When you arrive at the Goodwood Revival this week you maybe intrigued, depending on your age, by a banner on the footbridge that leads from the car parks to the circuit.
‘Dan Gurney for President’ it exclaims, stirring memories of a campaign that began in America and spread across the ocean to Europe in the 1960s. So great was Gurney’s popularity at the time that the Editor-in-Chief of Car and Driver magazine David E. Davis Jr launched a campaign to get Daniel Sexton Gurney elected to the White House.
In May 1964, soon after Gurney had qualified for the Indianapolis 500, Mr Davis exhorted his readers to keep Senators Goldwater, Rockefeller and Nixon out of the White House where President Lyndon Johnson had reached the end of his term. David described the candidates as an assortment of “poltroons, charlatans, earnest amateurs and fuzzy idealists.” Strong stuff.
“Who could possibly be better suited to champion our cause than Daniel Sexton Gurney?” he wrote, “ he goes like the wind, he can drive anything better than most anybody. He has the enduring love of 300,000 fans at Indianapolis. His name inspires countless stock car partisans in the Southeast. He is the patron Saint of American sports car racing. European GP aficionados speak his name in the most reverent tones imaginable. He has become a legend in his own time.”
This is only very slightly exaggerated. Gurney was in his second season with the Brabham Grand Prix team in Europe, coming sixth in the World Championship. In 1966 he formed his own F1 team, All American Racers, and went to score a famous victory in his Eagle-Weslake at Spa in 1967.
As far as most Americans were concerned, he was he was an Indy racer, a true American hero with film star looks and much charismatic appeal as he was a quiet man, less extrovert than many American drivers. David E. Davis was moved to describe him as being “handsome enough to be a film star and as brave as Dick Tracy”. Great stuff, and the readers loved it, buying bumper stickers and badges in support of the campaign.
After qualifying at Indy in ’64 none other than Jim Clark wore a Gurney badge and gave his support to the ‘Gurney for President’ campaign. “If he gets elected, he won’t have time to come to Europe and run against me,” quipped Clark. High praise indeed from one of the very greatest racing drivers of all time.
You too can wear a red, white and blue Gurney badge at the Goodwood Revival. The badges, and the stickers, cost £1 each with all proceeds going to The Fly Navy Heritage Trust, the official charity of the 2012 Revival.
Have fun, wear your badge, and don’t miss seeing the man himself. One of the highlights of this year’s event will be a tribute to Dan Gurney and his achievements as a driver and engineer. On the grid will be 24 of the cars that he raced including the Eagle, a Shelby Cobra and and of course a Ford GT40. Should be a great weekend. See you there.
Dan Gurney. Super Guy, the essence of cool!
I’m hoping his autobiography will be done soon…..
We American F1 fans really only have Gurney, Phil Hill and Mario(sort of) to be proud of in F1. Of course now no American drivers show interest in F1 so it is not likely to change.
The Eagle is still one of the most beautiful F1 cars ever. Gurney was great on all levels and very well respected everywhere.
May I add that in my humble opinion Dan is America’s greatest racing man. He was a great & tremendously versatile driver who won in everything from F1 cars to NASCAR stock cars. He was also a key man in getting Colin Chapman together with Ford to attack & revolutionize the Indy 500 before going to build his superb range of Eagle F1 & Indy cars which are among some of the most beautiful of all racing cars.
After retiring Dan enjoyed a great second career as a team owner & car builder. AAR built F1, Indy cars, F5000 cars, Formula Fords, IMSA GTP cars from 1966-2000 & Dan always looked for a new way. Innovation thrived in his heart & mind and of course he examined & believed in Ben Bowlby’s theories and stepped up to build the prototype Delta Wing. He’s a great man & fantastic enthusiast. Everything David E. Davis wrote about him is true. If you’re at Goodwood be sure to shake his hand & congratulate him on a magnificent career.
I have a couple of the bumper stickers, and the great man signed one for me. Even when he was running his IMSA team, he would always make time for fans. Wish I could be at Goodwood!
DG is cool in the sense that he always did what he liked or felt like doing, no tricks, this is great. Very simple but it works.
Check out his stories on AAR website. I like this one – http://www.allamericanracers.com/heavy_100.html
Also, I bet he wouldn’t speak to empty chairs, and nobody can say “You didn’t build that” about his Eagle F1 car.
He would have been a better choice than Nixon…….surely???
So sad to lose DED Jr. last year, just a few months before WB. I hung on their every word, both of them.
how a guy could be so competitive and yet so popular was always an inspiration to me, has anyone ever said a bad word against this champion?
sadly i can’t get to Goodwood this year but would willingly purchase a badge if i could,
Dan was and is one of those people that seems to have fans wherever he went, mightily quick – robbed more than once through no fault of his own, i often wondered – having read a bit more of his relationships with people like Black Jack –
a great tribute to a great driver and a champion individual
Michael Spitale, what do you mean by you saying that you have Mario (Andretti, I suppose) as ‘sort of’ to be among the ones to be proud of in F1 from America?…
I consider him to be a Great racing driver, as well as a super gentleman person. Truly one of the greats indeed.
I could add Richie Ginther to Michael Spitale’s list. And rid the ‘sort of’ tag on Mario; last time I checked he was an American citizen.
Dan Gurney has accomplished a lot in his long career. That’s excludes him from ever possibly being President.
Dave, really appreciated your mention of Ginther. This man is greatly under-appreciated in my mind. He contributed to so many things in racing, and was a cool guy from what I’ve read.
As for Mr. Gurney, no doubt he’d have made one of our finest presidents.
Possibly my favorite racer of all time. I regret never having the chance to attend the 2010 Monterey Motorsports Reunion that honored him. I was living in Boston at the time, and work prevented me from making the trip. Now I’m back home in Brazil it seems it’s even harder.
Is it possible to buy these bumper stickers/badges online?
Also, when will his book be completed, does anyone know??
Thank you so much everybody for all these positive and supportive comments about a great guy and a great driver/engineer. Gordon Kirby is right – it’s all true – and GK should know.
I spoke at length with Dan at Goodwood last weekend and I can tell you that the book is not far away. This autobiography will be in two parts – the first from his birth to his retirement from driving – and the second the story of what he has been doing since his retirement from the cockpit. Part one is finished and part two well underway. And yes, it will be published in Europe as well as in the USA. A must-have book I’d say.
I think you can get stickers and badges from Goodwood. Try the website at goodwood.com or email speed@goodwood.co.uk and see if they still have any left for sale in aid of the charity.
Just back from five exhausting but joyful days at the Revival. This event is just mind-boggling, by far the best in the world, and the tribute to Dan was spectacular. He sprayed champagne, red white and blue streamers fell from the sky, and canons were fired. This will alll be on the DVD of the 2012 Revival.
So what’s next? Singapore in the dark. Hmmmm, I’m not entranced by this. Looks a bit like racing round the perimiter fence of a high security installation. But it will be a good race, the season is so close, and tensions are mounting. But there is much else going on before the end of the season, and I will be back here soon.
RW
Rob, I rarely get envious but miss not being at Goodwood last weekend [just returned from a rather epic motorbike ride of some 4000 miles ] and am so pleased to hear of the tribute to Dan and also your mention of the perennially underrated Richie – another article forthcoming perhaps? I have this brilliant picture of the 1965 British GP when Richie actually beat Jimmy off the line! ah I digress
In another article Long Beach was mentioned and I think of this weekend at Singapore – doesn’t equate does it?
I thought the tribute to Dan was a cut above the usual “parade of cars and interview on the grid” affair that the Revival usually does. The “Dan Gurney for president” sub theme worked very nicely! The podium setting was an inspired idea, and it looked like somebody actually put some thought in to making it a proper tribute. Dan looked genuinely moved. It’s amazing that even now, Dan still has his finger on the pulse of technology, and to me is vastly under rated as one of the great innovators of the sport. Seems like a nice guy too.
A proper racing driver and real gentleman. I remember seeing him for the first time in his Eagle Climax at the 66 British GP when he qualified third fastest. Some things you don’t forget.
I was in the 8th grade in ’64. Our class had one of those mock presidential elections that year and one of my classmates, a kid named Jack Vaughn, brought in a packet of Car and Driver stickers and entered Dan in the election. As I recall he gave a pretty good speech in favor of Dan’s candidacy. Johnson won, though.
Chris B – would appreciate it if you can can you steer me to the writings about Gurney and Brabham?
Late to the party as usual, but as this thread will live for posterity (at least for a while), and since Richie Ginther was quite rightly added to the list of US Formula 1 drivers deserving of mention, I’m going to add the name of Peter Revson, who definitely should not be omitted.