Vanderbilt Cup Races

Dexter Park was a baseball stadium located in Woodhaven, Queens. Here is a photo from one of the many baseball games played before the automotive track was built around the perimeter of the track.

Here we see the entrance to the baseball stadium before the automotive race track was built. More of Dexter Park’s baseball history can be learned from a website that documents Queens history. 

Image courtesy of the Queens County Library photo archives.

Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig at a promotional rodeo, 1928.

Racing History

By 1951, Dexter Park needed to find a way to generate extra cash flow since the interest in baseball games at this park had declined. The solution was to pave a one-third of a mile long race track around the perimeter of the field. The location of the track is one block away from the Queens-Brooklyn border.

Here is an original poster used to promote the Stock Car Races at Dexter Park.

Poster forwarded from the Himes family.

Then- Here is an aerial photo of Dexter Park from 1951 when the race track was built. Note the sharp turn behind home plate and how the race track was constructed along the perimeter of the foul ball line on the baseball field. The dark outer border is the track (as indicated by the red arrows).

Queens Historical Aerial Photograph.

Now- A aerial photo of where Dexter Park used to be with a red box identifying the land that used to be the baseball stadium. Note that the street bordering the east edge of the property to Franklin K. Lane High School is named Dexter Court. 

Sporting events held at Dexter Park no longer meant only baseball; racing was on the ticket roster, and it helped keep attendance up at the park for a short period of time.

This particular image shows how narrow the paved track was, and the surreality of a race track being built inside a baseball park. The inner field stayed the same as it was during the baseball season.

Image taken in 1952, photographer unknown, forwarded by the Himes family.

The corners of the race track widened around each turn, particularly near home plate, as seen here.

The uniqueness of a race track in the middle of a neighborhood creates some fantastic photographs. In the background of this particular image is Franklin K. Lane High School.

Image taken in 1952, photographer unknown, forwarded by the Himes family.

In this image, you can see that the racing numbers were painted on large white cardboard squares, which were temporarily attached to the car with tape. The cars that raced (seen here and in the two images above) look as if they were brand-new cars that were simply driven off the dealer lot right to the track. Another thing to note is the lack of damage on the vehicles from racing. Compare this to images further on in this article, it's clear that these cars were not purpose-built race cars.

Image taken in 1952, photographer unknown, forwarded by the Himes family.

Midget car racing was also a popular event at Dexter Park. The midget racing was organized under the American Racing Drivers Club.

Image forwarded by the Himes family.

A spectator's point of view – midget racers lining up on the grid before a race begins. Early midget race cars often needed a push start in order to set off due to not having an onboard electrical starter – that is why you can see multiple tow trucks and a Jeep to serve as a push start vehicle in this image.

Image provided by James King and the William E. Stock Collection.

However, the most common form of racing was the stock car style race cars. This is because the track organizer, Jake Kedenburg was brought in to organize the races at Dexter Park. Jake was also at the time the same organizer who held races at Long Island's own Freeport stadium and Islip Speedway.

This organization was called the All-State Racing Stock Car Club, and it became the norm for Long Island stock car racers to be seen at Freeport, Islip, and Dexter Park race tracks.

Image forwarded by the Himes family

Seen here is a cartoon published in Illustrated Speedway News. This cartoon illustrates the three stock car race tracks on Long Island and the pros of racing at Dexter Park, which were beneficial not only to racers but also to the nearby residents.

Here we see the racers entering the track from the pit area, which was, as far as I can tell, a portion of spectator parking that was reserved for the racers, definitely more room than the dugout for the racers and their cars.

Image forwarded by the Himes family.

This image was taken at the same corner as the image above, but from a higher viewpoint by an unknown photographer. (Note the advertisement board that says “it’s a homer.”)

Here we can see just how flat the corners of the track are; unlike what is typical with oval tracks, this one had no embankment. On the outfield hill, you can see “Dexter Park” spelled out along the slope.

Image forwarded by the Himes family.

I used this image for the cover of the introduction article in this series ( click here ).

Robert Dwyer commented on that post, “the race track has an ad for Abe Stark. In Ebbets Field, if a player hit the sign with a batted ball, he won a suit. I wonder if the driver would get the same if he hit it with his car?”

Fun to think about, but of course not something that would promote safe driving!

Image forwarded by the Himes family.

Published in Speedway Illustrated in April 1951, we see driver Tony Wasburn turning too sharply in his 1932 Ford 3-window race car, going for a two-wheeled ride in front of the packed crowd at Dexter Park. The prark drew up to 5,000 fans at every event it held.

Photo credit W. Griffle.

A few seconds later, Tony Wasburn found himself on top of the guardrail on his side. According to the caption in the photo above, he somehow manged to get his 1932 Ford back on all four wheels and continued the race. 

Photo credit W. Griffle.

In 1955, the property was sold off, and the last race was held in July of that year. The track was popular but evidently not popular enough to outweigh the growing property value of land in Queens.

Today, nothing remains of the park except the memories of the baseball players, racing drivers, and fans; however, there is a historical marker just outside the parking lot of the C Town grocery store, located on the plot of land where Dexter Park used to be. Note that the sign doesn't mention anything about automotive racing. Maybe that is an indication of just how obscure Dexter Park's racing history actually is.

Obscure race tracks like Dexter Park will live on forever thanks to historical documentation, and it gives me joy to pass along the history I've learned about these Long Island tracks to our readers on this website. Here's an image of an unknown racing driver standing next to the Dexter Park Stock Car Racing poster.

Stay tuned for my next article, where I will look into the history of the 1939 World's Fair race track.