DEWEY, Okla. — It has been more than 40 years, but Robert and Bill McMurtrie remember names of drivers that frequented Dewey (Lakeside) Speedway during the 1970s like it was yesterday.
Leon and Ted Bacon, Courtney Grandstaff, Jim Bell, Al Purkey, Bud Purkey, Bill Collins, Matt Collins are some of the names that come to mind when you talk to the McMurtrie’s.
“This is special here. Especially since we both raced here and my dad,” said Robert McMurtrie of racing on the Dewey quarter-mile oval with his family. “This was the place to be on Friday nights.”
It is because of those memories that Bill and Robert want to bring racing back to Dewey. And it all started with a phone car from an old friend.
“A friend of ours named Clint Jones was out riding around and called Bill and told him he wanted to open the race track and Bill was the one to do it.” recalled Robert McMurtrie.
Next was visiting with the land owner and he was all in on the idea.
“Nobody knew that Bob wanted the race track,” Robert said of land owner Bob Chaney. “He is the one really driving this. He has the equipment and him and Bill have really hit it off.”
“I have owned the land for about 15 years,” Chaney said of the property the track sits on. “I have never been in racing, just cattle and construction, but I came out here to the races as a kid. I would like to see it going again.
“I build buildings for a living so I will build the office, concessions and restrooms and install the bleachers.”
And with no zoning requirements to meet it is full speed ahead.
“I talked to the city. They are not involved but they would like to see it come back,” Chaney said. “The County Commissioner also would like to see it come back. There is no telling what all we will have out here. Maybe even concerts.”
Work is underway to restore the racing surface and after some grading it appears the track and clay surface is intact just as it was when it closed in 1981.
“Our first goal is making sure the racing surface is all there and we don’t have to haul a bunch of clay in, and what we have seen so far the racing surface is just like it was when they walked away in 1981,” Robert McMurtrie said. “We hope to have the racing surface ready in a couple of weeks. Next we are going to start putting guardrail and fencing up. We are looking for grandstands. We already have Musco lighting.
“We are going to build (a road) off the county road to bring the rigs in and bring the spectators in off of ninth street.”
In 2017 Bill and Robert built a track on Bill’s property near Bartlesville and called it Blackgold Speedway. But county zoning issues kept it from opening. Now that equipment from Blackgold will be put the use at Dewey.
“Bill is going to take all the equipment off his race track like the guardrails and light poles, everything but the grandstands,” Robert McMurtrie said.
Racing is expected to return for the 2025 season.
“We are looking to open in 2025,” Robert said. “We are going to put a rules committee together made up of old race drivers and track owners. Our goal is to take the pure stock rules from five or six area tracks and make it where all those cars can compete here. We will probably have late models, sprint cars, a modified class, pure stocks and a beginning class.
“I personally want to start a vintage club of Oklahoma and put on a vintage show up here once a month.
“We could run Friday or Saturday, we are not sure yet. It depends on what some of the area tracks might do. We want to work with everybody.”
The placement of the grandstands is one issue yet to be determined.
“The lake has kind of encroached where the grandstands were, so we have to look at that,” Robert McMurtrie said of the lake behind the old grandstand area. “We might put them on the east side instead of the west side. We will be digging out Johnson Lake so we will have more water to water the track. We are also looking at building a covered grandstand.
There is a lot of positive talk about Dewey reopening and if all goes well a media day might be held in October.
“Probably in late October we would like to have an old-timers get together up here and have some cars make some slow laps and let everyone see what we are doing,” Robert McMurtrie said.
For many that day cannot come soon enough.