Time passed from ’61 to ’62 and the track continued to grow in local stature with cars and spectators traveling from as far away as Kansas City and Chicago. While there is no ‘big’ city in the immediate area, Kahoka is central to several mid-size towns of considerable population in the Mississippi River valley.

During ’62 we decided to employ the W.L. Miller Co of Hamilton, Ill. to pave the entire 1,000’ track on the Fairground property. The new surface really helped our popularity and made racing at Kahoka a favorite place. 

To insure quality entertainment for our growing crowds, we ‘booked’ in many special cars and exhibitions during the next five years. They included: Don Garlits, The Guzler, The Ramchargers, Art & Walt Arfons (with Doug Rose & Bobby Tatrow), Marshall & Vermillia, E.J. Potter, and ‘The Back-up Pickup’ to name just a few.

A lot of area racers became ‘stars’ at Kahoka too. These included such names as Arnie Beswick, Jack Sharkey, Jack Dittmars (Little Screamer), Curt Wasson, Ken Chenoweth, Ed Bruegge’s ‘Possum Chaser’, R.D. Wolf, and Jim Simpson; again to name only a few.

Everything seemed to be going well, the weather was always a factor, as was flooding on the Mississippi.  That is until early ’65 when word reached us that the Missouri Highway Department had made plans to by-pass downtown Kahoka with U.S. Route 136. The preferred new routing would go directly through our limited ‘shut down area’ which would make it difficult if not impossible to continue holding 1/8th mile drag races!

Tri State Dragway, 2014: Ken Chenoweth, Burlington, Iowa racer and Top Fuel pilot, snapped this photo of TSD sitting on the starting line of the long defunct Kahoka racing facility. It has held up quite well after 45-50 years of heating and thawing.

Tri State Dragway – 1964: Bill Curtis, Canton, Illinois racer prepares to make a pass in his fuel injected small block Chevy dragster. This photo, shot at night, shows the iconic ‘Clark County Fairgrounds 1885’ arch, and the heavy ‘track prep’ (powered resin) used by the stockers ‘back in the day’. (Photo from the archives of Bill Curtis)

Bill Curtis was a drag racing pioneer from the strip coal mining country in central Illinois. During the time Tri State Dragway operated in the ‘60s, Bill was active in many facets of the sport. During the late 1950s, he campaigned a roadster which became famous for doing battle at Alton Dragway with the track’s owner John Story.

As pictured to the right, he tried to claim a Top Eliminator title at Kahoka with an injected small block dragster. Next, he was teamed up with Neil Schwartzbaugh with a huge blown Chrysler Top Fuel car. That car won several titles!  Bill wound up in California, working for the Orange County Water District and now lives in retirement in Redondo Beach. Many DRO readers knew Bill, and there are frequent posts about drag racing to his web site.