You know you are getting older when you go see a movie like “Rush” and literally remember all the characters that are depicted in the movie. You not only remember who they were and what they did, but remember being there, meeting them, photographing them, being an observer of future history and future legends.
This is not a review of the movie “Rush” (which is an excellent film, however), but a bit of an essay on the era depicted by the film – the exciting, dangerous, flamboyant 1970’s.
Formula One was just coming into it’s own as a big, sponsor driven spectacle. In a few short years, it had gone from the time of unsponsored cars in national colors to multi-colored logo adorned cars, big budget teams and bigger than life drivers.
Unfortunately, safety did not seem to be much more of a concern in the 1970’s than it was in the 1960’s. We were still losing drivers at a frightful rate and in the images I have presented here, you can see them as they were, and as I remember them, frozen forever in time. They remain forever young, forever immortal in these images.
It was difficult to be a racing fan in the 1970’s. If you didn’t go to the races in person, you had to wait until the following Monday to read about the exploits of your favorite drivers in the local newspaper (when you could find the race report – if they even published it). More often than not, you only found out the really bad news – a driver was killed, or maimed for life. That was the news that the newspapers reported. There was no Internet, no TV coverage (except for the occasional Monaco Grand Prix on ABC’s Wide World of Sports), no Facebook, no cable TV, nothing.
From 1971 through 1978 I had the opportunity to work at both the US and Canadian Grands Prix as a photographer, and was able to come up with some memorable photos of the drivers and cars of the era.
It was an exciting time, a great time, an awful time. How can something you love so much be so great and so awful all at the same time? It just was. It was great for the legendary drivers, the outstanding and interesting cars, and the historic race circuits. It was awful for the carnage that was present during that time. Accidents that drivers might walk away from in the present day were all too often fatal. The cars were fast, but fragile. Run off areas at the tracks was minimal, at best, and nonexistent at worst.
The movie “Rush” brought it all back to me and I went through some of my archives for the photos you see presented here. As with most things in life, remembrances of the past have one thing in common. It reads better than it lives.
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