One last hurrah for Alba builder of world’s fastest car

By Phil Major
publisher@wood.cm
Posted 9/16/21

John Dearmore of Alba will wrap up a 65-year career in racing with a final grand tour this fall.

Dearmore will be showing his top fuel dragster that first burst onto the scene more than 50 years ago. It achieved national recognition in its heyday in the early 1970s as one of the fastest cars on the planet.

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One last hurrah for Alba builder of world’s fastest car

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John Dearmore of Alba will wrap up a 65-year career in racing with a final grand tour this fall.

Dearmore will be showing his top fuel dragster that first burst onto the scene more than 50 years ago. It achieved national recognition in its heyday in the early 1970s as one of the fastest cars on the planet.

Dearmore made his mark primarily building engines that could make cars go fast.

His machine shop near Alba also produced parts for those cars that have been in demand throughout the racing industry.

A devastating fire in 2014 wiped out the expensive machinery that Dearmore used to create those parts.

At that late stage in his career, Dearmore and wife Betty decided taking out loans to purchase new machines – they can go for as much as $250,000 apiece – was not a sensible idea, and so he semi-retired.

He continued to assist with building racing engines, completing the last one about a year and a half ago.

He last fired up the dragster 4-5 months ago at the NASCAR track, Texas Motor Speedway, in the Metroplex.

Dearmore learned the racing business as a teen in Kansas from his father and working at a shop, hanging out with race car drivers and mechanics.

He spent 1967-72 touring the country, primarily as a crew chief, leaving the driving to others.

But he admits that he loved the racing game so much that it took over his life, and he was on the road all the time. Whether his car won determined whether he could afford a motel room for the night.

Otherwise it meant borrowing someone’s room after they checked out to get a shower and head to the next stop.

Dearmore says once he completes the tour, which he plans to cap at the Nitro Revival 2021 in Irwindale, Calif., Nov. 6-7, he’ll likely sell the racing machine.

He was planning to be at a show in San Antonio and will display the car at the Iron Horse Festival in Mineola Saturday, Sept. 25.

After Dearmore built the car, it achieved status as the number one qualifier at the 1970 World Finals and was only the second car in history to break the 6.5-second barrier in the quarter-mile.

Car Craft magazine named it the performance car of the race, and Dearmore has a framed, enlarged copy of the article on his shop wall.

In a nod to a popular movie at the time, “Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid,” the announcer at nationals asked, ”Who are these guys?” – a reference to their background from the wheat fields of Kansas as virtual unknowns at the time.

Driver Brien Budd was even nicknamed Butch.

After the car went into retirement in the early ‘70s, it was stored in the rafters for 35 or 40 years until a nostalgia movement for drag racing’s heyday led Dearmore to restore it.

He notes it was a bunch of “old codgers” who had retired and had time on their hands and the resources to rebuild or recreate those cars. 

Finding parts became an industry unto itself, and many sought out Dearmore’s advice and counsel.

There were days when the parts search became a full-time job.

He went through several crankshafts before finding the right one, for instance.

The restoration took several years.

The Nitro Revival is the premiere event in the country for nostalgic racing, and Dearmore will be in his element, trading stories with friends through more than six decades in the sport.

Famed drag racers like “Big Daddy” Don Garlits and Don “The Snake” Prudhomme are among his contemporaries.

It was actually Prudhomme who defeated the Dearmore car in the semifinals at the 1970 nationals.

As John and Betty get by on their Social Security checks, Dearmore is planning to seek some local sponsors to assist with his farewell tour.

Contact him at 903-474-3568 or visit his booth in Mineola Saturday, Sept. 25. Plans are to fire up the car about 11 a.m. and 2:30 p.m. Ear plugs are recommended.