Islip Speedway

New York

The demolition derby was invented here, by a track promoter who noticed the crowd liked the crashes more than the racing.

racinghistorical

A fifth of a mile of oval pavement sat here, and out of it came the demolition derby. Larry Mendelsohn worked at the track. He noticed something about the people in the stands. They cheered louder for the wrecks than for the racing. So in 1958 he put on an event where wrecking was the entire point, and he patented the idea. Other accounts exist. One credits Don Basile with a derby at Carrell Speedway back in 1947. But Islip is the one usually given the credit. By the early sixties ABC's Wide World of Sports was broadcasting derbies from this Long Island oval on Saturday afternoons, and the place started calling itself World Famous Islip Speedway. It ran its last race on the eighth of September, 1984, and was torn down.

This is the first of 2 parts. The rest runs about 2 minutes and is read to you as you drive past. Hear the whole piece.

What this was written from
According to Larry Mendelsohn, he originated the idea after realizing that spectators enjoyed watching the cars crash more than the races.

Written from Wikipedia, used under CC BY-SA 4.0.

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