Bob Harmon Raceway/Twin City Dragway (Monroe)

History

Jean Bayles filed incorporation papers for Bob Harmon Memorial Raceway on June 10, 1964. The strip used a runway at Harmon Airport, eight miles south of Monroe off Highway 165 on Prairie Road, and Whit Alger managed it. Its opening two-day meet on May 1-2, 1965 drew 160 entries and 4,000 spectators, and Eddie Hill ran 171 mph in his twin-engine fuel dragster. On July 17, 1965, the first night of racing under new lights, ‘Q-Ball’ Wale was killed in the Wale & Candies AA/FD. After winning his race he tried to stop with the parachute, it didn’t open, and the car ran off the end of the strip at high speed into an embankment and a deep ditch.

At a two-day race on August 7-8, 1965, Hill set the track ET record of 7.62 in his twin-engine ‘Double Dragon.’ On Saturday, August 20, 1966, Larry Reyes ran 9.15 at 163 mph in the Cuda ‘Kingfish’ for the full-bodied car record. Harmon Raceway went up for sale in the summer of 1975. The ad listed 99 acres with a 5-acre lake and 60 acres of timber, five staging lanes, a paved pit and return road, seats for 4,000, a concrete block tower, two concession stands and ticket booths. One of the last races found under the Harmon name ran September 7, 1975. New management reopened it in 1976 as Twin City Dragway, and it’s now Twin City Motorsports Park.