RGeeProductions
09-01-2008, 11:21 AM
Organizers of the inaugural Hinchliffe Stadium Racing Expo hope that Sunday afternoon's exhibition will be the first of many events here at the former Great Falls midget and stock car and motorcycle racing venue.
'We got 22 racing cars - with at least one that raced here - on the finfield,' said show coordinator Ron Dennis, of Ronkonkama, N.Y. 'People were coming in from the Great Falls Festival all day.'Dennis, a three-quarter midget car driver/owner, worked with Friends of Hinchliffe Stadium, the
American Three Quarter Racing Association and the City of Paterson, among other individuals and groups, to reopen Hinchliffe to the public for the first time in 11 years. Hinchliffe's public return was a feature of The Paterson People's 2008 Great Falls Festival, a Labor Day weekend gala of concerts, canoe races, parades, rides and motrocycle stunts in and around the historic district.
Those coming in from the Sunday Labor Day Parade along Wayne and Union avenues got to see the No. 13 Hillegas copy-Elto outboard midget owned by Chris Slate, of Great Meadows, N.J.. Slate said that the No. 13 was also raced at the nearby Nutley Velodrome.
Slate, driver/promoter Neil Cole and Bill Claren were among those veteran drivers present who recalled racing on the paved one-fifth mile running track that lined the stadium's inner wall. Ed Otto, Sr. and Cole were aming those who opened Hinchliffe to motorcycles, midgets and stock cars 1933-37, 38-41 and 45-51.
Visitors also got to see the cleanup work in progress at Hinchliffe. The graffiti has been erased or painted over and most of the weeds and trees that have sprouted in the stands were felled.
Mayor Jose 'Joey' Torres and the Municipal Council plus the Paterson Board of Education granted access to the organizers in June. The 1932, 10,000-seat municipal stadium behind Elementary School No. 5, is owned by the school board.
Tores had promisied using part of a $2 million bod issued in 2006 to renovate the stadium. Expo organizersd and Friends of Hinchliffe Stadium want to see sports and entertainment events there with an eye towards
local racing. The stadium is within the national and state Great Falls Historic District.
Hinchliffe, named after the mayor who authorized the venue's construction, was also home to the New York Black Yankees Negro National League baseball team, among other scholastic, professional and semi-pro sports teams until 1997.
Walter Elliot
'We got 22 racing cars - with at least one that raced here - on the finfield,' said show coordinator Ron Dennis, of Ronkonkama, N.Y. 'People were coming in from the Great Falls Festival all day.'Dennis, a three-quarter midget car driver/owner, worked with Friends of Hinchliffe Stadium, the
American Three Quarter Racing Association and the City of Paterson, among other individuals and groups, to reopen Hinchliffe to the public for the first time in 11 years. Hinchliffe's public return was a feature of The Paterson People's 2008 Great Falls Festival, a Labor Day weekend gala of concerts, canoe races, parades, rides and motrocycle stunts in and around the historic district.
Those coming in from the Sunday Labor Day Parade along Wayne and Union avenues got to see the No. 13 Hillegas copy-Elto outboard midget owned by Chris Slate, of Great Meadows, N.J.. Slate said that the No. 13 was also raced at the nearby Nutley Velodrome.
Slate, driver/promoter Neil Cole and Bill Claren were among those veteran drivers present who recalled racing on the paved one-fifth mile running track that lined the stadium's inner wall. Ed Otto, Sr. and Cole were aming those who opened Hinchliffe to motorcycles, midgets and stock cars 1933-37, 38-41 and 45-51.
Visitors also got to see the cleanup work in progress at Hinchliffe. The graffiti has been erased or painted over and most of the weeds and trees that have sprouted in the stands were felled.
Mayor Jose 'Joey' Torres and the Municipal Council plus the Paterson Board of Education granted access to the organizers in June. The 1932, 10,000-seat municipal stadium behind Elementary School No. 5, is owned by the school board.
Tores had promisied using part of a $2 million bod issued in 2006 to renovate the stadium. Expo organizersd and Friends of Hinchliffe Stadium want to see sports and entertainment events there with an eye towards
local racing. The stadium is within the national and state Great Falls Historic District.
Hinchliffe, named after the mayor who authorized the venue's construction, was also home to the New York Black Yankees Negro National League baseball team, among other scholastic, professional and semi-pro sports teams until 1997.
Walter Elliot