy dash,
so they decided that the car that had run in the dash the most
often should get it; Earl Kouba was the winner. Now who said nice
guys don't finish first.
In 1957 the club was still at Lakeside on the pavement and the
red Riley Special V8-60 was parked. The top running Ford belonged
to Ade Butler with Jimmy LaManna driving. The fans really had
someone to root for as most fans like to see the underdog do good
and in 1957 Ade Butler's Ford might of just been the best Ford
ever built in Colorado. LaManna finished second in two 50-lap
features. Foster Campbell won both of those features in his Offy.
In 1958 the club was back at the Englewood Speedway (Colorado),
a third-mile dirt, for most of the season. They ran a few out-of-town
races at Grand Junction (Colorado) and hill City (Kansas). On
one trip we arrived at Hill City early and for two days the temperature
was 107 and 108 degrees and the water was lousy. Well, when Earl
Kouba showed up i ran right over and told him that this sure might
be a good track as the promoter claimed he put eight inches of
clay on the straight and 16 inches on the turns. I asked him what
he thought of that and he got out of his car and kicked his heal
in the dirt a couple times and said "it don't hurt to claim
it", but there wasn't any clay on that race track. He had
plowed many a field and he knew clay when he saw it.
One good thing happened as a young fellow out of Grand Junction,
who drove a Hillegass Ford, got the hang of driving on a dirt
track that day; he set quick time several more times during that
season. The two features were won by Ed Jackson and Foster Campbell.
A
story about Earl Kouba - The Ol' Hay Barber - Part VIII
Earl
was now driving for veteran car owner Warren Hamilton and one
night Earl didn't do much in the first heat, so when he came into
the pits and got out of the car, Hamilton said, 'Well, maybe we
should change gears, put another tire on the right front, and
some other things.' When Earl walked around the car a couple of
times and said, 'No, just leave it alone. Maybe it was me.' Wow!
Now how often do you ever hear a driver say, 'Maybe it was me?'
But that's the kind fo guy Earl was; Never looking for an excuse,
just the facts. Without making any changes, Earl went out and
won the next heat like he was driving home from work.
Next spring we had a midget show at Cannon City at the Apple Blossom
Festival and it was good day weather wise and the races were great.
While I was shooting pictures on the outside of turn four, a couple
of local youngsters came by, one on horseback and the other on
a motor scooter, just as the main event was starting. After a
while, Gene Pastoer, in the Stockwell Offy and Fost Campbel in
his own Offy, were running wheel to wheel down on the pole while
Earl was setting back about eight car lenghrs just watching. Then,
when he got the white flag for one lap to go, Earl put the Hamilton
Offy right up on the top of the track and threw a rooster tail
of dirt over the fence; he passed Campbell and pastor coming off
of turn two and won going away. Wow, what a finish! One of the
young boys asked the other how he would like to ride with that
fellow. The other one said, 'I would faint on the first turn.'
After we took the trophy shot, I asked Earl what made him make
that move on the last lap. He said, 'Oh, I just thought that I
should do something, even if it was wrong.' Well, 'ol Uncle Earl
never did much wrong, believe me. In 1957 a new sprint car club
was formed called the Bay Cities Racing Association (BCRA) by
a few fellows including Art Meyers and Don Budy. They held their
first race a the Colorado State Fair in Pueblo, Coloradio in August
1958. Almost 50 cars showed up, mostly sprints, but a few champ
cars. Earl drove a champ car for Ray Koch with a blown midget
105CI motor. Later he bought a sprint car, a No. 98 Olds-powered
car that was once driven by Jud Larsen. earl did a real good job
and it landed him a ride in one of Gordon Herring's 170 Offy champ
cars; the one that Johnny McDaniels had built for Bobby Ball to
drive. It was a beautiful car.
One day at a sprint car race in Cannon City, Gordon was leading
and Earl was gaining fast, as Lee Herring and Ethel Kouba were
sitting in the stands. Lee turned to Ethel and asked, 'You don't
suppose that Earl would pass Gordon, do you, Ethel?' Ethel said,
'Yes, I believe that he might if he can.' Lee explained, 'You
don't pass the boss!!' Well, Earl did pass the boss and he lost
his ride in the process.
Earl didn't mind helping younger drivers when he could. One night
at Lakeside after we just had our mag repaired and were checking
it out, it seemed we were off timing a tad. Mags got very hot
on a V8-60 and are a job to change; we didn't want to change it
any more then necessary. I asked Earl if he would take the teakettle
out for a few laps and tell us what he thinks. When he came back
in he said, 'You're one the tooth slow, but when you get on the
straight there ain't nobody going to get by you.' We advanced
the mag one tooth and pushed off in the pits. I knew by the first
ten feet it was right. We were all set up to go when our driver,
Bert McNeese arrived.
Earl drove different sprint cars for various owners, as well as,
the Pikes Peak Hill Climb and midgets in between. He kept as busy
as he wanted to be. In about 1946, we had only midget races helt
at the Continental Divide Raceway, just over the hill from Earl
Kouba's ranch and south of Castle Rock, Colorado. On the morning
of a race in October it was cold for that time of the year, so
I went down to Earl's with his head pit man, Wayne Arner driving
his purple Jaguar. We got Earl and loaded up when one of Earl's
neighbors came by to ask Earl to fix his car. Again, Earl never
turned anyone down that needed his help. So he said, 'You fellows
go ahead. I'll be along later.' Wayne said, 'All the hot dogs
will be there and you should get some practice laps.' Earl replied,
'Let them be hot dogs.' We went about a mile and a half over the
hill but it took but it took twenty miles around the road. We
drove through the pits in that purple Jaguar convertible with
a black and orange tiger tail hanging out from the gas cap. Someone
yelled, 'What's the matter? Couldn't you get him all the way in?'
It was so cold that I had to set the movie camera to about 64
frames per second to get it to run at 24 frames. The hot dogs
were Bobby Unser in the Johnny McDaniels Eddie Kuzma built machine;
Russ Swedler, the UARA champ, in the Bob Steffes machine; Rod
Siden stricker, the Minneapolis champion; Warren Schiebe in the
Bob Lockart Falcon; Ray Elliot in the Lou Cooper Falcon; and Ed
Jackson, the RMMRA champ. There was a good field of cars and finally
Earl showed up, late as the dickens. With no practice he went
out stone cold and set quick time on a track that have never been
raced upon. Earl said that it as so far to come by the road that
after he was about half way, he thought that he should have just
hooked the tractor to the midget trailer and driven over the hill
and through the fields. It would have taken about half as long.
Knowing Earl, he would have, too, if he had thought of it sooner.
That would have been quite a sight to se ol' Uncle Earl pulling
into the pits with the midget hooked behind the old John Deere
and wearing his bib overalls and straw hat.
Earl moved up to minnesota but he still drove his original Kurtis
midget until 1978 which marked fifty years of race driving. Ear's
oldest son, Joey, raced midgets with his dad, but his youngest
son, Jimmy, never got the chance. Later on the both got to drive
Baby, Earl's name for his Kurtis. He won many trophies over the
years but one that he cherished was the Sportsmanship Trophy he
got at Lakeside Speedway during the 1940s. He was also given the
Harry Kern Award in Minnesota. Earl didn't have many superstitions,
but he would never take money in the pits because it was green.
The announcer at Lakeside was interviewing Earl and asked if he
wanted to be the best driver at Lakeside. Earl said, 'Not especially.
I just want to be the oldest driver.' I call that good thinking.
His former car owners appreciated having Earl as their driver.
Many of them willed him their race cars after their passing. If
that was to keep up he'd would have had to built a bigger barn.
During the 1988 old timer's meet at Lakeside, drivers and car
owners attended from about a dozen states; as far away as New
York and California. Ethel Kouba was there from Minnesota and
she said she was never allowed in the pits during the races. It's
only in recent times that women are no longer discriminated against.
She thoroughly enjoyed being in the pits at last.
