Jesse Perkins was a San Francisco service station owner who was running right with the best dragsters on the west coast when he decided that he needed to do something special if he wanted to be counted among the absolute tops in the class. With that in mind he went to the folks at Race Car Specialties and had them construct a new, state-of-the art 196-inch dragster that came complete with a full floating Chrysler rear end, a 400 cubic inch hemi motor and all the other top notch running gear of the day. Jesse then had Hall of Fame craftsman Tom Hanna fabricate the body and Southern California’s own Tony Nancy do the upholstery.

Not content to leave it at that Jesse then had the legendary George Cerny paint the car in a beautiful combination of blues, oranges and purples that created a real show stopper. But Jesse still wasn’t done. He then had Nat Quick, one of the best artists of all time, draw one of the most beautiful scenes ever seen on a race car, a picture of the sun setting over the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco. And true to Nat’s talent and ability, he did the drawing freehand. Now Jesse and his driver, Bob Hightower were ready to take their car to the race track or to a car show and where ever they ended up they were a real threat to take home the trophy, either for low elapsed time and top speed or for the best appearing car at the event.

This may have been the latest creation from the mind of Jesse Perkins but it certainly wasn’t the first. The veteran owner, who won his first trophy at Half Moon Bay drag strip in 1959, had a series of cars that were all housed at his Shell gas station in Daly City, California. Among the other cars that he owned were the famous “Barn Job” roadster that was once driven by Tony Waters, and a very successful top fuel entry that was driven by Rick Bruckman. All of Jesse’s cars ran well, and if you haven’t figured it out by now, they all looked good, too!

– Bob Frey

-Bob Frey