Life
at the 1949 National Air Races with the Christensen Goodyear Midget
"Zipper" 

 
   
I had the good
fortune as an aeronautical engineering student to attend the 1949 National
Air Races at Cleveland. A fellow aero student knew Harvey Christensen who
was taking a midget racer to the races and we, plus
a 3rd mechanical engineering student friend, went along as "ground
crew" so we could have free and full access to the race and all the
"inside" events before, during, and after the race. For an aero
engineering student, this was like "dying and going to heaven."
     Christensen designed and built Zipper. He
was impressed with Steve Wittman’s Buster and Bonzo midgets
and patterned his aircraft after them. It was well designed and well
built. It had a steel tube fuselage shaped out with bulkheads and was
fabric covered, as was the tail assembly. The wing had two wood spars,
wood ribs, a plywood leading edge, and was fabric covered. The ailerons
were fabric covered steel tube assemblies. The landing gear was a
Cessna-type spring steel assembly. It was powered by a stock Continental C-85
engine to fit the 190 cu. in. midget rules and had a polished fixed
blade metal prop with the backsides painted flat black.
     Zipper was licensed N57l3N, had racing
number 59, and was painted all yellow. A local Minneapolis drive-in,
Rich.,O Root Beer, was a sponsor with their logo painted on both sides of
the fuselage.
     After Christensen arrived and we got settled into
our hangar space, we looked around to see what the midget "pros"
were doing. We got some wide masking tape and taped all non-functional
openings to minimize parasite drag. We cleaned Zipper and polished
it to a high gloss.
     As Christensen was inspecting the engine and
tuning it up, a representative from B&G Sparkplug stopped by to look .
. . . .