A very young TVR Editor & York, PA's Paul Miller at Susquehanna.

Born in York, PA, January 5th, 1929, Paul Miller is just yet another of the great drivers who raced in the Central Pennsylvania area. His outstanding racing career ran from 1953 through 1975. Since leaving his driving career behind, Paul has served as President of the York County Racing Club since its inception in 1979, the largest club of its kind in the country. I met with Paul in the basement of the YCRC building and got him to talk about his life as a racer. Here now is his story, in his own words.

TVR: Do you remember when and where you saw your first race?
Paul: My uncle use to drive, back before the war, and he had a roadster that he drove. A red #8. Where I lived, I lived on a farm, they use to get that out of the barn and go up and down the road. That got me into racing, that was a thrill... because when he would start that, I would get chills. He got hurt at Williams Grove then and took a bad flip down the front straightaway and down in the shrubbery and he gave up on it.

In them days they had the idea that you didn't want to wear safety belts or shoulder strap, because when you flipped you'd want to fly out so the car don't... the silliest thing I ever heard in my life

TVR: And his name was?
Paul: Al Miller 

TVR: At what point did you know you wanted to get involved and how did you accomplish that?
Paul: Well, it took me a couple of years, because I think I was only about 9 or 10 years old then. How I got started in racing was my mechanic, Dick Worley. I don't know where the devil he got it, but he got an old Ford coupe, and he says come down to the garage. He was working at the Stony Brook Garage, a Pontiac place... he said come down, every night I'm working on a stock car. I thought, "Oh Boy!" So, I go down there and I started helping him get it ready and everything. We had no driver, we didn't know where we were gonna run, but every night we'd work on that car.

Paul in Dick Worley's Ford for his first Bowling Green outing.

Finally, we got it done and he says, "Now, I wonder where I can get a driver?" I said, "What do you need a driver for? Here I am!" He said, "You'll drive? That's a joke!" I said, "Hey, I can do as good as anybody else out there." We decided the first race, 1953, was Bowling Green. So, we went to Bowling Green with the car, it was a beautiful car... best looking car there, but it didn't run that good. <laughs> We told them since I'm a new driver, I'd like to start in the rear. But, they didn't do that. Since I was a new driver they started me up front. I remember the heat race. I thought, well... the only thing to do is tramp it to the floor and go, you know. Well, they weren't that fast in them days, but... they passed me real quick! I think I went from the front to the rear real quick. I was glad of that! Maybe I left them go <laughs> I don't know!

They always got 40 or 50 cars down there. I remember one night down there I thought "Now I gotta start running a little faster because these guys are running over me." So, I went into that first turn and straight out over. Out over the bank... down over the bank... That was also the entrance where you would come out, you know, out onto the speedway from the pits. The pits were in the turn. I got everything straightened up, I didn't flip or anything, I got settled down and here comes the official. "Hey Miller! I want to tell you one thing," he told me. "You don't come off of the track that fast!" My God, I didn't try to go out, I lost it! <laughs> They thought I was leaving, going out into the pits. Well, they gave me a warning about that.

I drove maybe two or three races, then I had trouble... trouble with my back, my spine. So then we put John Nuzum in the car and John drove it a couple times. But, I couldn't wait to get my back in shape. I didn't want him in there, he was a good driver I was afraid they'd hire him. So, I got back in and we started running.

In the mean time they were working on Susquehanna (Speedway), trying to get Susquehanna ready. So, first race of the season we went... I guess it was the following season, I don't know, but we went to Susquehanna. We just didn't have a car that was good enough shape to compete against Bobby Hersh, Bobby Abel, all them top men, you know. So, I said... what we had was a 1937 Ford coupe, I said, "They're all using small coupes like '34's and '32's. We gotta do something.  We gotta get rid of this car and get a smaller one." So, we went to Gettysburg and bought a small car out of a junkyard out there. A '34 coupe. Well, I was getting my confidence up then. I thought, "Now I'm gonna see these guys get away from me!" They still got away from me! <Laughs> It wasn't... it wasn't... I'd say it wasn't me or the car. Both of us were a little out of date. 

We kept working and working, built our self up and umm... My first race to win was Susquehanna. Well... no, I did good one Sunday Afternoon. Gary Wolford won and I finished second, which was a close race. To this day Gary Wolford always say I held everybody up, that's why he won and I say, "Well, I don't look at it that way... I look at it like I kept pushing you around the track and that's why you won!" 

The 1962 Langhorne car.

But then, a couple weeks later... No, in the meantime we went to overheads. That's right. We built a car for Langhorne, which was a very good car. It had one of Dave Brown's engines in and out of 223 cars taking time trials, we had the 12th fastest time trial. I was very, very proud. And really, a mile track, we averaged over 100 mph around the track. I never realized I was going that fast. When I pulled in, Frankie Thompson gave me the sign like I did good. I didn't know what that meant, but when I pulled in everyone said, "Man, you were really flying around there!" And I said it didn't feel like I was going that fast. As a matter of fact, the first lap I sort of took it easy. The second one, I really got into it and almost spun out. Of course, we had trouble in the race then. I started right in back of Bobby Abel and Bobby came back and gave me a warning. He said, "Don't forget, Paul Miller, you don't win this race in the first lap." He said, "Don't run over me!" <laughs> We had a... a resistor broke off and we had trouble with the ignition. We couldn't find out what it was, so we pulled out finished way back.

In the meantime, The Reading promoters come up and asked ... they're gonna run modifieds up at Reading the following Sunday... would I bring the car up there and run. Well heck yeah, we'll run up there because I was running Reading pretty regular. So, we went up there and I couldn't wait to get in the track with this V8 Chevy engine. because it had a lot of power. So, I get out there and I'm showing off. I've really got this thing flying into the turns, running hard down the straightaways. I pull in and everything and we're about ready to get everything ready and after a while here comes the promoters. They said, "Can't let you run Paul." I said, "Why not?" They said the car's chopped down, its narrow... and we did have it chopped down. This car, we built it that I would sit in the back seat and move the motor back so it would handle better. It did handle good when they did that. "Well," they said, "It's not legally chopped up." I laughed. I looked... there's 56 cars there, I think it was, and it looked like 40% of 'em were chopped up. But, Frankie Snyder, and a couple of others, refused to run with me and Bobby Abel, that we had illegal cars. So, that's all right. So they said we'll have a 10 lap race just for the illegal cars. There was like 7 of us. Nope... ain't going out. That's it. We ain't coming back here no more, were gonna start racing at Williams Grove. But, the promoter told me to come up and see him...  he gave me some money, he gave me a couple hundred just for showing up. So, he was a good promoter. 

We started going to Williams Grove. But we had... this car was heavy, compared to these bugs like (Ray) Tilley and them guys had. I didn't stand a chance. I said,  "Man we gotta do something... we gotta cut some weight of this thing." We cut big holes in the frame and everything else to get rid of this iron. It was still heavy, but we almost got it competitive. I finished 3 weeks in a row, 2nd. Shoulda won one... it was my fault. I goofed up. Bobby Gerhart beat me that day. 

Our car... well here we go again. We gotta get something lighter... we gotta get something lighter. So, in the garage we had 3 old coupes sitting. I said let's take one of them, cut it down and make it light. I'll never forget... Jack Gunn had me on the first television station (at the Grove) and he had us on. He was interviewing me about about what's the difference with this new car. I said' "Its about $500 less." I meant 500 pounds! <laughs> So, he laughed about that. 

But, we decided we were gonna run two cars. So I said we'll get Ed Zirkle to drive the coach and I'll drive the bug, the light one. I was so use to that heavy coach that I just couldn't handle that light thing. I'm going around in a ring, run up over the bank...

We went up to Lincoln one night and Zirkle said that the car was really handling good. I don't know where he did in the heat. So I said, "Well mine ain't." I said, "As a matter of fact, crawl out of there. You take the bug, I'm gonna run the coach." And, I went out and won the feature. So, it made a difference there that we were use to a certain type of car and it was really set up good for Lincoln. There's a lot of pictures of me standing in front with the checkered flag, but it's Ed Zirkle's name on the car. But, that's the reason we put Eddie in the bug and he had trouble too. He said it just didn't handle right. I don't think we run a full season with that bug and we got rid of it. 

We moved on, umm... Won a couple features... I don't know how many. We moved on and decided we were gonna build a car for Langhorne. So, we went down to Gemmel's junkyard and we got a '36 Chevy up on the hill. "36 Chevy coupe. I said, "Pap, can I have that?" "Yup, take her down. She's yours," he said. He gave it to us. We took it back and put a Chevy engine in it for Langhorne. Umm... In the meantime, Ed Zirkle was driving another car and he qualified at Susquehanna for Langhorne... he was qualified. So I said we'll take both the cars to Langhorne. But in the meantime, they had a race at Lincoln. I said lets take them both up there and we can set this coupe up. You know... see how it will run. Well my God, Zirkle got in it. He started in the rear in the first heat, passed Pee Wee Poblettes on the last lap and won the heat with this coupe we built for a big track and here we are at Lincoln. So, I went out with the coach and won the second heat. We come in and umm... feature time I got in an accident with the coach. But, Zirkle didn't. He kept running and running and Roger Sowers won the feature and Ed Zirkle came in second with that old coupe that was built for a mile track. I'll never forget what Hilly Rife said... "Who's Ed Zikle?" He never heard of him. They were handing out the trophies, you know and he said, "Who's this Ed Zikle?" I introduced him to Hilly. 

But, Ed went on to race other cars and he got a pretty good ride. Then we only used one car. It wasn't long after that I sort of got hooked up with another car, Ken Appler's. The one Mussleman use to drive. And umm, Ken asked if I'd drive it. Yeah, I'll' take it out. Well, I'm use to a little 327 Chevy and I get in this big 427 Ford for warmups and went out... boy, into the turn, right around in a ring and they laughed. They said, "What's the matter?" I said, "Man! I ain't use to something like that!" I said, "This thing you gotta back off a little bit because this has got power!" I kept driving for Appler and I won 3 races in a row at Lincoln, and one was a Langhorne qualifier. We left Lincoln one night, I won the feature, and we had to drive like all night long to get to Cumberland, MD, for a 50 lap (day) race. And, I shoulda won that but Abel caught me on the last couple of laps... on a restart. That night we were racing at Williams Grove.  So, Ken says, "Go pick up the money and I'll meet you up at Williams Grove." I went and picked up the money and hell... I got lost! <laughs> I got lost on my way up to Williams Grove and I was just coming in as the consy's running and they're announcing Paul Miller's running 2nd and here I am walking up through the pits with my helmet and stuff. Everybody's looking. They put Ron Blazer in the car, because I was late. Ron says' "Do you want to run the feature?" I said, "Nope... you can run it. You qualified it, you run it" With Appler I think I won... not many, maybe 8 to 10 races. Appler always had good equipment, because that's what Gene Goodling won his championship with Appler. 

Then we got 2 cars. Brymesser drove one and I drove the other. Brymeser had fuel injection in the Ford and I had a four-barrel. Of course, my four-barrel made more money than Brymesser because I always got a hundered dollars extra for having a sportsman carburetor. I drove the #77 one time and I said I'll take the four-barrel... all that did was spin. We got together one year and Appler said he might only run one car next year and "you got the choice... what do you want to do?" I said, "I'll tell you what Appler... give it to Brymesser because I'm gonna start running heavies over at Reading." 

I went to Reading for a guy by the name of Donald Adams, out of Douglasville. He had a nice car, but he couldn't afford it, he was a farmer. I went over there and ran I guess two years for him. Umm... 3 races in a row, 2nd. They had in the Reading paper, "Miller a bridesmaid, but never a bride." I had a very good following there, had a fan club and everything... a lot of nice people in Reading. Then we decided to split up and they put Ralph Smith in the car. But, Ralph didn't like it, so then they put Glenn Fitzcharles in. He also said it didn't handle. 

So, I went with a guy named Bob Newland, from Coatesville. He had a garage down there, a Lincoln Mercury garage. And, started driving for him... and umm... a couple other guys. I don't remember them all.

TVR: This was still at Reading?
Paul: At Reading, yes. That was my last racing. They were closing, so I think that was 1975, I decided to retire. The car was in trouble and so... he didn't have it ready, so I didn't even bother going over anymore. And that was about... that was about it in my racing. 

I drove late models, which I'm not proud of. I drove a late model at Hagerstown one time, they asked me to drive. A guy had a Holman Moody Ford... it was fast! Don Zechman's old Ford. But, the steering was about 3 1/2 turns of steering, which I'm use to about a turn and a quarter, a turn and a half. Started right up front again. Right up front and I thought, "Well... I gotta get going." I made one lap around and got around, but whew! I about wore myself out in one lap. Went down into the turn... I was still leading... got into the turn, lost it, run in the infield and hit the water truck. <laughs> So, that was my late... well, then I went to the Grove and we just couldn't get that car to handle. I think Larry Hare crawled in the car then. I told them I don't want to run a late model anymore. I was still running modifieds at Reading. And... that's about a quick preview of my racing career.

Continue to Page Two of Paul's Interview

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