It is with very heavy hearts that we announce the passing of 1996 Inductee and former “Victoria Auto Racing Hall of Fame” President, Neil Montgomery.

Our sincere condolences to Neil’s family and his many friends in the auto racing community.

Here is a link to his updated biography page:

http://victoriaautoracinghalloffameandmuseum.com/neil-montgomery-1996-inductee

Having completed a first round of website updates, we are now continuing with a second one which will include revisions on more of the older individual “Inductee” pages.  We hope you enjoy the new information and added photos!         

It was pretty much inevitable, if not unavoidable, that 2008 Pioneer award winner Albert Smith would become involved in auto racing. Living just a good stone’s throw down the street from his employer Geoff Vantreight, Albert began working there in 1958 when the farm was already a hub of racing activity with Geoff sponsoring a Stockcar driven and maintained by two of his other employees, Alan and Jack Smith plus several other employees of Geoff’s were also racing fans. Albert wasn’t particularly interested in racing but did help occasionally with the car and made some trips to get parts for it. But 5 years of hearing Geoff, Al and Jack and Frank Perry discussing cars and racing convinced Albert that he should give it a try and get behind the wheel himself.

In the winter of 1963/64, he bought a 1953 Ford from a local auto wreckers and rebuilt the engine and with Pat Currier joining him and Albert behind the wheel they entered it in Western’s Jalopy class for the ’64 season. They did well enough that Albert finished 9^th in that year’s points standings and the following season, Frank Perry built a 1950 Meteor sedan which crew member Bernie Maggiora painted and lettered which Albert drove to 8^th place in year-end points.

Albert and Frank ran a ’53 Ford the following season and bettered their points placing, rising to 6^th. With another 1953 Ford, they finished just outside the top 10 in 1968 and in 1969 Albert got his 1^st ride in a Vantreight-sponsored Super Modified, a car formerly driven by Al Smith and later, Al’s younger brother Roy. Albert liked his open-wheel ride and continued driving for Geoff for several more years until he finally retired from active competition.

He kept up his racing interest which included being a spectator at several “name” races in the US plus some direct involvement which included crewing for car owner Dick Midgley at a race at Riverside, California in 1976.

Having had a very successful race driving career up until the mid 1930’s which ended only because his wife had discreetly pointed out that over 30 of his former fellow drivers had died at the wheel, 1992 Inductee Jack Smith then turned his full attention to building racecars. Jack was no stranger to fabrication, having constructed cars for other racing enthusiasts in order to help finance his own efforts.

In 1946 following his service in the 2^nd World War, Jack began work on yet another new racer, this one financed by local Victoria service station owner Howie Stanley who would be the car’s rookie driver.

Using the aerodynamic body design and rear-engine feature of the highly successful 1930’s German “Auto Union” car manufacturer’s “Grand Prix” racers, Jack added coil spring 4 wheel independent suspension with a cross-mounted 4 cylinder Model “A” Ford engine which had chain drive to the live rear axle. Not having the normal transmission and rearend assembly, this resulted in a car that weighed a mere 1,000 lbs. In building it, not only did Jack hope to win races, but also to prove that his innovations could be used in passenger car production for the increased safety of the motoring public.

At the 3^rd race meet of the ’47 season on June 14^th, Howie posted fast time and won the helmet dash and this repeated at several future meets along with heat race wins and good finishes. More wins came the following year and in 1949, Jack constructed a similar car for Speedway owner Bruce Passmore who had Vern Bruce as his driver. Jack’s 2^nd creation carried Vern to multiple fast times, 4 helmet dashes, heat race wins and 4 main event victories.