Claremont Speedway Book

[Stats]

CLAREMONT SPEEDWAY HISTORY

The long running Claremont Speedway in Western Australia holds a unique position in the history of the dirt-track sport.

After stints at West Maitland, Newcastle and the Sydney Showground, former New Zealander John S. Hoskins ventured over to the west coast and convinced the Royal Agricultural Society to construct a cinder track.

Following two successful day time meetings in May 1927, the lights came on for the first time on Saturday September 10, 1927.

A total of 37 meetings were held with the most successful riders being Ron Johnson, Sig Schlam, Charlie Datson (NSW) and Frank Brown (NSW).

At season's end Hoskins took Johnson, Schlam and Datson to England along with a troupe of eastern states riders under the control of A. J. Hunting.

The newspaper coverage of those speedway activities some 88 years ago was amazing.

No less than six different newspapers filed a race report on that very first meeting on May 14.

Now for the very first time, longtime speedway historian Ken Brown has produced a book on the birth of speedway racing in Western Australia.

After more than a year of research - and countless hours in front of the computer - the history of that inaugural 1927-28 season is now available for you to read.

With 100 pages and more than 130,000 words - the actual newspaper reports of the day have been copied word for word to provide the story of how the track was built, plus the meeting previews (with the nominations) and reviews (with the full race results).

"CLAREMONT SPEEDWAY 1927-28 THE LIGHTS GO ON" brings you the whole story of that eventful summer.

The language used by the reporters in those far off days was so different to what we read today.

For example, read the following report on pint sized Sig Schlam's performance on a 1000c.c. Harley Davidson at only his second meeting -

 

"The riding of Sig Schlam was full of merit. On a big machine he drove through the loose cinders like one possessed. His machine bucked and shied and at times was nearly a foot off the ground but "Sig" just sat there and drove it. The more the motor bucked, the more he turned on the "gas". His times were excellent and his win was a popular one."

 

To find out all about what happened during the 1927-28 season, simply go to www.blurb.com, click on Bookstore and type in Claremont Speedway.

Books are available in softcover or hardcover version, or as a PDF copy.