LEGEND: JOHN PETERSON
WE REMEMBER JOHN PETERSON, THE MAN WHO BROUGHT THE BURNOUTS TO THE WORLD
Remembering the bloke who started this whole burnout thing
THEY say you should never meet your heroes, but I’ve never met anyone in the car scene who was disappointed after coming in contact with John Peterson. JP was one of the true founding fathers of the street machine movement and a folk hero to Ford fans everywhere.
John passed away at the age of 72 in August, and his memorial service was attended by over 1000 friends and family. It was by turns a moving and uplifting day. If there was ever a guy who lived life to the full, it was JP. There were many tales of automotive adventure and a lot of laughs, but it was John’s devotion to his family, his generous nature and loyalty to his mates that were the recurring themes.
Along with family and friends, those that spoke at the service included Chic Henry, Victor Bray, Norm Hardinge and former Rare Spares General Manager Dave Rayner, who acted as MC. Dozens of Zephyrs and Zodiacs formed a guard of honour, and John was taken for his final ride by his son Shane in the mean black Dodge pick-up that was JP’S workhorse for many years.
The extent of John’s influence on our sport is hard to fathom. Before JP, a burnout was a short skid drag racers did to warm up their tyres. The cars that did big burnouts were full-on race cars, dragsters, altereds and funny cars – it was not really the domain of street cars. But John turned burnouts into an art form, laying the foundations for the sport we have today. Would the Street Machine Summernats have been so successful for so long without burnouts? Impossible! Watching a John Peterson burnout changed the direction of a young Victor Bray’s life and many others.
While JP and his iconic black Mk3 Zephyr are most famous for their burnouts, the pair also won multiple trophies on the show circuit and made a wicked combination on the drag strip too. All the while, the Zephyr, known as Dark Horse, was driven to and from events with John’s family on board. He lived and breathed the idea that a street car could also be a race car and a show car too.
That street-driven ethos is an important part of the Peterson mystique, as was his underdog status – making the humble 289 Windsor punch well above its weight. A big part of the appeal was John’s enthusiasm for the Blue Oval product – and his vocal hatred of anything with a GM badge. Truth be told, JP owned more than a few Holdens in his early years – much like Ford’s other favourite son, Dick Johnson – but once he saw the error of his ways, he never looked back.
John’s interest in cars began early. “I was sort of brought up around them with my father,” John told Supercar in 1984. “He was always playing around with cars, all the hotties of his day, like Studes, Olds, Buicks. I learned to drive in a ’39 Chev.”
It didn’t take long for the young JP to acquire a ride of his own: “When I was 11, I was doing a paper round and got sick of riding a pushbike, so I saved my money and bought a ’37 Willys which I used to hide from my mother. I’d ride the pushbike up to the Willys, throw the bike in the back seat and do the paper round with the car. Mum found out about the Willys, took it off me and drove it herself.”
John’s early racing included piloting FJ Holden stock cars at the Daylesford Speedway. “The promoters offered a cash prize to the first car to roll, and John managed it every time, five times in a row!” says his wife Margaret. “They had roll bars back then, but nothing like they have now.”
John’s drag racing career began in the mid-1960s with a 1950 Vauxhall, fitted with a Holden 179. That ran mid-17s, quite respectable for a street car of the day. He then dabbled with an FX Holden, getting it into the 16-second zone. Seeing the light, John started to campaign a Mk3 Zephyr in 1968-69, getting into the 15s with a worked Zephyr six powerplant.
Why Zephyrs? “My cousin’s husband had one and it had all the tricks of the day,” John
JOHN TURNED BURNOUTS INTO AN ART FORM, LAYING THE FOUNDATIONS FOR THE SPORT WE HAVE TODAY
told Supercar. “You know, a swan on the bonnet, homemade fins, spare wheel on the boot, spats, whitewalls, three-tone paintjob. All the trickery, aerials, foxtails, pom-poms, venetians – it had it all. I reckoned it was the ant’s pants.”
“Ken Spence’s Zephyr was also an influence,” says his son Shane. “Kenny motivated him to step it up.”
The famous Dark Horse Zephyr was acquired as a stocker and was used as a work vehicle while John was servicing bulldozers, with the back seat removed to accommodate oil drums and tools. A 289 replaced the factory six, and once the working life started to take its toll on the car, John started a restoration – never taking the car off the road
for long. The car emerged from the process as a show-winner – and running flat 12s with a mild 289 and Top Loader combo.
The Dark Horse won a stack of trophies over the years, including at the Melbourne Hot Rod Show and at the drags – including the ANDRA Super Stock Eliminator gong, won in Adelaide in 1977. “That was his favourite trophy,” says Margaret. “We divvied up the trophies amongst the kids and grandkids a while ago, but he kept that one. He was proud that he was able to drive the car there with the family, win the event and drive home. He very rarely broke anything and even if he did, he could fix it.”
The concept of the burnout as competitive performance art was born at Heathcote in 1977. JP joined in what passed for a burnout comp in those days, fitting the Zephyr out with its spare wheel and borrowing another from an unsuspecting mate. John eclipsed any other attempts by powerskidding the full length of the quarter, turning around and repeating the feat all the way back to the startline, before popping the tyres and driving off on the rims. At the 4th Street Machine Nationals in 1980, John won both the burnout competition and the go-to-whoa, establishing himself as the burnout king. This was followed by the first and last-ever paid burnout show on the streets of the Melbourne CBD for the 1982 Moomba Festival! And while there was no burnout comp at the fifth Street Machine Nationals in Canberra, JP won both the infamous Iron Man comp and the motorkhana. Wayne Barbour nabbed the burnout title in 1984 in his Corvette, but JP again took out the go-to-whoa.
Always restless, JP sold the Dark Horse in the late 80s and built a white version, which appeared at the seventh Nationals in 1987. This was fitted with a stove-hot 302, Doug Nash five-speed, three-quarter chassis and wheel tubs.
“John had some issues with his back and dropped out of the car scene for a while after that,” says Margaret. “But when he started working with Norm and Vicki at Aussie Desert Cooler, he found his love for the scene again.”
JP went to Canberra for Summernats 16 in 2003 and was back in 2004 as a guest judge at the burnout competition. The urge to mix it with the new breed had started to form and in 2008 John brought the white Zephyr back to Canberra for ’Nats 21. “The car was in pieces only weeks beforehand; John always left things like that to the last minute,” remembers Margaret. “He and Shane put the car together, with a lot of help from Billy and Mick Mildren. John was very excited to be competing again; both he and Chic had tears in their eyes.”
John’s work with Aussie Desert Cooler brought him face-to-face with car people at shows and swap meets all over the country, and even after he retired from the radiator game, he continued to be a regular at the swap meets and cruises.
Becoming a grandfather also meant a lot to John. “Our grandchildren started arriving in 1991 – five boys and three girls,” says Margaret. “Since then, John’s many holidays involved the grandkids. Even if he was going to a show somewhere or just for a drive, he’d pick up a couple and give them a fun day out. At the last few ’Nats he attended, John had three grandkids in tow. He loved them to bits and made sure they had a good time.”
As John’s health declined in recent years, he was unable to drive, which was a huge blow. A big consolation to John was the way his family and friends rallied around him. “We’re really thankful to all the people who called John to chat while he was stuck at home or came to visit,” says Margaret. “The Zephyr Club members would pick him up and
JOHN POWERSKIDDED THE FULL LENGTH OF THE QUARTER, REPEATING THE FEAT ALL THE WAY BACK TO THE STARTLINE
take him to their monthly meetings, which he really looked forward to. Other guys came and took him cruising, which was something he loved to do. John was connected to so many people through cars. Once he was stuck at home, his phone bill doubled! He had the same address book for decades and he reconnected with a lot of people he hadn’t spoken to in years.
“Life with John was unpredictable at times and it kept me on my toes my entire life, but I loved it,” Margaret concludes. “He was strong and he taught me how to be strong. He was a great father to the kids and a special pa to the grandkids – he lived for them. It’s going to be a dull, boring life without him.”