Five-State Raceway (Liberal)

Newspapers called this Kansas’s first NHRA-sanctioned strip, which was wrong. Strips at Edna, Wichita, Garden City, Victoria and Great Bend had all been NHRA-sanctioned at some point before it, though when it was built it was the only Kansas strip under NHRA sanction. Lowell M. Bushart owned the quarter-mile track, which ran on a northwestern taxiway of the Liberal Municipal Airport as a nonprofit supervised by the Five State Fair Board. The concrete was paved over with asphalt for better traction. Larry Bell was the first manager. Sunday racing began with the opener on April 19, 1970, featuring about ten dragsters from the Midwest All Stars circuit. NHRA’s Darrell Zimmerman called it the best racing facility in the Midwest. Some residents had objected before it opened, and fighting and drinking at the opener didn’t help. Crowd estimates ran from 4,000 to 15,000, and police said the parking area was littered afterward with beer cans and whiskey bottles.

An NHRA divisional points meet on April 17-18, 1971, paid a $22,000 purse, with Norman Gingrass, Ray Motes and Judy Lilly among the pre-entries. Another NHRA divisional in May 1972 drew over 300 entries over two days and saw fourteen national records set. Gary Cheatum won top fuel, John Dekker funny car and John Hagen pro stock. George Fabry and Bruce Tawson became managers in 1973. Apart from an IHRA year in 1975, the strip stayed under NHRA sanction through at least 1978, switching from class to bracket racing in mid-1976. The Mid-America Bracket Nationals on September 2-3, 1978, paid an $8,000 purse. In May 1979 several people complained that the operation was dangerous, and the city commission asked its attorneys to look into ending the lease. The United Dragracers of Western Kansas said they’d like to take over the racing if that happened.