AMSOIL SPEEDWAY INDUCTS FIVE NEW HALL OF FAME MEMBERS
By Jerry O’Brien
7-22-16Five new members of the AMSOIL Speedway Hall of Fame were inducted onFriday July 22nd in a ceremony held at the Curling Club building located on theHead of the Lakes Fairgrounds. During the 14th annual edition, a buffet dinner wasprovided by Kurtz Catering and the new Hall of Fame members were inducted in aprivate ceremony, by invitation, for current Hall of Fame members and theirguests.The new inductees were then toured the track in a pair of convertibles furnishedby HoF member Jack Hunker from his extensive car collection. They ended up inVictory Lane where they were introduced to the fans. The tradition continued as afive sections of the speedway grandstands are named for the incoming class andwill stay in place until the next inductees are named.The AMSOIL Speedway Hall of Fame has three categories, Retired Drivers,Pioneer/Achievement and Active Driver. Two years ago the Retired Driver portionof the list was split into two sections. The first covers the years 1962-1988, thenext 1989 to the present. Voters pick two from section one and one from sectiontwo. The total inductees in any given year should be five.For the 2016 edition the first section inductees were Warren Carlson and RickEgersdorf and the section two nominee was Mike Meger. In the Pioneer/Achievement section track announcer, entrepreneur and all around Character ClarkBrown was nominated and the 2016 Active Driver nominee was Scott Lawrence.In order to be eligible for the Active Driver award you must be 50 years old orolder and still racing.The late Warren Carlson did his racing in the mid ‘60’s and won a feature andsome heats. A racing crash and roll over prompted him to give up the driving anduse his considerable mechanical ability to work on other cars. At one time heworked on six cars including those of Hall of Fame members Jack Hunker andHarlow Filteau as well aas Billy Stuart, Wayne Wenske, Rick Sundet and JimHunker. Warren passed away at age 43 from complications from ALS. His wifeBonnie Carlson accepted the crystal trophy along with their four sons and otherfamily members.Rick Egersdorf was a frequent visitor to the speedway, especially when the bigmoney races were on the line. Ricked with car owner Craig Geller for many yearsin the orange #17 Late Model. At the speedway he won four weekly feature races,won the Late Model Invitation in 1983 and the then named Super Superior Classicnow known as the Northern nationals. He also won the WISSOTA Qualifier forthe WISSOTA 100 back in 1988. Rick was on hand with his family to accept hisaward.Mike Meger joined his Dad Andrew “Skip” Meger in the Hall of Fame. Mikeraced the #2 Modified with Skip while he was still in highschool. He raced at thespeedway during the brief time that the Cook Family from the Cedar LakeSpeedway were also promoting the newly named Superior Speedway. In 1989 theCooks imported what they called the CLS Late Model to replace the Super Stocks.A few racers built these cars including Mike. He did wellin the class with someheat and feature wins. The class never took off here and were soon dropped as theSuper Stocks were reinstated. Mike’s car was converted to a Late Model which heraced for several seasons winning some heats and a feature. He always ran the #2carrying on the family number.Clark Brown was the announcer at the speedway as well as at several other areatracks for a number of seasons. He was great friends with Hall of Fame memberand long time track flagman, Art Johnson. In the beginning the roles were reversedas Art was the announcer and Clark was the flag man. He worked in Duluth, MN.For the then Willcol Ambulance Service.Clark was a great character in an era filled with characters.At the then Tri-State Speedway, everything was done from a structure in theinfield and flagging was done right down on the track. Clark would sit on anactual tree stump and call the races. Once a car slammed into the structure sendingClark flying ultimately uninjured.Unfortunately doing due diligence failed to find any information on ClarkBrown, wife, children or any other family, even an original home town.Scott Lawrence was named to the Hall of Fame as the Active Driver. He justturned 50 years old and has quite an impressive record that is still ongoing. Hestarted his racing career at age 18 back in 1985 in a Chevy that he bought fromanother competitor for $125. He proceeded to win the so called Bomberchampionship in his rookie season and was off and running. The Bombers evolvedinto the WISSOTA Street Stock over the years and Scott won nine track titles inthat division: 19 85, ‘86, ‘89, ‘92, ‘94, ‘95, ‘96, ‘98 and 1999. ‘99 was also theyear he was WISSOTA National Street Stock Champion with 37 feature wins overall. He also won two Northern Nationals Street Stock titles. His total feature winsin the division was 48.He moved up to the WISSOTA Super Stock division and has recorded 27feature wins at the speedway, the last, thus far, coming just a few weeks ago. Hehas three Super Stock track championships at his home track: 2009, 2012 and2015 and has won the division three times at the Northern Nationals.He raced on Hall of Fame night, led some laps before finishing
third in thefeature.