Dan Roney

Dan working on his 1940 Ford Coupe with a 1957 Oldsmobile J2 motor. "It was going to be a drag-only car, but I sold it when I first married," he told Sondre Kvipt of Kustomrama in 2020. The photo was taken around 1963-1964. Photo courtesy of Dan Roney.

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Dan Roney of Oakmont, Pennsylvania. Dan was a member of The Axle Snappers of Aspinwall car club in the 1960s. Back then, he was working on a 1940 Ford Coupe with a 1957 Oldsmobile J2 motor. "It was going to be a drag-only car, but I sold it when I first married," he told Sondre Kvipt of Kustomrama in 2020. "I would work on it when I had some extra money, which wasn't too often and the car sat for long periods since I had it in a rented garage and wasn't allowed to put any sort of heat source in the garage, so it sat over the winter months. As you can see with the C/MP on the windshield, I didn't exactly know that the Modified Production class was for cars with the body and motor having to be the same. At our local dragstrip, Pittsburgh International Dragway, the cars in the Gas class were quick, and I knew it would be a waste of my time to try and compete with them running the Ford in the Gas class. So, I never got to drive the Ford other than the day I drove it from down the street to the garage. A good friend bought the Ford in 1965 when I was getting married, and he raced it once after working on it to get it strip-worthy. It kept overheating, and he never did make a full pass." When Dan joined The Axle Snappers of Aspinwall, the club was slowly disbanding.