John Bradley (drag racer)
John William Bradley[1] (29 October 1925, San Bernardino, California-29 November 2012, Dolan Springs, Arizona), nicknamed "Mr. Flathead",[2] was a pioneering American drag racer and land speed racer.[3] He was inducted into the International Drag Racing Hall of Fame in 1994.[4]
Early life
[edit]Bradley was a veteran of the United States Navy during World War II. He was a member of National Hot Rod Association for sixty years.[3]
Racing career
[edit]Bradley started racing in Southern California in 1946, competing on dirt tracks and in illegal street races, with a Deuce roadster.[5] His first dragster used Ford Model T frame rails and a Ford flathead V8; built in 1952, it hit a speed of 147 mph (237 km/h).[5]
He set records beginning in 1956 and was still doing so until a few years ago.[2] He recorded twenty-eight wins in Top Eliminator in 1956 alone.[2]
He drove the tube-chassised[5] Gene's Brake Shop Special digger in 1961.[2] Running on gasoline, Bradley would cheat, hiding nitro in the fuel line to pass scrutineering; nitro had been banned as unsafe for racing by NHRA in 1957.[2] Track officials routinely tore down the carburetors and intake manifold, and tested the front-mounted fuel tank, without finding anything amiss.[2] This car would take Bradley to 50 Top Eliminator titles and a number of track records during 1957 and 1958.[5]
At the Colton Dragster Invitational (Bradley's home track) in 1957, Bradley defeated Emory Cook (in the hemi-powered Cook and Bedwell digger).[2] He lost in the semi-final at the NHRA Fuel and Gass Championship in Bakersfield, California, in 1959, but won that year's Southern California Championship, hosted by the Pomona Valley Timing Association.[2]
Bradley also drove a twin-engined car which used a pair of flattys, in a chassis welded up in Bradley's garage, built with the assistance of long-time partner Max Romero.[2] This car ran 100% nitro, and turned in a pass of 8.98 seconds at 172 mph (277 km/h).[2] He campaigned this car from 1958 to 1962.[5]
Bradley used a high-gear-only transmission in all his dragsters, which resulted in bogging off the starting line when combined with the flathead's poor low-rpm torque. It was because of this he used the nitro.[2]
Unlike other racers, Bradley continued to campaign a flatty-powered digger, earning him the nickname "Mr. Flathead".[5] Bradley retired from professional racing, but continued to run a 9-second flathead-powered exhibition car on California's nostalgia drag racing circuit into his late 70s. This car uses eight-plug billet aluminum cylinder heads Bradley designed himself.[5]
He was inducted into the International Drag Racing Hall of Fame in 1994.[4]
Family
[edit]Bradley's wife, Jeanne, died in 1998. He had two children, Frank and Lori, and five grandchildren, Mona and Travis (from his son's marriage), and Nichole, Holly, Tige from his daughter's.[3]
Bradley is buried at Riverside National VA Cemetery, Riverside, California.[3]
Notes
[edit]- ^ "John William Bradley, Born 10/29/1925 in California". CaliforniaBirthIndex.org. Retrieved April 30, 2024.
- ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Nostalgiadragworld.com Archived 2020-10-31 at the Wayback Machine (retrieved 5 May 2017)
- ^ a b c d Landracing.com (retrieved 5 May 2017)
- ^ a b Landracing.com (retrieved 5 May 2017); Sportsmuseums.com (retrieved 5 May 2017)
- ^ a b c d e f g Ford.carstalks.com (retrieved 5 May 2017)
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