A Book About Racing History On Long Island
 by Ken Spooner

       It all started with a song...

    The spark that illuminated author Ken Spooner to create "LONG RIDE ON A SHORT TRACK" first burned brightly in 1988. That's when Spooner, a country hit songwriter, was moved to write a song about Axel Anderson, one of his childhood auto racing favorites.

      That song, "AXEL", unleashed in Spooner an avalanche of emotions.

      Ken, who was born and raised on Long Island, and raced stock cars at Riverhead Raceway in the mid sixties under the pseudonym Ken Joseph, began recalling a flood of fond racing memories - remembrances of a youthful, awed spectator and of fledgling, intimidated driver. He determined to share his experiences and those of his racing idols in a book.

      From 1994 through 1995, he made several visits back to his native Long Island to interview Anderson and his friends and family as well as several of Anderson's racing contemporaries. What has resulted is a vivid and rich testimonial drawn from hours of first-person interviews and supported by dozens of rare and historic photographs.

     "Riverhead Raceway and Axel Anderson left a big impression on my life," Ken Spooner has said. "Long Island racing history was made by the guys I grew up with. Telling their story was way overdue."

     Long Ride On A Short Track, by Ken Spooner, is about the tale of the Saturday Night "Heroes", the "Weekend Warriors" at the race track during the 1950s-'60s. It was put together using history given much from Marty Himes, the Himes Museum Curator. Almost every photo, fact & video tape was from Marty's (or filmed there). If you thought racing in the '50s & '60s & '70's was just a "Southern Thang" think very fast again. This book would not be what it is without the large help it got from Mr. Marty Himes.
 

VERY Limited Quantities Are Still Available...

To Purchase An Available Copy... Contact Marty Himes @ the Museum.