The following interview is excerpted from the forthcoming book VOICES FROM THE HAPPY BOTTOM RIDING CLUB. Dr. Barney Oldfield was an aircraft design engineer and was head of the flight research instrumentation group for Bell Aircraft in Buffalo, New York. He was a charter member of Pancho’s Happy Bottom Riding Club. His membership card is dated 1942.

My name is Dr. Bernard Oldfield. My friends call me Barney. Although I was born in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada to American parents, I grew up in Buffalo, New York. After University I was hired by the Bell Aircraft Company as head of the Flight Research Instrumentation Group to work on America’s first jet aircraft, the XP-59A. This was a top-secret project, as secret [Read More]

The following interview was conducted in 2006 by the Pancho Barnes Trust Estate Archive with early hot rod Dry Lake racer Hyman “Blackie” Gold. Blackie became a friend of Pancho Barnes about 2 years after she relocated from Pasadena to Muroc on her Rancho Oro Verde. This interview features an excerpt from the coming book, VOICES FROM THE HAPPY BOTTOM RIDING CLUB.

(All photos copyright Pancho Barnes Trust Estate Archive.)

My name is Hyman “Blackie” Gold and I was born February 28, 1914. My first job was at a Ford agency, Fortner and Loud, located on the northwest corner of Colorado and Hill in Pasadena, California. I started there as a grease monkey. I was 10 years old. And they said, [Read More]