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SUMERDUCK: Curtis family brought Fauquier dragway back from the dead

Curtis family shows no signs of letting go of its racetrack, which they call 'something special'

Date published: 7/17/2003

T WAS APRIL in the sleepy town of Sumerduck, which means crops were sprouting, cows were grazing and Roger Curtis had to get to work on his mother's farm.

He strolled into the State Bank of Remington and asked for a $700 loan for a bale of hay and a new rig.

But Curtis was of the leisurely lot, and on that day 40 years ago, he and the bank president got to talking.

"What do you know about drag racing?" the banker inquired.

Curtis, then 27, tried to halt a smile from creasing his face. He was a street racer, tried and true.

After nights making cellophane at the old Fredericksburg FMC plant, he used to take a three-carburetor '59 Chevy to a chunk of State Route 3 known as the Judyville Stretch.

The dragsters would mark off a mile for racing and send some idle onlookers to watch for police.

"A lot of people drank and did whatever," Curtis said. "But my thing was racing. Back then, you'd buy your car off the showroom floor, take the hubcaps off and go."

On his free days, Curtis drove down a winding country road to Sumerduck Dragway, where racing was legal.

The 5-year-old track was in the midst of some rough times: Its original owner went bankrupt, and the following buyer fared no better.

So the bank claimed the property, and the president was looking for a suitor.

He gave Curtis a 90-day note to make payments-- with no money down--and said if the track didn't make a profit during that span, Curtis would pay interest and the two parties would part ways.

Curtis looked past the weeds sprouting across the dragstrip. Looked past the fact that the -mile layout had been a speed bump for the previous two owners.

The key was convincing his wife, Mary Frances, to buy into the buy.

They'd married six years earlier after meeting at a dance. Mary Frances didn't know the first thing about drag racing, but she knew plenty about her husband.

"I went home and told her I'd just bought Sumerduck Dragway," Roger Curtis said. "She goes, 'Oh, Lord, it's been bankrupt twice, it won't make any money. What do you want that for?' I told her I believed it'd do all right."

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Date published: 7/17/2003