Art Dahlberg

Art Dahlberg is a Florida classic car restorer, amateur race car builder, driver and mechanic, and an internet entrepreneur. He develops and markets historical racing posters, prints and art through his website memorylaneracing and writes a racing blog there as well. His article on a gifted Florida racecar driver named Rod Perry shows how Rod Perry's driving ability was a direct influence on Bobby Allison, his Brother Donnie Allison, Red Farmer, and the early days of NASCAR in Florida. It is considered one of the most important articles written about the early days of short track racing in Florida. He is 60 years old and currently lives in Largo, Florida with his wife of many years, Debbie.
Early history
Art Dahlberg grew up in South Florida, going to Sunset Elementary, and then Palmetto Jr. High, and then attended Palmetto Sr. High.
His grandfather was an internationally known dairy scientist Dr. Arthur C. Dahlberg, who was instrumental in the development of the modern formula and manufacturing that Kraft Cheese used for Cream Cheese production beginning in 1924. Dr. Dahlberg was the author or co-author of 179 research articles, and many of his findings were includled in the sanitary milk code of the U.S. Public Health Service. He was elected as a Fellow in the American Public Health Servide in 1960. A.C. Dahlberg was one of the American representatives to the international Dairy conference in Berlin, Germany in 1937.
One of Art's Uncle's, Dale Dahlberg served in WW2 as a forward gunner on PT boats in the Pacific Theater. His second cousin Kenneth Dahlberg was a Fighter Ace in the European theater and was credited with 14½ aerial victories. He received numerous awards and citations, and later founded Dahlberg Electronics, a subsidiary of which is the Miracle-Ear hearing aids manufacturer.
Racing
Art discovered the sport of auto racing as a young teenager, first attending races during a family vacation at the Minnesota State Fairgrounds in the summer of 1962. He started going to Hialeah Speedway and what is now referred to as the "old" Hollywood Speedway on Pembroke road around 1965. During the mid 60's Dahlberg was fully involved in the huge slot car boom that swept the country then. At one point he represented Haast Slot Car Racing at Orange Blossom Hobbies, and won the Florida State Stock Car championship there. A total of over 3,000 competitors had entered the eliminations at tracks across the state. In 1966, Art purchased an old stock car and drove his first race at Hollywood Speedway the day he turned 16. Soon after, Dahlberg experienced a stuck throttle that destroyed the car in a grinding crash. Around the same time he first saw Mini Stocks run in an exhibition race at Hollywood Speedway, and was immediately drawn to these unique foreign economy cars turned into oval track stock cars that raced at Hialeah Speedway. Art helped his boss at a Texaco station, Al Cyre build a Renault Dauphine Mini Stock and helped out in the pits during the cars initial races. According to Art "The first welding that I ever did in my life was on a racecar." After two races, Cyre decided that racing was not for him, and worked out a deal, selling the car to Art for a week of work at his gas station. Art's first time on the Hialeah track was eventful, to say the least. "I ran about 4 laps, drove down into turn 3, spun the thing out, hit the ripples, and rolled it 3 or 4 times," recalls Art. "We heated a few suspension parts, straightened it out, and it was as good as new, except for the body looking like a walnut from then on, that is." Throughout the late 60's and into the 70's, Dahlberg competed at numerous tracks around the state and South Florida, racing at Sunshine Speedway, Hialeah Speedway, Palm Beach Fairgrounds Speedway, Miami-Hollywood Motorsports Park nowadys referred to as the "new" Hollywood Speedway, Vero Beach, New Smyrna, and other venues. He enjoyed his greatest success at the Florida City Speedway , winning numerous races there in the early 70s. He also competed in TQ Midgets there. In the mid 90's Dahlberg got involved with the Pro4 Modified Series, later renamed Outlaw Modifieds. These are tube frame cars with homemade bodies and modified four cylinder engines. He constructed a revolutionary car with high left side weight and many other innovations, including a radiator mounted on the left side of the car. He won in the cars very first race at Auburndale Speedway, and went on to win more races in what was a very unusual racecar. Dahlberg has also drag raced, road raced, raced in Autocross, and competed in Go Karts. He once drove a 850 Hydroplane at the old Miami Marine Stadium.
Business
Art Dahlberg started working on cars in his early teen years. "We would buy old MGA's that needed a little work for 10-20 bucks a pop, fix them, and sell them for 200 dollars", he recalls. “We got VW Beetles for nothing; people just wanted them towed out of their yards. Me and my buddy Howard Forman had cars all over the place. In 1969 the only place in all of Dade County south of Kendall drive that worked on British Sports cars was Wayne Jones Imported Motors. They sold MG, Triumph, Renault and Austin Healey's and every time I went in there for parts, they were asking me to take a look at a car they could not get running right." After High School Art and Howard bought and sold cars and did freelance auto repair until 1970, when, in South Dade county they opened A&H Foreign Auto Repair. "We had a gold mine", recalls Dahlberg. "People brought their cars to us from all over the county. As far as I know, we were just about the very first non dealer affiliated so-called 'foreign car' repair shop in Dade county. And it was such a cool time to be involved with cars like this. There were so many neat forgotten cars I got to experience, work on and drive, DAF, Simca, Anglia, Lancia, Goliath, Borgward, and of course Fiat, Renault, Peugeot, Citron, I worked on them all. You had to adapt parts at times, I learned so much, so fast. I remember walking out to a Vauxhall, after assuring the owners that of course we worked on them, not knowing which end to open for the engine. I guessed right on that one, It was in the front. We worked on anything and everything, as long as it was a foreign car. When the oil embargo hit, we could not get enough VW's to sell, we could build up a beetle shell in one day."
In 1975 Dahlberg had a falling out with his partner and moved to Broward county, buying a piece of Property on 441 in Hollywood and opening 'Foreign Car Specialist'. "If anything it was crazier up there," says Art. "A month after I opened the Outlaw Motorcycle Club moved in next door and then they opened a massage parlor right across the street and put their girls to work there. All the girls had sports cars, and I sold the bikers SU carburetors, I never missed a beat." Art continued working on foreign cars in his shop until the early 80's. Then problems arose. "I had gotten divorced in the late 70's and started hanging out with the wrong crowd. I made a series of bad decisions and I basically lost everything and had to start over in 1987."
Throughout the 80's Dahlberg continued working on a variety of cars in different situations. He rented out his shop to a good friend of his and fixed cars on the side there. "I made up cards with 'Have tools will travel' and dropped them off all over town. I had one of those huge old Motorola portable phones, and it rang all the time," he recalls. "Then I got burnt out on fixing cars for the public and decided I wanted to do something different, so I opened a delivery service which turned into a moving company. I did that into the mid 90's before I screwed my back up. I went back to fixing up sports cars and selling them and looking for something else to do."
A racing historian is born
Art Dahlberg has been to an incredible variety of races. He has seen everything from Indy Cars to Swamp Buggy races. He saw Don Garlits run the first 200 mph run ever to be run in Florida, at Masters Field in Opa Locka, and Rick Mears run the first 200 mph lap at Pocono. He saw one of the greatest upsets in history at Talladega when Ron Bouchard won in a photo finish in 1981. He watched Curtis Turner put Smokey Yunick's Chevelle on the pole for the 1967 Daytona 500. He was in the stands for the 1976 Daytona 500 and saw the greatest finish in 500 history between Richard Petty and David Pearson unfold in front of him. He saw the last Formula 1 race at Watkins Glen. Bruce McLaren and Denny Hulme running 1-2 at Mossport in the old Can Am cars. Short tracks from Washington state to Florida and everywhere in between. "Jungle Jim" Liberman getting backed up through a smoky burnout by his stunning girlfriend attired only in a leopard thong bikini and high heels, experienced "Wild Willy" Borsch driving an evil AA/FA with one hand. Frequently Dahlberg got into places where he was not supposed to be and many times had a camera of some sort. "At Sebring in 1967 when everyone was sleeping I snuck across the track and caught a little bit of sleep in one of the pits", he recalls. "In the morning I hung around out of the way, and watched the last Le Mans start from the wall of the Ford pit. There was dead silence, all you could hear were feet hitting the pavement. I saw AJ Foyt run straight at me, leap in the Ford GT and go tearing out of there with no harnesses on at all. They would fasten their belts and harnesses during the first lap in those days. Priceless memories." Dahlberg confesses to being very much a fan of short track oval racing in general, and the open wheel classes in particular. "The greatest pure racing on earth is found in the Sprints, midgets and supermodifieds," he says. "I grew up watching all the great Florida open wheel drivers as well as guys like Ollie Silva, Armond Holly, Gene Tapia, Nolan Swift, Jimmy Shampine, and all the rest. I saw the very first Sprint car race not Sprint Cup, but sprint car race that Jeff Gordon ever competed in. I've seen a lot of racing and I'm looking foreword to much more."
Historical racing posters
Over the years Dahlberg has collected a massive amount of material relating to all forms of the sport. In the mid 90's he started compiling it together and dividing it into five sections, Indy cars, Sprints Midgets and Supermodifieds, Stock cars, Road Racing and Florida oval track racing that would eventually become the historical racing posters of Memorylaneracing . "I did not want just a collage", Dahlberg explains. "Each and every part of these prints is relevant to the history of that particular segment of the sport. It took well over a year of full time work to create these. They are completely original works of historical art."
Dahlberg also writes a racing blog , and is the author of several ghost written articles about a wide variety of subjects. He is a natural writer who has a fairly unique blend of talents. Unlike most who speciaise in, say, Nascar but who ingore Indy Cars, Art has always enjoyed virtually all forms of motorsports. In addition he is familiar with many aspects of racecar design, fabrication as well as being a versatile driver. All this, combined with his decades of race viewing gives him an internesting and unique perspective that makes his words compelling to read. He continues to work on assorted car and racing related projects, and plans to continue to attend as many races as he can for years to come.

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