General Information
The history and backstory of Terlingua Racing seems to be popping up all over the place lately, due in part to the excellent-and best-account of that history as told by Sue Elliott. For me, the name and logo bring back many a fond memory. Carroll Shelby, as most of his fans already know, is not a conformist. In fact, they don't come more antiestablishment than Carroll, and thank God for that. The wonderful legacy of Shelby vehicles wouldn't exist any other way. But Terlingua Racing was Carroll's (along with a few of his closest pals) way of "thumbing our noses at the establishment," according to Carroll. That pretty much defines the tone that is Terlingua. But to rub their noses in it, Shelby and Terlingua decided to go racing, and that, folks, is when history was made. The incredible Ken Miles was Terlingua's first driver, and none finer ever sat behind the steering wheel of a race car. He made kicking ass look easy. From Cobras to Ford GTs, Ken was the champion's champion, till his tragic death in a testing crash at Riverside Raceway in California.
I'm proud to say that Terlingua's next legend was my father, Jerry Titus. Together, Carroll, my father, and the team that was Terlingua Racing won the Championship they weren't supposed to win: the '67 Trans-Am title.
I grew up as a teenager with that now-famous Terlingua Racing Team rabbit logo on all my notebooks, back when it was still an underground political statement. They were a band of mavericks bent on whuppin' all the sure-to-wins on a regular basis. They were fun times that made a son proud. From drag racing to stock cars, insiders have proudly adorned the Terlingua Racing Team shield. Well, history is about to repeat itself, as Terlingua Racing and a prestigious line of products under the same name have come back to racing and, quite likely, back to thumbing their collective nose at that establishment. -Rick Titus
Now, the logo:
The artist and creator behind the fiery rabbit is Bill Neale, a major star in the world of fine automotive art. His masterful paintings serve as centerpieces for many private and museum collections around the globe.
A founding member of the prestigious Automotive Fine Arts Society, Neale has garnered awards and accolades at some of the most prestigious automotive fine art shows in the world. For decades his work has been regularly featured in Car and Driver, Automobile Magazine, Road & Track, Cavalino and Sports Illustrated.
He’s been drawing cars and airplanes ever since he can remember. Neale earned his bachelors and master degrees in Art at the University of North Texas with graduate studies at the renowned Chouinard Art Institute.
Neale draws inspiration from his personal experience as a former SCCA amateur racecar driver and from time spent with legendary drivers at some of the most exciting races of our time. “My first sports car was an MG TD. I also drove a Lotus, A Triumph and several Porsches.”
Neale blazed the trail in automotive art when it wasn’t popular. “I’ve always loved painting cars, but automotive fine art was not taken too seriously by the ‘establishment’ when I was starting out,” explains Neale. So I went into the advertising business. This allowed me to make a living during the day and then hit the canvas with my automotive art at night.” His successful career in advertising took him from Creative Director and V.P. of Tracy Locke/BBD&O to owning his own firm, Point Communications, until he sold it in the late eighties.
“Bill’s paintings are historically accurate, impeccably detailed and emotionally irresistible,” says Gerald Roush, fine art collector and editor of the Ferrari Market Letter.
The key to Bill’s success is his ability to paint a subject in the medium which best captures its spirit. Most artists typically paint in only one medium, but Bill is equally skilled with watercolors, acrylics and oils. The result is a style that is all his own.
Recognized as one of the most prolific automotive artists of our time, Neale is often noted for his friendship with Carroll Shelby. “In my opinion, Bill is simply the best automotive fine artists in the world today,” Shelby said. “As co-founder of the Automotive Fine Art Society, he helped take a little known field and make it one of the most visible and coveted art genres.”
Both native Texans, Neale met Shelby back in the 1950’s at the Caddo Mills race track. Both former WWII aviators, the pair quickly became close sharing their love of fast cars and dirt bikes. Shelby said, “We hit it off. We lied to each other all afternoon. He likes to tell people that our relationship has naturally manured over the years.”
During the raucous, no holds barred era of the nineteen-sixties, Neale and Shelby, along with other Shelby Rat Packers – Dave Witts, Tom Tierney and David E. Davis, would unwind hunting, racing dirt bikes and - God knows what else – at a dusty and deserted town called Terlingua that Shelby and Witts co-owned.
It was there Neale first scribbled his now famous logo. What started out as a joke among friends, gave panache and notoriety to the small Texas ghost town and evolved into the classy racing emblem coveted by racing enthusiasts and mavericks the world over.
And in Bill's words, the real story:
AT FIRST, I THOUGHT ABOUT A BUZZARD…
The Terlingua Ranch logo has this rabbit which looks like what you would see on a European coat of arms. Originally I sketched some ideas using various other critters that lived in the area around Terlingua and the Rio Grande River. Among the other critters that I tried on the first design was a buzzard, which was pretty neat. But then I thought, the jackrabbit is really more of a Texas critter…and the design just naturally developed. His ears have a classic look and he has fur up around his neck. Many people wonder why he’s holding up his right foot, but the reason is simple. He’s saying, “No more peppers in my chili please!!!”The three feathers underneath the rabbit represent the three Indian tribes that populated the area prior to the days when cinnabar ore was mined to produce mercury. The three Indian tribes were the Kiowa, Apache, and Comanche. The tribes gathered in an area around the only source of water, now called Terlingua Creek, and while living together they developed one language. The name of the region comes from these three languages or “Tres Lingues”, later adapted as “Terlingua”.
Also on the logo is the sun, which I included primarily because it is so bloomin’ hot down there! Midday temperatures of 110º-115º are typical. I picked the color yellow because it just seemed appropriate for that area. Most areas down there are either bright earth colors or brown. In the upper left hand corner there is the date 1860. In the mid 1800’s, mercury or “quicksilver” mining made Terlingua a boom town. 1860 was the date of the first race ever held in the Terlingua area. That first race was between two mercury ore wagons pulled by 6 mules each and it was held on the road which is now the center of Terlingua. When I told that to Shelby he said, “Neale, that’s a hell of a story. Where did you find it? What book was it in?” And I said, “Shelby, I didn’t read that in a book. I made it up!”
~ Bill Neale
