In the 1960s, Mickey Thompson was one of the most talked about and well-known racers of the day in the U.S. His pursuits included: land speed racing, drag racing, and the Indianapolis 500, along with his line of speed equipment and tires. His son Danny Thompson recently rebuilt the Challenger II and made a run at Bonneville of 419 m.p.h. in his quest to top George Poteet’s 439.562 m.p.h., piston-driven world record speed.

It was a pleasure to spend a part of last Sunday with old car enthusiast and vintage racer Charlie Nearburg. He is the holder of the current naturally-aspirated piston-driven speed record of 414.316 m.p.h. in the single engine Spirit of Rett streamliner. The drive home left plenty of time to think about his accomplishment and Thompson’s recent attempt.

In light of all of this it seemed like a good time to take a look back at Mickey Thompson’s 1960 attempt in Challenger I, to be the first American to best Englishman John Cobb’s one-way speed record of 402 m.p.h. At the time Cobb held the Land Speed Record (LSR) with a speed he set in 1947 at 394.196 m.p.h. Thompson was able to pull it off and set a higher speed of 406.60 m.p.h., but on the return run to try and set an official two-way LSR the car suffered a breakdown.

Today, we have a link to a fabulous series of photos of Mickey’s 1960 attempt, at Thompsonlsr, where you can learn the complete story of the family’s LSR activities. Above you will also find a 12:53 long video of the original 1960 film produced for the Goodyear Tire Company telling the story: Mickey Thompson Fastest Man on Wheels courtesy of the King Rose Archives. Top photo courtesy of Royalbroil and Wikimedia Commons.