In this three-minute film clip, watch TV Tommy Ivo assemble his tube-framed dragster and install a supercharged, nitro-guzzling Chrysler hemi V8. Here’s a rare and special look at drag racing machinery circa 1965, check it out. 

The sport of drag racing never had a better ambassador and salesman than Tommy Ivo. The actor-turned-hot rodder from Burbank, California criss-crossed the country for more than 30 years as one of the first touring professional drag racers. Along the way he created untold thousands of fans—and some highly memorable machines, too: beautiful dragsters and funny cars, a trend-setting Model T roadster, and a four-engine, tire-churning monster called Showboat. 

We don’t know a lot about this three-minute video clip from back in the ’60s, except that it purports to be from 1965 (we’re not sure) and the narration is supplied by a very familiar voice: Keith Jackson, then on his way to becoming a world-renowned sports announcer. As Ivo assembles his state-of-the-art ’60s fuel dragster, we get to see up close how raw and elementary the early rail jobs were: a few steel tubes, primitive suspension, a monstrous, nitro-burning hemi V8, and very little else. To this day, these first-generation dragsters remain among the sport’s most compelling machines. Video below.