BeeLines - July 11, 2018
By Marybelle Beigh, Westfield Town & Village Historian
Coon Road Speedway Event – Rousing Success – Ox Roast 2018!
Right there at the start of the activity venues at Ottaway Park Westfield Firemen’s Ox Roast 2018, was a white tent with an old white race car - #18 (how appropriate!) – a replica of the #18, 1941 Mercury race car that was driven by Don Strain at Coon Road Speedway, about some 60 years ago.
The tent was filled with folks watching a video produced by Greg Peterson and Randy Anderson describing the story of Westfield’s Coon Road Speedway, showing photos of actual races and interviews with the men and women who participated in those races one way or another during its short life span between 1956 and 1960. Your Westfield Historian has published three “BeeLines” and/or “Buzzings from BeeLines” about Coon Road Speedway over the past year, seeking anyone with memories or memorabilia for Peterson’s and Anderson’s project. And it was such a pleasure to see the great response at the Ox Roast, on Sunday, 7-8-2018, and Peterson’s exuberant phone message Monday morning about the event. More phone calls and emails arrived from both men in quick succession, filled with photos and wonderful stories to share.
The photos and captions used with this BeeLines speak volumes. In addition, the following stories, shared by Randy Anderson, further describe the experience.
Among those at the tent on Sunday was John Swartout, son of the original builder and owner of Coon Road Speedway, Joel Swartout; John was maybe 7 years old when his dad was crushed to death in a freak accident when a piece of heavy machinery he was using to work on the track tipped over on him. So, John grew up without a dad, but seeing the video triggered memory after memory, both in John and those in attendance who had been a part of that era, to give an expanded and special awareness of how John’s father had touched so many other lives as well.
The fascinating story about the “Mystery Man” of Coon Road Speedway, Ken See, was shared in the video, and having this elderly gentleman right there, both provided another special insight into the lives of our Octogenarians, and older, who find daily existence rather bland and uneventful at this point in their lives. As Ken shared his feedback with Randy, tears glistened in his as he described being drawn back into the excitement of a twenty-some year old, experiencing it as though he was reliving those moments again!
And then, after gathering the paraphernalia and more interview clips, several of the folks regrouped up on Coon Road. Ken See brought his four-wheeler in the back of his pickup and drove lap after lap on the remains of the old Speedway track as the videos captured the action. Anderson described his amazement at seeing, covered with vines and shrubbery, the remains of the various structures along the track – wood slats are gone but the metalwork remains of the grandstand, for example.
For those who are interested, Peterson and Anderson are working on finishing up the video to include what was gleaned on Sunday, hopefully in the next week or so. They will be providing copies to the Patterson Library, the CCHS McClurg Museum, and to the Westfield Historian Archives, when completed.
Please enjoy the photos and captions, and if anyone can locate an actual old movie of Coon Road Speedway in action, please contact your Westfield Historian at her cell phone number: 716-397-9254, or e-mail