Cumberland Dragway (Nashville)

Claude Lampley and Louis Gasser ran this quarter-mile track, which opened on Friday night, July 11, 1958, when 1,200 people watched more than 125 cars. Bonnie Kemp won top eliminator in his ‘32 Ford roadster at 102.72 MPH, the fastest speed yet recorded in Tennessee. Races ran weekly on Fridays on the paved northeastern half of the Cumberland Airport runway. From November 2, 1958, racing moved to Sunday afternoons for the cold months and added a class for women. Donna Felts won the first Powder Puff Derby, and Ira Walden took top eliminator in the modified division in his Olds-powered Model A.

In 1959 Cumberland and Union Hill Raceway, another Nashville-area strip, agreed to stop competing with each other. They used the same rules, prize money and classes, with Cumberland racing Saturday nights and Union Hill Sunday afternoons. Cumberland’s start was delayed because its insurer required a retaining fence first. The 1959 season opened on May 2 before 1,300 spectators, and Bobby Walker of Nashville ran 103.87 in the CA modified division, the fastest class, in his ‘57 Chevy-powered 1932 Dodge with six two-barrel carburetors. From May 9 time trials started later, because airport rules allowed no racing until half an hour before sundown, when the airport closed to planes. Robert Brawley set a track record of 111.1 MPH in his Pontiac-powered Model T on September 19. Pud Hibdon raised it to 126.26 MPH on June 17, 1960, and to 136.36 MPH in his dragster on June 23, 1961, by which time the strip was an eighth-mile. About 200 cars and motorcycles raced each week. The airport was close to downtown Nashville, and redevelopment was under way by 1965, when racing stopped. Nothing of the airport remains.