Aquasco Speedway

Maryland’s first dedicated drag strip went in on land Alfonso and Rose Procopio bought in 1955. Their son, Al Jr., talked his father into building it, and Julio Marra, who married the Procopios’ daughter Betty, helped set it up and run it. It opened May 25, 1957. Joe Jacono set a strip record of 130.4 mph on October 20, 1957. That same month, young members of the Road Angels car club from the Frederick area wrote to the Frederick News calling it a very poor drag strip.

In Drag News on June 14, 1958, Bill Holz described it as isolated out in the country, about 2,800 feet long, with plans to extend it on the roughly 300-acre property. He said the concrete starting line helped launches, but the rest was a little wavy. The Cavaliers and Lifters car clubs ran the races in 1958. The Procopios kept improving the strip, which got AHRA sanction around 1960 and NHRA in 1965. It sat back in the woods on Neck Road in Aquasco, off Route 381, and the woods have nearly taken the old track back.