Newspaper The Press Democrat (Santa Rosa, California, United States), 17 December 1956, pages 1 & 8, 'Racer Is Killed At SR Drag Strip Probe Ordered.' In addition to his brother, Jerry, he is known to have been survived by his mother, Ella Mahoney of Phoenix.Ĭook County, Illinois Birth Index, 1916-1935. Joe Mahoney was an engineering student at San Jose State College. Santa Rosa's police chief ordered the strip to be shut down indefinitely, though sportswriter Phil Esler of the Santa Rosa Press Democrat debunked a report from a San Francisco newspaper which claimed it was due to safety specifications not being met. Since it was under city control and supervision, Santa Rosa police investigated the accident. The strip, at the former Cotati Naval Auxiliary Airfield, had been turned over to the city for drag racing just two months earlier. The race meeting was halted after the accident. The Mahoney Brothers car had low elapsed time for the day, 10.31, and had run the fastest speed of the day, 135mph, in the morning time trials. It was Mahoney's third or fourth run of the day in a Mercury powered, fiberglass bodied car he and his brother had built.

Mahoney's seat belt and the car's roll bar remained intact, but his helmet came off in the crash. Having passed through the time trap at 129.82mph in a side-by-side run, Mahoney's dragster veered into a skid, flipped end over end, then rolled for 1000 feet before coming to rest on its side. Complete name: Joseph Vincent Mahoney, Jr.īirth Place: Cook County, IL, United Statesĭeath Place: Santa Rosa, CA, United StatesĢ6-year-old college student Joe Mahoney died after his dragster flipped and rolled at the end of a run on the Santa Rosa Drag Strip near Cotati, California on 16 December 1956.

A Time and a Place by Joe Mahoney