Few cars in drag racing have made a bigger impact on the sport than the wild ’33 Willys campaigned by Ohio George Montgomery.
In the 1960s, the sport of drag racing was red hot, the automotive venue of choice for America’s car-crazy young baby boomers. And in National Hot Rod Association (NHRA) competition, one of the more popular categories was the Gas Coupe and Sedan class. Stock-appearing passenger cars with drivetrains borrowed from all-out dragsters, the gassers, as they were known, always put on a spectacular show. One pioneer in the category was the light blue ’33 WIllys coupe campaigned by Dayton racer and speed shop operator George Montgomery. His Willys not only dominated the gasser ranks through much of the ’60s, it helped to define the category.
George’s ’33 Willys made its big-time debut at the 1959 NHRA Nationals in Detroit, where it won Little Eliminator its first time out (above). Montgomery had originally constructed the Willys as a companion car and successor to his similar baby blue ’34 Ford coupe, which had run 126+ mph in the quarter-mile in 1958. A few sharp racers, George included, had recognized that the compact Willys, with its lighter weight and shorter wheelbase, had greater drag-strip potential than the popular Ford chassis.
After the impressive win in Detroit, the Willys and its Ford garage mate were featured as a pair in the February 1960 issue of Rod & Custom magazine, showcasing his meticulous craftsmanship. Montgomery’s fame quickly spread, and soon he became known as Ohio George, while the car was billed as “the world’s wildest Willys.”
Montgomery returned to the Detroit Nationals in 1960 with the Willys, now sporting a radically jacked-up ride height for increased load transfer and improved traction (a trick popularized by the Ramchargers with their ’49 Plymouth, The High & Mighty). At one point the crankshaft centerline on the Willys was raised a full 24 inches from the ground, the maximum allowed by NHRA. Previous gimmicks used by George to improve traction in those early days included a 200-lb concrete spare tire.
George and the Willys captured Little Eliminator a second straight year in Detroit, defeating Doug “Cookie” Cook’s ’37 Chevy in the semi-finals and running 11.59 at 129.31 mph in the final round—crazy performance for a stock-bodied car at the time. The victor’s purse included a new 1960 Ford Falcon Ranchero, which George used as a support vehicle at NHRA events for years to come. A legend was in the making.
For go, the Willys originally used a ’59 Cadillac V8, bored and stroked from 390 to 432 cubic inches (later combinations featured 414 CID) and fitted with a GMC 6-71 blower and other full-race mods. Visible in the photo above are the Hilborn two-port fuel injection and twin ignition coils for the Jackson Roto-Faze distributor. Judging from George’s T-shirt, we’re guessing he ran a Howard camshaft. Again, note the sanitary construction standards Ohio George became noted for.
The big Caddy V8 was at first coupled to a 1930s-style Cadillac LaSalle three-speed gearbox and a Ford/Halibrand rear axle complete with torque tube drive. George later installed a four-speed GM Hydra-Matic prepared by Hydro-Motive of Chicago. In its Cadillac-powered phase, the Willys ran in the 10-second zone at better than 130 mph.
When NHRA changed the weight/cubic inch limit in the A/Gas Supercharged class for 1963, George swapped the Cadillac V8 for a small-block Chevy V8 and put the Willys on a weight-reduction program, installing fiberglass fenders, hood, grille, and doors (above). The little Chevy, a 327 poked and stroked to around 375 cubic inches and retaining the the GMC blower and Hillborn injection setup, still made more power than the Willys could put to the pavement, George discovered, due to the limited tire and chassis technology of the day. But with the new engine combination the car continued its winning ways in ’63, covering the field at the U.S. Nationals at Indy, where it won both its class and the Middle Eliminator title.
By 1965, cars powered by big Chrysler Hemi and Chevy Big-Block V8s were beginning to dominate the blown gasser category, so George made a switch as well, cutting a factory deal with Ford drag racing boss Charlie Gray to run a mighty 427 SOHC Cammer in the Willys for 1966. (See our popular feature on the Ford Cammer here.) The drivetrain received some upgrades, too, including an Art Carr-prepared Ford C6 automatic transmission (which featured fully programmed shifting) and an Oldsmobile rear axle, but the unique torque tube setup, specially engineered by George, was retained. George was a gifted fabricator and a student of the rulebook. In the photo above, note the tall black water tank in front of the engine—close enough, under the arcane NHRA gasser rules, to be considered a radiator.
In this, its ultimate form, the Cammer-powered Willys won its category at the Indy Nationals in ’66 and at the ’67 Winternationals in California. One final modification was a radically chopped top to reduce the tall body’s wind resistance a bit. Over an eight-year career with three different drivetrains, the baby blue Willys dominated the gasser ranks, ultimately running the the 8-second range at more than 160 mph.
But alas, nothing is forever. At a Ford event in Dearborn, George was touting his many race victories with the Willys to Ford engineering executive Don Frey, when Frey looked at him blankly and said, “We sell Fords, don’t we?” George got the message and headed straight back to Dayton to begin work on a new gasser, this one with a ’67 Mustang body shell cloaking the big Ford V8. And another legend was born.
Fortunately, the story of the blue Willys doesn’t end here. Many years later, the car was located and brought back to George’s Speed Shop in Dayton—now recognized as the oldest continuously operating speed shop in the USA—for a complete restoration. At that point, the curators at the Henry Ford Museum, who certainly know an important piece of automotive history when they see it, stepped up. The Willys was acquired by the museum in 2005, and there you can see it, seven days a week, on permanent display.
