[ Dale Armstrong ] [ Jim Bucher ] [ Jon Lundberg ] [ Ken Veney ] [ Dave Wallace Jr. ]

[ Jim McFarland ] [ Weekly, Rivero, Fox & Holding - The Frantic Four ]

Dave Wallace Jr.

Dave Wallace Jr. pretty much grew up with drag racing as a second home for him. His dad, Dave Sr., worked at San Fernando Raceway and Jr. followed him around where ever he went, learning what dad did. By the age of 11, Jr. was sharp enough to fill in at such jobs as writing and passing out timing slips, helping dad on the entrance gate and generally making himself useful.

From the very beginning of his association with the sport, Dave wanted to be a track reporter, a job that was shared by his dad and sometimes the track manager, Harry Hibler. However the big day arrived when at the ripe old age of 14, Dave Jr. was allowed to try his hand at writing the news for the day. Dave did such a good job that he was told to learn to type and the job was his complete with a salary of five dollars per week. By the end of the summer Dave had learned to type and the weekly byline from San Fernando Raceway contained the immortal words “By Dave Wallace Jr.”

In the November 1965 issue of Modern Rod magazine, Dave had his first magazine feature story appear in print. In 1968 Dave replaced his journalistic hero, Ralph ‘Digger’ Guldahl as the weekly feature writer for Lions Drag Strip. In 1969 Uncle Sam saw fit to draft young Dave so his weekly byline disappeared for a while but in 1973 it appeared in print again, this time as publicity director for Orange County International Raceway. Staying in the newspaper field, in 1973 Dave became the editor of Drag News where he oversaw the publication until early 1977. While Dave was at Drag News he also did some moonlighting as an announcer but he soon realized his first love is as a journalist.

In the spring of 1977, Dave was able to fulfill a lifelong ambition by joining the staff of Hot Rod magazine as one of its editors. Over the next three years Dave put together a series of great editorial packages including the industry’s first series devoted to governmental threats. In 1980 Dave took the plunge from full time editor at Hot Rod to launch his career as a freelance writer/photographer. Dave’s words and photos have appeared in virtually every performance automotive title in the U.S. plus many European and Australian publications as well. Not limiting himself just to the monthly titles, Dave also produced three drag racing history books for Petersen Publishing in the years 1981-1983. The success of these books lead Petersen Publishing to sign a contract with Dave to produce a bi-monthly drag-racing magazine which soon became a monthly title.

[ Go Back ]