Dead Owls Car Club – 8mm film (1959)

When putting the hot rod video together (“The Hot Rod Years – Ridgecrest, California”), I needed an effective opening for the video.  Tex Whitson showed me four rolls of 8mm film (silent) that he had shot back in the late 1950s of the Dead Owls Car Club and of several meets at the Inyokern Drag Strip.  I thought this footage would be perfect for my video.  It would show a bit of what hot rodding was like in the late 1950s—better than anything else I could come up with—it was footage of the real thing and it was shot during the time that I was most interested in.

After I looked at the footage I realized that I did not know who most of the people were in the film, and which cars belonged to which people.  So I decided to make another video: this one would show Tex Whitson describing the film that he shot.  Tex has an incredible knack of remembering names, events, and cars, so I knew he would be up to the task of narrating the film he shot some 60 years ago and that he would accurately remember pertinent events and people that are in the film.

We set up a laptop with his film (converted to video) in the computer, ready for playback.  He controlled the speed of the video and could therefore freeze the footage, back it up or play it forward whenever he wanted so he would have time to tell a story or two relating to that particular series of images.  Even though 4 rolls of 8mm film run about 12 minutes, our video transfer with Tex’s comments runs 2 hours.  That is the video we will be showing at 2 pm in the Coso Gallery at the Maturango Museum on Sunday, July 28th.  Admission is free.  Tex will be there to provide additional comments and answer questions after the screening. I will be there to introduce the program and answer questions about the video.

~Mark Pahuta