1964 Indianapolis 500 Film

No copyright infringement is intended with this, or any other video I upload. The purpose of uploading this video is for the viewing pleasure for those that watch it. This is the 48th running of the Indianapolis 500, run on May 30, 1964. This race will go down forever as one of the blackest in racing history, as two drivers were burned to death and two others were seriously burned. This race also marked the apex of the competition between front-engine and rear-engine cars at Indy, as numerous teams, including those of Parnelli Jones and A.J. Foyt, had on of each, but both teams decided to go with the roadster for this race. Another veteran team, Leader Card Racers, decided to go with e rear-engine car for this race. Reigning World Champion Jim Clark was the man to beat, destroy the old track qualifying record by more than 7 MPH, with Bobby Marshman and 2-time winner Rodger ward completing the front row, all n rear-engine cars, with Parnelli and A.J. Foyt qualifying fourth and fifth. When the race started, Clark took the lead as expected, but at the end of the second lap, rookie Dave MacDonald, driving one of Mickey Thompson’s low profile cars, lost control exiting turn four and hit the inside wall where it angled, and the car, full of gasoline, exploded on impact, careened across the track, and hit both the outside wall and Eddie Sachs at the same time. Sachs’ car, like MacDonald’s, exploded on impact. Sachs was killed instantly and MacDonald died two hours later. Ronnie Duman was also seriously burned in this crash. Others involved included Johnny Rutherford, Bobby Unser, Chuck Stevenson, and Norm Hall. Mickey Thompson’s team withdrew the car of Eddie Johnson in deference to MacDonald one lap after the restart. Incidentally, the lemon-necklace that Sachs wore to alleviate some of the problems drivers of that period had with a dry mouth ended up on one of the axles of Rutherford’s car, which rode over the top of Bobby Unser’s in the crash. Think of how Indy history as we know it could have been forever altered, as both Rutherford and Unser would win the race three times each. That crash, along with the one six days earlier in the World 600 that would eventually take the life of Fireball Roberts, and one not long after is race that seriously burned Jim Hurtubise, would lead to the invention of fuel cells by both competing tire companies, Goodyear and Firestone. Clark and Marshman dominated the race after the restart, but both ran into trouble. Marshman lost an oil plug as a result of running on the apron, and Clarks’ rear suspension collapsed while leading. That, plus a botched pit stop, would lead to the Lotus team withdrawing Dan Gurney not long after the halfway point. The other contending rear-engine car, driven by Rodger Ward, had a fuel mixture control jam, giving him such poor fuel mileage that he would have to make five pit stops in this race. The misfortunes of Marshman and Clark handed the lead to Parnelli Jones, but as he left the pits after his first pit stop, his on-board fuel tank exploded, knocking him out of he race and giving him serious burns, as well. After that, Foyt had virtually no competition the rest of the way, and Ward’s extra pit stops resulted in Foyt eventually lapping him on route to, by far, the easiest of his four Indianapolis 500 wins. Ward took second, the sixth consecutive year in which he finished fourth or better (1-2-3-1-4-2), a streak bettered only by Ted horn, who piled up nine consecutive finishes of fourth or better from 1936-’48. (But unlike Ward, Horn never won the race.) This would also be the last time that a front-engine car would ever win the Indianapolis 500, and just three years later in 1967, there would not be a single front-engine car in the entire field, and the last time a front-engine car would qualify for the Indianapolis 500 would be in 1968. Interestingly, every driver behind ward in the top third of the field, except Johnny Boyd, who finished fifth, scored his best Indy finish in 1964. Lloyd Ruby finished third, which despite the numerous times he would come close to winning the race in later years, was to be his best finish at Indy. Johnny White took fourth place and top rookie honors, while behind Boyd were Bud Tinglestad in sixth, 1958 Indy pole sitter and 13-time NASCAR winner Dick Rathmann in seventh, Bob Harkey eighth (a finish he would match in 1974), Bob Wente ninth, Bobby Grim tenth, while Art Malone brought one of Andy Granatelli’s Novis home in 11th place. All credits go to FOX and SPEED (SpeedVision, the forerunner to the SPEED Channel, originally aired the material seen in the video), the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, USAC, and Championship Racefilms.