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Northern Light IRL: Dedicated Indy Sponsor Gilmore Dies at 74 in Traffic Accident

2 January 2001

Posted By Terry Callahan
Motorsports Editor, The Auto Channel

Michigan resident best known for long partnership with Foyt

INDIANAPOLIS-- James S. "Jim" Gilmore Jr.s happiest moment in Indy-car racing came shortly after A.J. Foyt won his fourth Indianapolis 500 in 1977.

Gilmore was in his fourth year as sponsor of Foyts racing team.

"When A.J. got the winners ring, he took it off and gave it to me and said, Jim, you may go broke, a lot of things may happen in your lifetime, but this is something we did together," Gilmore once reflected about that historic victory.

On the afternoon of Dec. 31, Gilmore was killed in a freak vehicle accident in his hometown of Kalamazoo, Mich. He was 74.

According to police reports, Gilmores pickup truck hit a patch of ice, overturned and slid into a fence. Snow fell through the driver-side window and the sunroof, and Gilmore was covered with snow. He had to be dug out of the snow before his body could be removed from the truck and he was pronounced dead after CPR efforts failed to revive him.

A passenger in the truck, Lynn Marie McCarthy, was treated and released from a Kalamazoo hospital.

Services are being handled by Langeland Family Funeral Home, where visitation will take place from 4-7 p.m. Wednesday. The funeral home address is 622 S. Burdick St., Kalamazoo, MI 49007. The funeral will be conducted at 1 p.m. Thursday in St. Lukes Episcopal Church, 247 Lovell St., Kalamazoo, MI 49007.

Gilmore had an interest in racing from his boyhood when he built model race cars and tiny gas engines that powered them.

"Ive always been mechanically inclined even though I dont have any degrees in engineering," Gilmore once said. "Thats one of the reasons I love race cars. I see the mechanical side, the intricate side."

Many years later, after working in the family department store and then branching out to run his advertising agency and later owning a chain of radio and TV stations, Gilmore became involved in racing as a way to lessen the pressures of his business dealings. He helped fellow Michigan resident Gordon Johncock get his start in Indy cars in the mid-1960s.

Gilmore later sponsored cars owned by Lindsey Hopkins and Clint Brawner and driven by Wally Dallenbach, Mel Kenyon, Jack Brabham, Art Pollard and Jimmy Caruthers.

In 1973, Gilmore formed his partnership with Foyt. They signed an original contract that was renewed year after year without either one changing any of the wording. The team wore red-and-white checkered shirts with "Jim Gilmore Racing" emblazoned over the left pocket.

Through thick and thin, Gilmore always had a smile and was available to the media. He was the buffer for Foyt when things went wrong.

Gilmores dedication to auto racing included the presentation each year of the Diana Fell Gilmore Woman Behind the Scenes Award. It honored his late wife. This years award winner will be announced at the annual USAC banquet this Friday night in Indianapolis.

In the 1980s, Gilmore, who was elected mayor of his hometown in 1959, owned the largest Chevrolet dealership in the United States, in Miami. He also owned the family Cadillac/Pontiac/Nissan dealership in Kalamazoo and a Lincoln-Mercury operation in Hialeah, Fla.

He began Gilmore Broadcasting in 1962 with a radio-TV station in Joplin, Mo. He still owned WEHT-TV and Jim Gilmore Productions in Evansville, Ind.

Racing souvenirs in Gilmores home included the car Foyt drove to a closed-course speed record of 217 mph in 1974. It sits in the living room. Another Foyt Coyote hangs from the ceiling of the family room. Walls of his home and offices are covered with thousands of photos of Foyt and clippings of his drivers exploits.

Survivors include: daughters Bethany Lass of Richland, Mich., Sydney McElduff of Quincy, Calif., Elizabeth Bystrycki of Otsego, Mich., and Ruth Lamp of Ann Arbor, Mich.; son James S. Gilmore III; and 13 grandchildren.

Text Provided By Paul Kelly

Editors Note: To view hundreds of hot racing photos and art, visit The Racing Photo Museum and the Visions of Speed Art Gallery.