News Corner
Ron McQueeney, one of Indianapolis Motor Speedway’s best-known photographers and its longtime director of photography, passed away July 14 in Indianapolis. He was 80.
McQueeney spent more than 50 years involved with IMS and the Indianapolis 500 Oldtimers, snapping some of his first photographs with a new 35-millimeter motorized Minolta camera on Opening Day for the 1972 Indianapolis 500.
McQueeney took up photography as a U.S. Army motorcycle policeman in Okinawa in the 1960s. He was hired as a full-time IMS photographer in 1974. When he retired in 2011, he was director of the track’s photography staff, a position he had held since 1977.
McQueeney seemed to be omnipresent and tireless during his Speedway career. He literally had shot photographs from all corners of the iconic and historic facility.
McQueeney estimated he pressed the shutter buttons on his cameras more than a million times at IMS, photographing INDYCAR, NASCAR, IROC, Formula One, MotoGP and IMSA. He also shot numerous celebrity visits to IMS and the IMS Hall of Fame Museum along with various landmark scenes of the track.
“I would say almost every event that I’ve been to here at the Speedway, I’ve enjoyed one way or the other,” McQueeney said at the time of his retirement. “For me, this has just been a labor of love.”
McQueeney also organized and led teams of photographers for IMS evince since the mid-1970s and all INDYCAR events from 1996 through 2010. He also led an ongoing project to convert millions of negatives in the IMS photo archives into digital images.
“These are things people don’t see,” McQueeney said. “It’s behind-the-scenes work.”
IMS abandoned film photography and shot all-digital starting in 2003. That eliminated the camera shuffle for McQueeney and his staff, but it created other challenges.
“Always before we had a delay of a day or two between when we turned our film in and we got to see the images,” McQueeney said. “Now you could see the images not only in the back of the camera, but you could work with those images and send them to the magazines and people who needed them around the campus here almost instantly.
“So, it came to where they expected that instant gratification. We were out shooting, we’d have to come in more often, download them to the computer and upload them to the media sites and the websites where people could see them.”
McQueeney was part of the fabric of the Speedway since the days when winged Indy cars were considered a new trend. He knew the drivers, the mechanics and team members, and the support staff that helped make Indy the “Racing Capital of the World.”
“These people are my co-workers,” McQueeney said. “They’re my friends. I don’t know many people in my neighborhood, but I know all of these people (in the sport). At least if they don’t know me real well, they know me by name. That’s always a thrill to me.
“I cherish all of that and the 40 years of memories I have from that, too.”
At the time of his retirement, McQueeney had shot 40 Indianapolis 500s, 18 Brickyard 400s, eight United States Grands Prix and four Red Bull Indianapolis Grands Prix at IMS. He also had shot CART, INDYCAR and USAC races along with drag racing, motorcycle racing and boat racing — more than 1,000 events overall.
McQueeney served several terms as president of the Indianapolis 500 Oldtimers. He had been Chairman of the Board of the Indianapolis-based organization at the time of his passing.
“I would say that my favorite race of all time would be any Indy 500 that I’ve been involved in,” McQueeney once said. “That’s where I shine, and that’s what I feel I do best. I’ve been fortunate that I’ve been to a lot of events around different parts of the world and seen a lot of things, and I still come back here, and you can’t express what the enjoyment is and how I feel about this place.
“There is no other place like Indy.”
McQueeney is survived by his wife, Marsha. No services will be held, per his request.
Indianapolis 500 veteran Paul Goldsmith, a winning competitor on two and four wheels, died Sept. 6 in Munster, Indiana. He was 98, the oldest Indianapolis 500 starter at the time of his passing.
West Virginia native Goldsmith made six consecutive “500” starts between 1958-63. His best finish came in 1960, a third-place result in the No. 99 Demler Epperly/Offy car overshadowed by the sensational duel for victory between Jim Rathmann and Rodger Ward.
Goldsmith also finished fifth in 1959. That strong result came a year after he completed zero laps as a rookie starter in 1958, as he was caught in the multi-car accident that claimed the life of Pat O’Connor. Goldsmith’s best qualifying position was ninth for his final start, in 1963.
Incredibly, Goldsmith achieved such success at the top level of open-wheel racing despite making only eight career starts in cars without fenders. All eight races were USAC Championship events, including the six Indianapolis 500 starts.
Few racers in his era were more versatile and successful than the humble, quiet Goldsmith.
Raised in Detroit, he began racing motorcycles as a teenager after the end of World War II. He jumped immediately to American Motorcyclist Association expert status on Harley-Davidson machines, competing while working full time at a Chrysler factory. Goldsmith’s first major AMA motorcycle win came in 1952 on the 1-mile dirt track at Wisconsin State Fair Park, now paved and known as the Milwaukee Mile.
In 1953, Goldsmith won the Daytona 200 motorcycle race on the old beach road course, with his Harley prepared by legendary engine builder and tuner Smokey Yunick. He also won the 100-mile race at treacherous Langhorne (Pennsylvania) Speedway.
Goldsmith finished second in the AMA standings in 1954 to a protegee and friend from the West Coast who also achieved success on two and four wheels – Joe Leonard.
While still racing motorcycles, Goldsmith tried his hand at stock car racing, winning a 250-mile race in 1953 at the Detroit Fairgrounds. He made his final motorcycle start in 1956 and then focused on stock car racing, earning his first NASCAR victory that year in a 300-mile race at Langhorne for Yunick’s team.
Goldsmith was the final NASCAR Grand National winner on the old beach course in 1958 in Daytona Beach, Florida, while the construction of Daytona International Speedway was underway. He is the only competitor to win on the beach course in a car and on a motorcycle.
In 1959, Goldsmith teamed up with ace mechanic Ray Nichels and dominated the USAC Stock Car circuit in Nichels Engineering machines during the first half of the 1960s. He won the USAC Stock Car championship in 1961 and 1962 and finished second in 1960 and 1965.
Goldsmith won 26 USAC Stock Car races in 85 starts, with 44 top-three finishes. Nineteen of those wins came in 39 starts during his title-winning seasons in 1961 and 1962. He won nine races and earned 59 top-10 finishes in 127 NASCAR starts. His last NASCAR win came in 1966 at Bristol (Tennessee) Motor Speedway.
Despite only six starts at Indianapolis Motor Speedway, Goldsmith turned many laps at the Racing Capital of the World as Firestone’s chief test driver.
He also participated in one of the most unique events in IMS history, a 24-hour race between two cars Nov. 21-22, 1961. Goldsmith and fellow star drivers Ward, Len Sutton, Fireball Roberts, Marvin Panch and Joe Weatherly alternated between a Police Enforcer version of a Pontiac Catalina and a conventional Catalina in heavy rain, a test of the machinery and drivers. They were the first drivers to compete on the completely paved 2.5-mile oval, as the front straightaway of original brick was covered with asphalt in October 1961.
His noteworthy accomplishments on two and four wheels were honored with membership in several Halls of Fame, including the IMS Hall of Fame, Motorsports Hall of Fame of America, Motorcycle Hall of Fame, USAC Hall of Fame and Michigan Motorsports Hall of Fame.
Goldsmith retired as a driver in 1969 to focus on his growing aviation exploits. He was a noted pilot, one of the first drivers to fly himself to and from races. He also trained pilots for China East Airlines, flew parts to races in his plane, and owned an aviation engine repair business and an airport in Griffith, Indiana. Goldsmith also owned a series of ranches and restaurants.
Goldsmith was predeceased by his wife, Helen, and son, Greg. He is survived by his daughter, Linda Goldsmith-Slifer.
Indianapolis 500 Oldtimer Bill York, who worked in and managed the media center at Indianapolis Motor Speedway for more than 50 years, died Aug. 20 near Nashville, Tennessee. He was 91.
York, a proud native of Peru, Indiana, served and befriended journalists from around the globe and drivers and race team officials in his roles in the media center at the Racing Capital of the World from the late 1950s to the mid-2010s. His contributions spanned every event at IMS during that time, including the Indianapolis 500, Brickyard 400, United States Grand Prix Formula One race, Red Bull Indianapolis GP MotoGP race and more.
The colorful, genial York ran the IMS media center with a fair, firm hand, mixing a no-nonsense approach with a hearty laugh that earned admiration and respect from all journalists and officials.
York and longtime IMS media official Bob Laycock created handwritten Indianapolis 500 qualifying cards – complete with driver and primary sponsor name, and time and speed for each of the four laps of every qualified driver, written in color-coded markers to match sponsor colors – that became legendary fixtures on the walls of the old media center located adjacent to Gasoline Alley and the current media center adjacent to the Pagoda. Drivers often sought their qualifying cards as keepsakes, especially from their rookie year in the “500.”
He also was instrumental in helping to increase the recognition of the Stark & Wetzel Indy 500 Rookie of the Year Award in the 1950s when he was a sales representative for the Indianapolis-based meat company.
York began working in the IMS press room in 1958 as a statistician, eventually taking over management duties in the media center through 2008. He then continued to serve as a media center liaison into the mid-2010s. Working at IMS was a part-time job for York – he was a very successful salesman during his professional career – but a role he fulfilled with full-time passion and skill.
He earned a variety of auto racing awards for his work, including the 2010 Bob Russo Founders Award for lifelong contributions to the sport, the 2011 Jim Chapman Award for excellence in motorsports public relations and the STP Unsung Hero Award.
While York was a renowned figure among global racing media, he also was respected and admired by National Football League and professional basketball journalists due to his longtime work in the media rooms of the Indianapolis Colts and Indiana Pacers.
York was the first leader of the statistics crew for the Pacers in 1967, a role he maintained for five decades and more than 2,000 games as the franchise moved from the American Basketball Association to the National Basketball Association. The Pacers’ media room in Gainbridge Fieldhouse is named in his honor.
He also led the stat crew and worked in the media room for the Colts from their arrival in Indianapolis in 1984 through the 2010s, working at both their original home at the RCA Dome and their current home, Lucas Oil Stadium.
York was predeceased by his wife, Jay, and a son, Rick. He is survived by a daughter, Marla.
Parnelli Jones, the 1963 Indianapolis 500 winner and the first driver to qualify for the “500” faster than 150 mph, passed away peacefully with his family by his side June 4 in Torrance, California. He was 90.
One of the most versatile drivers in history, Jones (pictured here with Al Unser) was so highly rated by all his competitors, including several of the best from Europe. He only competed in the Indianapolis 500 seven times yet led in all but two of them for a total of 492 laps, still the eighth-highest laps led total in the race’s history. And in the only two starts he didn’t lead – 1965 and 1966 – he ran many laps in second place, finishing in that position in 1965 and retiring from there with mechanical trouble in 1966.
Jones, who was born Rufus Parnell Jones on Aug. 12, 1933, in Texarkana, Arkansas, is the only person ever to have led the Indianapolis 500 for 400 or more miles on two occasions. The first came when he won in 1963 and the second when his Andy Granatelli-entered, STP turbine-powered car failed after leading 171 of the first 196 laps in 1967.
Winner of the pole position with track-record qualifying speeds faster than 150 mph in 1962 and 1963, Jones never started lower than sixth in any of his seven “500s.”
Even after retiring from INDYCAR SERIES competition as a driver, somewhat prematurely in 1968 at the age of only 34, the street-smart Jones continued to be a winner. He fielded a team with a longtime business partner Vel Miletich that won the “500” in 1970 and 1971 with a pair of PJ Colt chassis, built in-house under the direction of chief mechanic George Bignotti and driven by Al Unser. This combination also won the United States Auto Club National Championship in 1970 followed by a second and third straight title in 1971 and 1972 with former motorcycle racing standout Joe Leonard behind the wheel.
Vel’s Parnelli Jones Racing even briefly ventured into Formula One. They fielded Mario Andretti in the 1974 season-closing Canadian and United States rounds, followed by the entire Grand Prix circuit in 1975, and all the races up through the Long Beach, California, round in spring 1976, at which point lack of sufficient sponsorship brought the campaign to an end.
During this same period, the team also fielded Andretti and Unser in the Sports Car Club of America’s Formula 5000 road racing series and the USAC Dirt Car (later Silver Crown) series on 1-mile dirt ovals, the two drivers consistently recording top-three finishes in each of these widely contrasting forms of motorsport.
Jones was named after a local judge, Rufus Parnell, whom his mother respected. The family moved from Arkansas to Fallbrook, California, when Jones was 2 and then to Torrance, California, when Jones was 7.
At age 17, while racing old cars in Gardena, California, Jones needed an alias to prevent race officials from learning he wasn’t the minimum legal age of 18 to compete.
Jones’ school friend, Billy Calder, came up with an idea to solve the problem. There was a girl in their school named Nellie, and Calder used to tease Jones about her liking him. Calder knew Jones’ middle name was Parnell, and he would joke around with him, calling him “Parnellie.” Calder painted the name “Parnellie” on the jalopy door, and the rest is racing history, with the “e” dropped somewhere along the way.
As a driver, Jones burst on the USAC scene in 1960, joining his friend and traveling partner Jim Hurtubise in defeating all the venerable Offenhauser-powered sprint cars with much less expensive V8 “stock block” Chevrolet powerplants. Jones was offered cars to drive at Indianapolis that first year, but the savvy newcomer chose instead to watch from the sidelines as Hurtubise smashed the qualifying track records and dominated the Rookie of the Year honors. Jones had decided instead to make his championship debut after the “500” to potentially enjoy a full season on “the circuit” before returning to Indianapolis the following May with valuable miles under his belt.
It worked out better than expected.
By the time he almost won the 1960 Milwaukee 200 with a Quin Epperly-built “laydown” that August, Jones already had been blessed with the break of a lifetime by testing tires for Firestone, thus racking up hundreds of miles at IMS before ever taking a rookie test. Everything seemed to be in place for him to drive the same Epperly car the following May until veteran Tony Bettenhausen took it out for a “test hop,” raved over its handling and convinced car owner Lindsey Hopkins he should purchase it for Bettenhausen to drive.
Jones wasn’t out of a ride for long.
J.C. Agajanian, for whom Bettenhausen had previously agreed to drive in 1961, was already somewhat of a mentor to Jones, and it didn’t take long for Agajanian to hire him in Bettenhausen’s place. Jones qualified fifth for the “500,” led 27 laps and might have been a late-race contender for victory had he not been hit in the eye by a rock. Even with blood streaming into his goggles and an engine down on power due to a fouled spark plug, he refused to give up, flagged off several laps behind at the end in 12th place. The Rookie of the Year balloting resulted in a tie between Jones and Bobby Marshman, who finished seventh.
Jones’ 1960 USAC Sprint Car season had culminated with the final Mid-West Sprint Car title and was followed in 1961 by the inaugural National Sprint Car title, the first in which the previously separate championships of the Mid-West, East and Pacific Coast were merged. Jones eventually won 25 USAC Sprint Car feature events, along with another 25 wins in USAC Midget Car feature events despite competing only on an occasional basis.
At the end of the 1961 season, Jones posted his first of six USAC National Championship victories with a win in the season-ending 100-mile dirt track event at the Arizona State Fairgrounds.
By this time, Jones had already been heeding the advice of his racing hero, 1952 Indy 500 winner Troy Ruttman, in seeking Agajanian’s help with investments. It had begun with steady contributions from Jones’ sprint car earnings until their holdings, as partners, grew to include a variety of valuable real estate acquisitions. Set up with a Firestone store in 1965, Jones worked hard with that investment, and it wasn’t long before he opened a second store and a third, eventually topping out with no less than 47 of them. Even after selling the whole enterprise many years later, he remained on board as a consultant, with his iconic name still appearing above the main entrances.
Although Rodger Ward won his second “500” in 1962, Ward often said Jones was the moral winner of that race. The first – and only – driver to qualify faster than 150 mph that year, Jones, in only his second “500” start, proceeded to lead 120 of the first 125 laps of the race until failing brakes obliged him to slow down. Never giving up, as was typical, he nursed his ailing car home to seventh after having run for almost 200 miles without brakes.
In 1963, Jones won the Indianapolis 500 in the No. 98 Watson-Offy nicknamed “Calhoun,” although the race was not without controversy. Late in the running, oil began to seep from a tiny crack in an externally mounted oil tank, placing Chief Steward Harlan Fengler in the unenviable position of having to decide whether or not to black-flag the leader. While he was still deliberating, the leak stopped, and Jones was allowed to continue to the victory.
Just over a year later, Jones was invited to drive two races for Team Lotus, the first being the August Milwaukee 200 when Jim Clark was not available, and the other as Clark’s teammate for the Trenton (New Jersey) 200 in September.
Jones won both races.
It was quite a compliment when Lotus team principal Colin Chapman came forth with an offer to have Jones partner World Champion Clark on the Formula One circuit, but for a variety of reasons, Jones politely declined, preferring to race at home. He landed yet another title, capturing the 1964 USAC Stock Car championship with eight wins in 15 starts for Bill Stroppe’s Mercury team, and he even trounced the sports car contingent in the late-season Los Angeles Times Grand Prix at Riverside Raceway in California.
Jones’ sixth and final USAC Championship victory came in June 1965 in the Milwaukee 100, driving the same Agajanian-owned Lotus with which he had finished second to Clark in the most recent “500.” He had decided to cut back on INDYCAR SERIES racing at that point and made only one more start for the balance of the year, racing USAC Stock Cars instead and becoming more and more involved with off-road racing.
Despite Jones’ numerous victories and accomplishments, he also will be remembered for almost winning the “500” in 1967 with Andy Granatelli’s controversial, STP-sponsored, four-wheel-drive turbine.
Jones qualified a disappointing sixth with the dominant car, but it didn’t take him long to get to the front on Race Day. Using the four-wheel-drive system to its fullest extent, Jones negotiated the turns above the accepted “groove,” and by the time he entered Turn 2 of the opening lap, he had driven around the outside of all but pole sitter Mario Andretti. As they cleared Turn 2 and headed down the backstretch, Jones moved to the inside and sped past Andretti with apparent ease to lead the first lap by a huge margin.
Rain fell after only 18 laps, forcing the race into a second day, but then the story pretty much remained the same. When an inexpensive bearing in the rear end failed within sight of the finish, Jones had led for 171 of the 197 laps.
In 1968, Jones was supposed to drive the much-revised No. 40 turbine in the “500,” but he ended up never turning a lap, having weighed his chances of winning against the growing responsibilities of his many business investments and his family. He decided instead to step down and turn over the car to Leonard, who was driving for the team Jones co-owned with Miletich.
Although he was now no longer an Indianapolis 500 driver, that did not mean Jones was through with driving. He became part of Ford’s effort to win the SCCA Trans-Am championship, and he won the driver’s title in 1970. In off-road racing, he teamed up again with Stroppe to score five major wins with a much-modified Ford Bronco, sponsored by Olympia Beer and affectionately nicknamed “Big Oly.” The combination won the Baja 1000 in 1971 and 1972, the Baja 500 in 1970 and 1973, and the Las Vegas Mint 400 in 1973.
Jones is survived by his wife of nearly 57 years, Judy, and sons PJ and Page, both of whom had professional racing careers. PJ Jones followed in his father’s footsteps by starting the Indianapolis 500 in 2004 and 2006. Page Jones was making great strides on Midwest short tracks until he suffered serious injuries in a crash in 1994, ending his driving career.
Parnelli Jones was inducted into numerous Halls of Fame, including the Indianapolis Motor Speedway Hall of Fame, the National Motorsports Hall of Fame and both the National Sprint Car and National Midget Halls of Fame.