1959 Pontiac Challenger I - Racing Legend Mickey Thompson

Turned down by Chrysler, Mickey appealed to Knudsen and Pontiac to supply the power for his soon-to-be famous Challenger I streamliner. "They sent us four stock [389] test engines--they weren't even new," Voigt said. "Pontiac freighted them to Mickey's house in El Monte. We had a helluva time unloading them because we didn't have a forklift or anything like that."

But with Pontiac power, the development of Challenger I continued. Placed inside chalk drawings on the floor of Mickey's backyard garage, the four Pontiac engines were positioned on 2x4 and 4x4 blocks, while Mickey and Fritz drew a sardine-can-tight outline of the streamliner. The plan was for the front engines to face backwards, driving the front wheels, while the rear engines handled the rear wheels.

Mickey's biggest challenge would be making four simultaneous gearshifts, while trying to keep Challenger on course. The clutch and shift linkages were quite complicated, with four clutches operated by a single foot pedal. The process of shifting gears on all four LaSalle three-speed transmissions was rigged to go through a single hand lever positioned in the cockpit to Mickey's right. His only view of the salt came through a 4-inch square piece of glass that had been taken from a face shield of a welder's helmet.

With financial and publicity support from Goodyear and a nearly all-volunteer crew, the Thompsons set off for Bonneville in August 1959 with their eyes focused on the land speed record of 394.19 mph, set by British fur broker John Cobb in his airplane engine-powered Railton-Mobil Special. But after several attempts, Challenger I never came close to the mark despite the performance mods made to the Pontiac engines and the increase in cubic inches for each one.

However, a fortuitous conversation with Captain George E.T. Eyston, a British engineer who had set land speed records in his car Thunderbolt, and who happened to be on site at Bonneville with British Motor Corporation supervising the MG EX 181 streamliner effort, turned things around for Mickey and the Challenger I team.

"We had run 362 with no problem," Voigt said. "We had a little trouble with this and a little trouble with that, and Mickey usually didn't tell people the true numbers when they asked about horsepower, but for some reason, he decided to give Captain Eyston our true numbers. Eyston reaches into his pocket and pulls out a slide rule and starts moving it in and out. After about 10 minutes, he tells Mickey, `I don't know the exact amount, but you're going to need at least another 300-400 hp if you want to break 400 mph.'"

On the drive home to El Monte, Mickey again dictated ideas to Judy. He was looking to correct issues with clutch slippage and wheelspin, but more importantly, he knew he needed to get more horsepower.

While making plans to supercharge the four Pontiac powerplants on Challenger I, Mickey used his savings to open the Mickey Thompson Equipment Company in Long Beach, California, where he manufactured his own performance parts, including parts for Pontiac engines.

Publicity Funds The Project
While waiting for another chance at history on the salt, Mickey came up with a stunt to grab additional speed records and headlines. With a Dragmaster chassis, a Don Borth-designed aluminum body, Halibrand magnesium wheels, disc brakes, a quick-change rearend, and a 16-foot ribbon parachute, Mickey's self-proclaimed "favorite car," Assault I, would run three different Pontiac engines, taking back multiple FIA speed records held by the Nazi-subsidized German Auto Union.

"A lot of people thought Mickey liked to go out and set records so that Mickey Thompson was in the record books," Voigt said. "But that wasn't it at all. Mickey realized that to get people to pay attention to you, to get people to sponsor your ideas, you needed recognition. And records meant recognition."