I received a message from Gary Adam's wife, Carole, this morning. Gary fell yesterday afternoon and they were unable to revive him after repeated attempts and he passed away last night.
I had known Gary from the Cincinnati slot racing scene since the late 1960s. This included the local weekly racing scene as well as the Tri-State regional racing series which at the time was almost as strong as any slot racing of that era on the east and west coast as well as the south. It was the era of big wire winds in the motors and bigger air dams to keep the cars on the track. The controllers ran so hot they needed heatsinks and Lexan plastic for the handles. To say this slot racing era closely paralleled unlimited 1:1 Can-Am racing at the time would not be an exaggeration.
Years passed and turned into decades and we had gone our separate ways. Gary was trained in the printing trades and started at the Cincinnati Enquirer as a typesetter. When the technology changed and started to become computerized and digital, he embraced it and the learning curve it involved. The net result was he traveled all over the world helping to set up computer systems used by newspapers as they switched to the new era.
He lived in Chicago for a while and took up slot racing up there for a time. Our lives crossed again at the R4 races at Tom Thumb in Columbus, OH. I hadn't raced in 30+ years and he was racing again on the Retro scene so it was a fit. We spent a lot of time travelling to races talking about anything and everything slot racing or not. How much slot racing had changed and how much it had not.
With the right equipment and the stars aligned, Gary was as competitive as anyone with their controller hooked up to the track. I'll miss our long rides and longer talks but will value them even more as the slot racing experiences we shared enriched each others lives. That's what shared interests do for all of us and slot racing is no different.
Gary, thanks for being part of all of our lives and the hobby we love. It has been a fun and enriching trip. Our thoughts are with your beloved wife Carole and your treasured children.
