1947 Gold Cup Remembered

By Fred Farley - Unlimited Hydroplane Historian

Driver Danny Foster became the first Gold Cup winner to use a modern power source in 1947.

MISS PEPS V, which used an Allison aircraft engine, outran the likes of MISS GREAT LAKES, NOTRE DAME, and TEMPO VI en route to the checkered flag.

The 1947 Gold Cup was run on the extremely rough water of Jamaica Bay. It is the most recent Gold Cup to be contested in the state of New York, where the cup originated in 1904.

NOTRE DAME won the first heat of 30 miles, but MISS PEPS V rebounded to win the next two. Heat Three featured a good battle for first and second between PEPS and MISS GREAT LAKES with owner/driver Al Fallon. Foster did 56.256 to Fallon's 55.667 in the almost ocean-like chop.

MISS PEPS V had originally used half of a Curtiss Conqueror when she raced as Lou Fageol’s SO-LONG in 1939. The Dossin brothers commissioned Foster to install an Allison in the PEPS. And he did. But Danny had to literally hang the cockpit over the transom in order to make room for that enormous engine, which vastly overpowered the 23-1/2-foot hull.

The 1947 season saw the first true national circuit for Unlimited hydroplanes. Four races--the Ford Memorial, the APBA Gold Cup, the Silver Cup, and the President's Cup--counted for APBA National High Points. MISS PEPS V won all but the Silver Cup and emerged as High Point Champion.

As the top boat of 1947, MISS PEPS V reaped the benefits of a commercial sponsor. This was unusual. At the time, such arrangements were permitted but frowned upon. Although financed by Dossin Food Products, which had the franchise to distribute Pepsi Cola in the state of Michigan, MISS PEPS V did not carry the full product name into competition.

The only boat besides MISS PEPS V to win a major race in 1947 was Herb Mendelson’s NOTRE DAME, which captured the Silver Cup on the Detroit River with Dan Arena driving.

MISS PEPS V and NOTRE DAME represented opposing philosophies in 1940s Unlimited hydroplane racing. The PEPS was a three-pointer, built in 1939 by the Ventnor Boat Works, while NOTRE DAME was a step hydroplane with no sponsons, constructed in 1940 by Arena.

The success of the propriding three-pointer SLO-MO-SHUN IV was still a few years in the future. In 1947, the non-propriding sponson boats, such as MISS PEPS V and TEMPO VI, were pretty much on equal terms with the fast-steppers, such as NOTRE DAME and MISS CANADA III.

MISS PEPS V proved in 1947 that the good fortune of MISS GREAT LAKES with Allison power in 1946 was no fluke. The Thunderboat Era had most assuredly begun. For the next four decades, Unlimited hydroplanes would have to pretty much depend upon World War II fighter aircraft power sources to be competitive.

Retired by the Dossins after 1947 and replaced by a full-sized Unlimited hull, MISS PEPS V re-appeared a few years later as Stan Dollar’s SHORT SNORTER and won the 1953 Lake Tahoe Mapes Trophy with Dollar driving.