Landracing Forum
Misc Forums => Health, Welfare, and Passings => Topic started by: Freud on September 15, 2014, 11:46:59 AM
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Matt Williams of the Gold Coast Roadsters told me that Tim Rochlitzer passed away this morning.
Tim goes way back at Bonneville and his talent was used to build several excellent lakesters.
Tim and Matt were the leaders in the presentation of the Gas Up for a long time.
When I know more I'll post it here.
FREUD
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Another pioneer lost, Ive know Tim for many years and had many great moments with him. I will miss him and his always happy smile.God Speed Tim and RIP. :-( :cry:
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Tim lived about a mile from me on Ontare Rd in Santa Barbara and just a few houses up from cousin Arley.
In the 50ths and 60ths when most of us were drag racing, Tim was Bville racing and had a lot of influence in a lot of
Santa Barbarans being Bville racers. Tim also sponsored Bville racers with tubing for headers ECT, through his True Radius Bending shop. In our case without asking.
R.I.P. Bville racer Tim.
JL222
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'Bye Tim. You were a worthy competitor. :cheers: Wayno
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Thanks Tim for all the unselfish help and positive influence you gave to me and so many others. RIP
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Tim was always very nice and personable toward me. He paid me what I consider the ultimate complement. When I showed up with my Thunderbird Super Coupe to run in the 150 mph club, he looked over the roll cage I had built from scratch. Nodding approvingly, he gave me the thumbs up. Several hours later he came up to me and asked how I had gotten the welds on the upper tubing completed all the way around the tubes. I told him I had drilled out the spot welds and removed the roof skin so we had access to all the weld places. I was very flattered that he would check my work so closely and then he complimented me on the workmanship. Coming from someone like him, I took it with pride and have never forgotten it. He was a real gentleman racer and great ambassador for our sport. Tim, thanks for your friendship and class, RIP.
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I have always felt very fortunate to have known and been friends with Tim. Earlier this year when Tim showed up to the land speed portion of the Grand National Roadster show It was good to see him and chat. He seemed to really like the show and talking with old friends. Tim was also a member of the Bonneville 200 MPH Club and built the lakester that was later owned by Seth Hammond.
I took a picture of Tim with my son Kevin at the GNRS.
We'll miss you Timmy, God Speed...
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I've got some free tubing from Tim for my headers. Class act all the way around!
RIP
Willi
Kraut Bros.
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RIP Tim, you were really patent with dumb kids asking questions.
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Tim first went to Bonneville in 1950
Tim became a member of the 200MPH club in 1963
Tim was as nice a person as you have met
Tim was a Racer
Tim was a friend of mine
RIP old friend
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Sorry to hear the news about Mr. Rochlitzer. He was a nice guy, and I always enjoyed talking to him. RIP and Godspeed Tim Rochlitzer, you will be missed.
Tom G.
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Thanks for the fill in info, Doug.
FREUD
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Tim Rochlitzer was a teenage hot rodder long into his senior citizen years. I was so tickled to talk with him so often as we were preparing the Dry Lakes Racing Hall of Fame program that was part of the ceremony during the annual Gas-Up held annually at the Mendenhall Museum in Buellton. He served for years as President of the Gold Coast Racing & Roadster Club and was him self inducted in 1993. Good friend Matt Williams (got his red hat in Tim's RR tank) took over as President when Tim stepped down after many years. The club ans HOF continues to rest upon Williams' shoulders.
What I marveled at was Tim's analytical perspective. His had his ducks (and most everyone else's ducks, like it or not) always in tight formation. He had a very low threshold for "BS" which gave rise to his favorite characterization that he was "safety wired in the P.O. position." I am laughing even now as I write this thinking about it. His ire always had solid basis -- even when he was annoyed with himself.
Let's think about that crew cut, as much part him as any race machine and his big beefy grey truck that push started the tank.
True Radius Bending, his shop in Santa Barbara, helped give rise to many hot rod and race car over the years. My favorite story is that of Al Teague building Betsy. The car began as a lakester. Tim played a big part in keeping Al safe as well as fast. They would have phone chats followed by parts being shipped by Greyhound bus because it was cheaper than the post office or UPS. Back and forth would go parts of the chassis, roll-cage, what have you, until Al was ready to race.
He was the youngest launch director at Vanderberg AFB, where a variety of rockets left earth gravitational grasp. Perhaps he got some of his technical savvt form his mom, Catherine, who was crack ham radio operator in the 1940's. . .got her call sign BEFORE WWII!
He was the "father" of Seth Hammond's #77 lakester (original build 1962) that went onto put more people in the Bonneville 200MPh club any any vehicle to date. 16 red hats I believe, maybe more and at least 3 blue ones, including wife Tanis' and Jeanne Pflum's outstanding plus 300 records.
In later years there was Raspberry Rocket, that spent most of its racing life painted pink, another joke. When Tim brought the car to the painter, the spray man said, "what color do you want?" Tim snorted, "Any color but pink." Gotta love it.
He was lifelong friends with the Markley Brothers, I have photos of them together decades old and all were on the cover of the DEC 1962 Hot Rod Mag (Tim's car is #43).
Jim Miller has slice of Tim here: http://www.ahrf.com/legends/tim-rochlitzer/
Perhaps sons Brian and Bradley have the heaviest hearts today, they were both youngsters when they lost their effervescent mother and it daddy that raised them up -- never marrying again. Sending a cyber hug to you guys. . . .
Those are just a few of the thoughts that percolated back up when I got the news that Tim had died. Another rip-roaring land speed racing original silenced. Gotta go, too sad to say anymore just now.
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GodSpeed Tim... another legend lost to the speedway in the sky
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A Mini Gas Up will be held in Tim's honor Saturday, October 25, 2014.
The site is Mendenhall's Gas Pump Museum in Buellton, CA.
This is where the Gas Up is held.
There will be other posts but if you arrive in Buellton on Oct 25, you will find it.
FREUD
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Brain Rochlitzer asked me to help the family write Tim's obituary for the local papers. Below is what will run. However, it is hoped that those of you who you who knew him will weigh in with remembrances for the tribute I am compiling for the October 25th Celebration of Life in Buellton. Post them here for all to see, or send a personal message and I will add them to the celebration handout - LSL
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Timothy Mortimer Rochlitzer
The unimaginative would say Timothy Mortimer Rochlitzer entered this world on June 16th 1930 and left it behind September 15th 2014. What a lame gloss over that would be for a man whose life was spent poking holes in the impossible and the improbable. Driving his own hand-built race car to a speed of 246MPH on the pristine Bonneville Salt Flats gives you an idea of the man’s skill and determination.
A Vienna native, at age four, his parents fled Austria to escape the war and settled in what became their beloved Santa Barbara, California. A graduate of Santa Barbara Catholic High School in 1948; Tim earned a degree in mechanical engineering at Gonzaga University.
Rochlitzer served in the US Army Airborne Division from 1953-55, as he put it, “jumping out of perfectly good airplanes.” In civilian life, he found work with Lockheed at Vandenberg Air Force Base and became the country’s youngest “Launch Conductor” tasked with blastoff responsibility of numerous cold war era space projects.
It was at work that he met the love of his life, Dorothy Ann Taylor. They were married in 1962 in Yakima Washington. The newlyweds settled in Santa Barbara and began a family, happily raising sons Brad and Brian until Dorothy passed away at age 40 in 1982. As single parent, Tim brought both boys into manhood teaching them the value of hard work and living life with integrity.
Infatuated and fascinated with all things mechanical, his teenage love of cars grew into a vibrant, lifelong obsession. Proud as he was pleased to be called a “hot rodder,” the Santa Barbaran added “land speed racer” in 1952 after his inaugural trip to the salt flats.
He earned membership in the Bonneville 200MPH Club recording a 224MPH land speed record in 1963 and then later worked relentlessly to help his two sons, Brian (262MPH) and Bradley (265MPH), join the prestigious racing club.
Entranced by the ultimate rush of unlimited speed and enduring camaraderie, Rochlitzer’s passion laid the foundation of his business life fabricating racecars. In 1965, he hung the True Radius Bending shingle and began a tube bending and metal fabrication business that remained in continuous operation until 2014.
Stories abound about “there was never a racer that he wouldn’t help” which ate away at the profit margin and regularly dented the successful business model. Tim Rochlitzer always did things his way, in his time, regardless of what anyone, or any business model had to say. You either admired, or could be driven crazy by this single, enduring attribute.
He served for many years as President of the Gold Coast Racing & Roadster Club that is responsible for the founding and perpetuation of the Dry Lakes Racing Hall of Fame (DLRHOF) that recognizes the astonishing achievements of land speed racers. His peers voted him into the DLRHOF in 1993.
An avid dirt bike rider, he spent countless weekends riding in the backcountry giving his sons an early appreciation of nature and the art of two-wheel drifting. “You go where you look and keep your feet on the pegs,” was an oft repeated phrase that is now is a metaphor for life that his boys value.
Preceded in death by wife Dorothy, brother Joseph, parents Catherine and Joseph as well as so many of his Bonneville racing extended family, a reunion for the record books must be going on as you read this.
Sons Bradley (Bess), Brian (Sarah), and three grandchildren Avery, Jade and Bo, mourn his passing knowing that future has a hole in it where dad and grandpa should be.
A celebration of this larger than life character will be held on October 25th, 2014, 1pm, at the Mendenhall Museum in Buellton, CA
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Good job, Louise.
He was his "own way."
I owe him a lot.
FREUD
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A lovely day for Tim Rochlitzer's Memorial at the site of Mendenhalls Gas Pump Museum in Buellton California
Saturday Oct 25.
Many family members attended with Brian Rochlitzer remembering the influence that Tim had on the two
sons, Brian and Brad.
As soon as I get home I'll post some fotos.
It was like old times when we saw people that Tim hung with in the 1950's. Ya gotta remember,
this was an older crowd.
RIP Tim.
He was a dandy.
Land Speed Louise did a great job on a paper describing his life.
THANKS Louise. I plan to ask her
permission to include it later.
FREUD
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Louise has already posted the tribute that she wrote.
It several posts before this one.
FREUD
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Tim was a real racer.
People asked many times, Why do they compete?
Why do they work so hard, out in all that heat?
They will use every dollar that they have to spend,
to buy speed parts from a list, that just has no end.
They will loan parts to someone, who wants to try and beat
the record speed that they just set, at the very last meet.
When you visit their pit, to enjoy the shade that is there
They will offer you a cold drink, and to sit down in a chair.
They will help you work on your racer, for hour after hour.
When they could be at their hotel, taking a nice cold shower.
These a just a few of the things, real racer have done.
For they can still remember, this is supposed to be fun.
Tim was a real racer, on that we can agree.
That will always remain as a happy memory.
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That is good what you wrote, Doug.
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Doug wrote a piece that describes Tim quite completely.
Thanks Doug for the memories and recognition.
These two images were from an era that required a real effort to achieve the Two Club.
I know, it's the same now. Well not really.
This was over 50 years ago.
FREUD