Ron & Gene Logghe
Gene and Ron Logghe were like most of their generation; they loved cars and racing. One thing Gene and Ron had over most other car enthusiasts, their father, Morris Logghe, owned the Logghe Stamping Company. Both Gene and Ron worked at Logghe Stamping, a company that produced products for the auto industry. Since they worked at the stamping company, both Gene and Ron became skilled with their hands as well as their minds.
Both brothers wanted to start racing. Ron designed and built a sports car for road racing and they soon realized road racing was above their budget. But, in 1958 they attended their first drag race and were instantly captured by what it offered, and it was affordable.
Soon, they revamped the sports car for Ron to drag race and built a tube chassis roadster for Gene. In 1961 a local racer named Connie Kalitta asked if the Logghe brothers would build him a dragster chassis. Since the Logghe’s had the equipment and the knowledge, they built thier first Logghe dragster chassis. Connie had great success with this car, and others began to ask if they could purchase one of these chassis. With the chassis business taking off, the Logghe’s expanded into clutch cans, steering components, and axles to go with their chassis. Ron had come up with a new chassis design, small and ultra-lightweight dragster. While testing the car, Gene got burned and their father forbid the brothers to drive a dragster anymore.
Jim Marsh and Roy Steffey, employees at the Logghe Stamping, were having great success in their nitro injected chevy Logghe dragster. The four paired up, forming the Logghe, Marsh & Steffey team with Jim Marsh as driver. In 1963 and 64, the four began to win events and set records wherever they showed up. They beat so many top contending AA fuel dragsters at the time, the car earned the name “the giant killer.” Orders for the Logghe dragsters began to pour in, and soon the Logghe Competiton Products division was formed for the sole purpose of building racing cars and race-related products. The Logghe’s started work on another new design, “the Streamliner,” a sleek streamline body covering a Logghe chassis to cut through the wind. The streamliner did not prove to work out, and in 1965 the Logghes return with “the Prussian,” a blown Chrysler dragster driven by Maynard Rupp and tuned by Roy Steffey. The team went on to win the first NHRA points championship.
This caught the attention of Fran Hernandez and Al Turner with Lincoln-Mercury, who approached the Logghes to build a series of cars to beat the Chrysler altered wheelbase funny cars in the factory experimental class for 1966 (aka the funny car). Logghes came up with a tube chassis with coil-over shocks and featured a one-piece flip top body. The new Ford 427 SOHC would power the cars. The flip-top funny cars had instant success. This led to a stampede of new customers wanting a logghe funny car.
By 1967 drag racing had become a big business for Logghes, and it was not uncommon for at least one newly built dragster and one completed funny car to leave the Logghe shop in a week. Racers at heart, Gene and Ron Logghe promoted both Dragsters and Funny Cars though out their carreers. Many Great names in drag racing won with Logghe race cars such as Tom Prock, Jay Howell, Chuck Kurzawa, Connie Kaliita, Gene Snow, Al Bergler, Shirley Muldowney, Poncho Rendon, Arnie Beswick, Bob Pasccito, Roland Relong, Willie Borsch,” Jungle Jim” Leiberman, and Jack Chrisman, to name a few.
The Logghe Stamping Company turned out over 600 race cars, including Pro Stocks, Altereds, Dragsters, Funny Cars, Motorcycles, Cars and Motorcyles for Bonneville, and even Go-Carts.
With countless wins over the years for Logghe’s, The Logghe Stamping Company was named Car Craft Magazines Funny Car Chassis Builder of the Year in 1967, 68, 69, and 70. In 2006 the Brothers were Honored by the NHRA Hot Rod Reunion, and in 2010 they were inducted into the Michigan Motorsports Hall of Fame.
The doors closed the doors on the famous Logghe Stamping Company in 2013. Gene Logghe still resides in Michigan; Ron Logghe passed away on May 27, 2020.