Harry Hurst

I first went to Sebring in 1965. That was the year of the great downpour and we arrived at sunset, after the rain had stopped. My dad was an accountant in Tampa and this was the height of tax season, but (I now realize) he made the time to take me, my sister and mother on the two-hour drive so I could attend my first race.

It was still light when we arrived and I was able to actually see the cars and drivers I had only read about up to that time. Jim Hall and Hap Sharp in the beautiful Chaparral, Cobra Daytona Coupes, Ford GT-40's, Ferraris 330P's. Unfortunately, Dan Gurney was already out by the time we arrived. We only stayed a few hours, but that was enough for me - I was hooked.

The next year I returned as the guest of family friends and we left at 10 p.m., confident that Dan was firmly in the lead and would win. Some things are just not meant to be. His car broke less than a quarter mile from the finish.

When I turned 18, I joined the SCCA and became a flagman, but being stranded out on the Webster turn and wearing white coveralls wasn't my idea of really being involved. Luckily, I had developed a serious interest in photography and took photos when I flagged. A friend, John Annis, gave some of my shots of the 1969 Daytona 24-hour to John Smiley, the press officer at Sebring at the time, who asked me to take photos for him (in exchange for credentials, of course!).

That was how I happened to be at Sebring in 1970 as track photographer at the ripe old age of 19.

I continued to take photos at Sebring, Daytona and Road Atlanta races for the next several years, but lost interest as the rules changed and the great cars and drivers disappeared. I continued my interest in photography, but moved on to working on English sports cars at a shop I owned in Tallahassee.

By the end of the 1970s, I decided a change was needed so I sold the shop and moved to Philadelphia to write the service training programs for Jaguar. I held other jobs - all related to cars - with Sun Oil and deLorean before finding my niche in advertising/public relations at a great agency: Aitkin-Kynett (later Lewis, Gilman & Kynett).

I rose to group supervisor in PR, with clients like Black & Decker (handling their participation as "Official Supplier" to the Statue of Liberty restoration), Dana, FMC automotive service equipment and IVECO trucks. I moved over to Harris, Baio & McCullough in the mid-1980s, a new agency run by ex A-K alumni. At HB&M I was able to return to motorsports when I helped arrange sponsorship of Al Unser Jr. in Indycar racing for our client, Exide batteries.

In the early 90s, I struck out on my own and set up Hurst Advertising & Public Relations. It was a great ride and I was fortunate to have some wonderful clients and employees. We grew at a steady pace and things were great until the economy went south in the early 2000s. That was when I had some time on my hands and revisited the photos I had taken at Sebring.

For over thirty years, these photos sat in boxes. Some found their way into other books and Web sites (I had sent prints to the Sebring organizers and they became part of the Ulmann archives, which were later sold). Finally, I decided to put them together into a photo essay; to tell the story of one race and the cars and drivers that made it great.

Since I could do the layout myself with the skills I had picked up running the agency, it didn't cost me anything to produce the first layout, which I had Xerox printed in black & white at a local print shop. It had photos with a minimum of copy, mostly my own observations and some factual context. I sent these soft-bound editions out to friends and acquaintances, asking for their comments. Many of the people I sent them to I had never met, and some were people I had never dreamed of meeting.

One of the best suggestions came from Michael Keyser, a well-known driver who also produced a number of books and films, especially "The Speed Merchants." He suggested I also add other people's recollections of the race, and of that time and place. That led me to sending another batch of photocopy books to drivers and other people who were there: Dan Gurney, Ed Ulmann, John Smiley (the press office who hired me), and Brian Redman. Bill Warner (a well-known photog who I shot next to at the races) recognized one face in the cover photo and pressed me to send a copy to Wayne Sparling, a Florida native who would work as a fabricator for Luigi Chinetti's NART every year. Wayne's remembrances turned out to be the best thing in the book!

Because of the book, I was able to talk on the phone with drivers who I had worshiped as a teen, especially Dan Gurney. Dan wasn't the easiest guy to get through to - Kathy Weida did a fantastic job screening out people like me! Mario was easier but he blasted me for the inaccuracies I had with the facts: after 30 years he could still remember his lap times to the hundredth of a second! Thankfully, he calmed down and helped me get it right and also provided the foreword to the book.

Little by little, the book took on a life of its own and eventually I ended up with a cinematic storyboard of the race. I still was having Xerox copies made and everything was in black & white. I had a number of people encourage me to make it a real book, so I sent copies to the handful of specialty automotive/racing publishers. The response, while complimentary, was underwhelming. The most notable comment was that this was " a ballroom book." When I asked what that was, the response was, "All the people who would buy this book would fit in a ballroom."

At that point I resigned myself to only giving the book out to friends, but my wife, Marsha, told me that if no one else would print it, then we should do it ourselves. Thankfully, neither of us had any idea what that really meant. And, fortunately, the internet age was really beginning to blossom.

I had handled a large quantity of printing for my clients - brochures mostly - and had a good handle on how to make the files for printing. I also had good contacts with several large printers in the area and got print quotes. I was astonished when the prices came in: even in quantities of 2 - 3 thousand I would barely break even at $30 per book, the price I had established in my mind.

So, I asked other publishers where they got their books printed and learned that almost everything was done in the Far East, especially China. I got names of several suppliers and, using email, was able to get quotes within days. The price was more than half what it would cost in the US, even including shipping, although it was still $20,000 for 2000 books. But Marsha still said I had to go for it, to "follow my bliss" as she put it.

The process went surprisingly well, sending files via DHL and emailing back and forth. After seeing wet proofs and making adjustments, we went to press in September, 2004. By early October the book was done and I had two cases (32 books) air shipped to me to send out for magazine reviews. I wrote a press release and send all the copies to every automotive/racing/classic magazine I knew. Then I waited.

The full order arrived in early November, three pallets of books! I had some storage downstairs where my agency was then located at the Berwyn, Pa. train station, so we stacked them there. But the realization quickly dawned on me: "How am I ever going to sell this many books?"

Then, one morning before Thanksgiving I received a phone call. It was a woman from Road & Track magazine and she needed to ask me some questions. I asked her what it was for and she said that Tom Bryant, then the editor of R&T was going to mention my book in his column and she had to verify some facts. She indicated he really liked the book and so did everyone in the office. I was ecstatic and asked he to please fax me a copy of the article as soon as it was done.

Several days later, it came over on the fax. I was blown away:

"Every now and then a truly special book comes along, and this is one of them. The photos are excellent and the quotes from many of the participants provide insights that make the race come alive....One of the best racing event books I've ever read...This truly is a remarkable work."

The column appeared in the January, 2005 issue of R&T which meant that it was mailed to subscribers in early December - right in time for Christmas. As the orders poured into my web site, I could actually see the magazine being delivered: first orders from California and Arizona, then a day later from Colorado and Texas, then to Illinois and further east. Every day was spent boxing and shipping books. Luckily my office was right across the street from the Berwyn post office and I became very well acquainted with the great people there.

By Christmas, we had sold enough books to pay for the entire print run. We continued to sell at a steady rate through the new year and into the Spring as other reviews came out in other publications. Then it tapered off and it was almost four years until the last of the 1970 book was sold.

In the meantime, I thought I had the magic bullet for book publishing so I decided to do another Sebring book, this time on the 1965 race - the first race I ever attended. Dave Friedman was a fantastic source for the photos and also had a wealth of memorabilia and archival material. This is the book that I still have for sale on Amazon. I hope you buy it!

In 2007 Marsha and I decided to move into Center City Philadelphia and I began a dream assignment helping Dr. Fred Simeone with his museum. For those of you who do not know of this place, it is the greatest collection of racing sports cars in the world, and has received the international awards to prove it. I was honored to play a role in the launch and development of this institution and learned an enormous amount from Dr. Fred, especially about pre-war racing of which I knew very little.

I also returned to HB&M, a great group of professionals, and now head up the PR department. I do contribute to other books and have had my photos in Janos Wimpffen's photo album to accompany Time and Two Seats, Matt Stone's book on Steve McQueen, Michael Argetsinger"s Donohue book, and a new book from Michael Keyser on the 1970 and 1971 season. I recommend all of these books to you.

Thank you for taking the time to read all of this and if any of you are fledgling authors/publishers, I would advise you to "follow your bliss."