All images credit: Speedhunters.com/NHRA Museum

The formative years of the sport of drag racing were a truly remarkable time. With the high performance industry and the overall concept of ultimate straight line performance still in its infancy, figuring out what combination would outperform the next invoked the same kind of process as asking out that gorgeous young lass that was completely out of your league: you didn’t know unless you tried.

While one engine was great, the gears running within the minds of the sports’ founding fathers began to spin, and suddenly they were trying two engines, and even four. And perhaps the most famous of all of these multi-engine endeavors belong to one of the most famous men to ever grace the quarter mile.

In 1961, famed actor and drag racing legend “TV” Tommy Ivo rolled out a creation that would become one of, if not the greatest exhibition vehicle of all time and one that would solidify his standing as the sports greatest showman. With four Buick V8 engines strapped to the framerails, Ivo’s all-wheel drive dragster was a true marvel. The engines on the left side drove the front wheels through a Halibrand quick-change center section, while the motors on the right powered the rear wheels through a second Halibrand situated to the right of Ivo in the drivers compartment. All told, this monster packed 1,856 cubic inches and made over 2,000 combined horsepower.

With Ivo unable to drive due to contractual obligations with the television studio he was working for, a young Don Prudhomme handled the initial driving duties of this beast. With all four wheels blazing the hides the entire length of the strip, the four-engine car looked more like a plume of smoke charging down the track then a race car, and it was part of what made this machine such a hit at dragstrips all across the nation. According to Ivo, your hope was that it was pointed straight and still going straight once the smoke cleared, because you couldn’t see anything.

Ivo’s creation, which came to be known as the “Showboat,” was an undeniable crowd pleaser, but the NHRA brass were less than pleased. Concerned that the four-engine concept would take off, Wally Parks and company relegated the car to exhibition-only status. Unwavered, Ivo took his show on the road and all but invented the concept of traveling drag racing acts that we still see today.

In 1963, Ivo opted to return to Top Fuel racing and sold the Showboat to crewman Tom McCourry, who later gave it a second life by adding the famous Buick Station wagon body – crafted by legendary body man Tom Hanna. Hanna hand-formed the entire body, which sported a real roof rack and the first escape hatch in a Funny Car-type body. McCourry campaigned the car as the “Wagon Master” for another 15 years, and thanks to the addition of the Buick Riviera body in an era when Funny Cars were the sports’ biggest draw, the Wagon Master was a hit once again.