Yesterday’s news and subsequent story about the passing of the great Walt Arfons garnered me more personal emails regarding the relationship between Walt and Art Arfons than the great majority of things we have published on these electronic pages. Lots and lots of people had no idea that the brothers and by proxy of them, their entire families were largely estranged from one another. The major reason for that is probably because neither of the guys ever found it prudent to run his mouth in public about something that was obviously considered a private matter between them. Like the closing paragraph from the Sports Illustrated story we excerpted, the tension and lack of communication between the two began decades and decades ago but lasted on some level, right up until they both left the world.

Why? How? For what? In specifics, those questions could only be answered by two men who are sadly no longer equipped to handle that task, but in general the answer is simple, brilliant people who have strong vision don’t generally work well with brilliant people who also have strong vision on the same things that they do. Yes, there are exceptions to this rule, but let’s think about stuff involved with racing. Do you think that Smokey Yunick would have been well equipped to work with another guy that shared his personality, acumen, and exploratory attitude when it comes to engines as an equal? Hell no. Yunick had brilliant guys work for him like Ralph Johnson and when two guys understand their roles, it can be great. As best I know, there was never a Native American tribe with two chiefs and to my mind, Art and Walt were both chiefs.

I used the photo of Ronnie Sox and Buddy Martin as the lead for this column because they are the prime example of how two people, both with amazing acumen in different areas, can meld into a solid unit and own the world. They created a model that dozens, maybe hundreds behind them followed and they both knew their strengths and didn’t try to impede on the other’s area of influence. Martin was a good business man and someone who knew who to work his phone book to help further their team’s objectives. Martin was not a guy who could shift a four speed like he was born to do it. Ronnie Sox was not interested in managing the team. He was interested in learning how to make the car faster, how to drive the car better, and how to keep everyone else a door handle length behind him. Jake King, their brilliant mechanic was concerned with making horsepower and didn’t give a rip about what the other two guys liked or excelled at doing. That’s what a successful team effort looks like, because if one spoke fell out or left the wheel, the whole thing would have come out of round and honestly who knows if Sox would have dominated in another type of car.

Walt and Art were not those guys. They were the guys who conceived the car, fabricated every inch, spent countless sleepless days and weeks preparing them, towing them to the race venue, and then ultimately drove them. They made the presentations to corporations for sponsorship, glad handed anyone who they thought could support their operations, and ultimately didn’t need to listen to another damned soul when it came to the finished product. I may be painting with slightly too wide a brush.

Walt was probably not that guy. How can I say that? Look at Tom Green’s involvement with the Wingfoot Express. Green’s design and guidance were huge in the construction and ultimate success of that machine. There are no Tom Green’s in Art’s history. He was a man alone.

For those of you who think I am highlighting some sort of “flaw” here, you are dead nuts wrong. In his quiet way Art Arfons was a maverick, the kind of which I personally idolize. I am a voracious reader of biographies centered around guys like him. From Red Adair, to Henry Ford, to Steve Jobs, to Don Garlits, these are all men who had the audacious and wholly American attitude that they weren’t just going to be good or successful at something, they are going to dominate and own it. There wasn’t an idea of settling with being “OK”, the only thing these guys wanted was EVERYTHING and they wanted it their way. Did they need the help of others to get there? Sure. Did they need the help of others to set direction, make the plan, and will the operation to success? Hell no. They wouldn’t have taken it, they didn’t take it….even when it could have helped.

The schism between Walt and Art Arfons is interesting on lots of levels of course. People are fascinated with human conflict, especially when it centers around family issues. I am not so much fascinated at the issues that drove the brothers (ok, half-brothers) apart, I am fascinated by what drove them period. To create the things that they created and to do the things that they did, when they did them, took something bordering on fanatic insanity that may not even exist in humankind anymore. Like the guys who built and flew the first airplanes, they were thrusting themselves into the unknown. Going places that hordes of scientists hadn’t even really dared to go with a slide ruler and graph paper, but they somehow knew that they could do it…and get away with it…and they did!

I hope that somewhere deep in my soul, psyche, or genetic makeup that I have a spec of what drove these guys and that drove others of their ilk. We all feel the feelings they did when we make a new personal best pass at the strip, fire a motor the first time, learn to master a mechanical skill. In those moments we’re Walt or Art, tasting the air at the top of the world. If that’s as close as I get, I think I’m OK with that.