SpeedTV.com Book Review: SO-CAL Speed Shop: The Fast Tale of the California Racers Who Made Hot Rod History
Written by: Gregg Leary Charlotte, NC – 12/1/2005

TITLE: SO-CAL Speed Shop: The Fast Tale of the California Racers Who Made Hot Rod History

AUTHOR: Mark Christensen

PUBLISHER: Motorbooks International

“SO-CAL Speed Shop” is a remarkable book that could be a screenplay for an amazing Hollywood film. It is the true story of the larger than life exploits of Alex Xydias, whose father WAS a famous Hollywood movie producer. At age six, Alex was exposed to his first “cool” car—an Auburn Cord his dad parked in the driveway of their Hollywood mansion. But his dad’s illness and the stock market crash of 1929 threw Alex from the lap of luxury.

At 10, Alex delivered newspapers, sold “Liberty” magazines and picked up empty Coke bottles to help make ends meet. “It was a time of great ingenuity, because whatever we had, we had to make,” Alex says in the book. “It paid off later during the war, when we had to keep tanks going, planes going—it was the beginning of the hot rod mentality. We had to invent our toys, invent our games, invent everything.”

Alex customized his bike and created primitive soap box derby-like cars that looked like something from “The Little Rascals.”

Alex caught hot rod fever by watching the midget races at Gilmore Stadium. His hero was Vic Edelbrock, who looked like Humphrey Bogart and worked on midgets in his gas station.

The connection between Hollywood and “hot rod” was never far from Alex. He went to school with Judy Garland, Jason Robards and Mickey Rooney. Alex worked after school in a service station and took auto shop classes. Alex’s ’34 cabriolet hot rod, “Jewel” even had a Hollywood connection. He found it in the basement of the Ambassador Hotel, the site of early Academy Award ceremonies and a favorite of stars like Rudolph Valentino and Joan Crawford. In 1944, Alex joined the Air Cadets to become a pilot, but instead became a flight engineer and gunner on a B-17 bomber.

World War II exposed the former gas station mechanic to a quantum leap of technology, the finest tools, the most powerful engines and the knowledge that there were thousands of ex-servicemen just like him, returning vets with a thirst for danger and a lust for speed,”coming home with a lot of mustering out pay, and I knew that cars would be something they would want to spend it on.”

Alex opened the original So-Cal Speed Shop the day he was discharged from the service, March 3, 1946. He cut deals with the best suppliers like Edelbrock, Weiand, Navarro, Meyers, Offenhauser, Winfield, Harman & Collins, Jahns, started advertising in “Hot Rod” Magazine and orders started coming in from all over the country. So-Cal started racing on the dry lakes of California, the Bonneville Salt Flats, the sands of Daytona Beach and drag strips. So-Cal’s hot rods were the first to run 170, 180 and 190 miles per hour. A World War II surplus belly tank from a P-38 fighter was molded into a record-setting speedster that was featured on a “Hot Rod” magazine cover in 1949. Four more “Hot Rod” covers would follow by 1954. Further success with cars like the So-Cal Streamliner persuaded “Mechanix Illustrated” to delineate So-Cal as 1952’s “Number One Race Team.”

Xydias intuitively knew presentation and branding years before they became advertising buzzwords. His scalloped red and white immaculately painted and detailed cars with drivers and crew wearing So-Cal team shirts and jackets modeled after what Alex had seen on Indy 500 crews, giving the team an international identity.

But racing giveth and it taketh away. When Alex’s friend, Dave DeLangton, was badly burned driving the same car Alex had just set a track record in at Pomona, Alex gave up racing and closed the original So-Cal Speed Shop in 1961. He went into film production, then edited “Car Craft” and “Hot Rod Industry News.” HRIN would lead to trade shows that became SEMA (Specialty Equipment Market Association) … the world’s largest. Alex would partner with Mickey Thompson in founding the SCORE Off-Road equipment trade show.

In 1994, Alex returned to Bonneville and ran over 176 miles per hour. In 1997, Pete Chapouris III and Alex resurrected SO-CAL. The new company created many winners of the Hot Rod Class at the Pebble Beach Historic Concors d’Elegance and created the famed 1950 Ford “Kopperhed” for ZZ Top’s Billy F Gibbons. Clients include many Hollywood stars. Alex Xydias and So-Cal have come full circle.

The 192 page hardbound book is lavishly illustrated with spectacular large format color and black and white photographs with breathtaking detail. Many of the 50 year old photos look like they were taken yesterday. Beautiful Rex Burnett cutaway drawings add to the book’s impact.