Walterboro Drag Strip

Roger Odum and Tommy Gibson are said to have started drag racing at the city airport in 1956, though a newspaper reported that the first races there were on Labor Day 1958. That meet had 42 classes and was sanctioned by the International Timing Association. Henry Easterby set a track record of 127 MPH on October 11, 1958, in his Cadillac-powered “Shadetree Eliminator” dragster. Lights went in for the first night race on October 25, 1958, and a noon-to-midnight program was set for Labor Day, September 7, 1959. Spectators paid $1 and racers $1.50, and there was one trophy for the overall winner. Don Garlits made exhibition runs there around 1959-60.

Racer Charles Hall said Walterboro rolled up the sidewalks at 6 p.m., there wasn’t much else to do but race, and racing was going strong when he first came in 1958. He started with a lightly modified ‘50 Ford, then built up a ‘55 Ford. Until 1960, 70 MPH was fast. Then Ford brought out its 352-cubic-inch, 360-horsepower engine in 1960, and suddenly everyone was going 100. Hall remembered Buster Sweat of Summerville buying one of the ugliest plain black four-door Fords at the dealer in St. George, driving it back to Walterboro, taking off the hubcaps and going over 100 MPH on his very first pass. One night, he said, that car beat a field of two Fords, 17 Chevys, 60 Pontiacs and one Oldsmobile, and everybody knew it. Politics ended the racing. According to Hall, a big-wheel senator on his way to Hilton Head came in on an unscheduled flight, had to wait for the strip to be cleared before landing and raised Cain about it. Racing at the airport stopped not long after.