Drag racing has lost a friend with the passing of Jim "Superman" Nicoll. It has also lost one of its finest storytellers, too.

By popular demand, we have brought out one of a 2012 story Nicoll used in the War Stories Showdown to beat his best friend Chip Woodall in their semi-final match. Nicoll would go on to finish runner-up to Nicky Boninfante.

In winning, Nicoll told a story of his experiences with the Mad Bomber, the famous Bob Crietz.

NO. 3 QUALIFIER – JIM "SUPERMAN" NICOLL
WAR STORIES CLAIM TO FAME – YOU DON'T THINK I GOT THIS NAME FOR MY SURVIVAL INSTINCTS DO YOU?
(Graphic courtesy of Phil Burgess)

TELLING THE STORY OF: IN HONOR OF THE MAD BOMBER

We never did learn the consequences of playing with M-80s or explosive devices back in the 1970s. We were drag racers by trade, and blowing up stuff on the race cars was not acceptable. Outside of the car, we wanted to blow up as much stuff as we could find. The more creative we could get with the explosions, the better.

I loved blowing up stuff. It fit my hillbilly redneck persona.

My partner in this lifestyle was Bob Creitz.

Creitz, who lived in Tulsa, always made our visits entertaining. I’m telling this story in memory of Creitz, who passed away. He always made sure those who he befriended never forgot him for one reason or another.

Creitz taught us the value of being a good M-80 thrower. As you will recall in my last story, it was myself, John “Zookeeper”Mulligan and Leroy Goldstein who blew the tire off of Don “Mad Dog” Cook’s trailer with a carefully tossed M-80. Later on John would swear off M-80s when he threw one and it bounced off the target and returned back in the car. The M-80 went off in his hand seriously wounding it as he was trying to throw it a second time.

The rest of us … there was no way we were giving up the M-80s.

Visiting Creitz’s place was always a blast … no pun intended. Creitz’s shop in Tulsa was to the southwest. Creitz’s shop always attracted the best of the best.

Having a shop with colorful drag racers and an abundance of idle time was always a recipe for disaster.  The tour headed to Tulsa for an AHRA event promoted by Jim Tice and for a few days we had plenty of spare time. It was me and Mad Dog who had time to spare and we headed to Creitz’s shop.  
 
Our favorite pastime was looking through the paper in search of used 1957 or 1958 Chryslers for sale. On one particular weekday, a major ego-filled one upmanship competition would spin out of control and eventually get someone in a lot of trouble.

The lure of these cars was the 392 engines, and the cars … well we could have cared less. On this particular day, we came across a 1958 Chrysler New Yorker and called the seller. He was all too happy to bring the car over to the shop.

Now this man had an affection for this car which made me wonder why he wanted to sell it in the first place. He brought the car over to Creitz’s shop and spent most of the time telling us about how he bought the car brand new and loved it so much. If he was selling his baby he wanted to know it was going to a good home. The car was like his child and wanted to make sure the new owners would baby it as he did.

I ended up making the deal with the gentleman for the new car and as he cleaned it out, you could tell he was happy with the deal he’d just made for this car which was in excellent shape.

The man had no sooner said his tearful goodbye and gotten in his new car than a major explosion transpired blowing out the windshield and the dash. The old man leapt from his car with a look of shock on his face.

What had happened?

When it became apparent this was the work of Mad Dog, who had strung together several M-80s, lit and stuck them in the glove compartment, the old man became so enraged he cussed me out for quite a while. When I say a while, he hung around for hours cussing me out.

If you remember the last story, you will not be surprised why Mad Dog couldn’t wait just a few more minutes to let the man get down the road.

The old man wasn’t the only one pissed. Someone had gotten the best of Creitz in blowing something up. Creitz took very serious his explosive reputation.

To top this one, Creitz knew he had to do this at night. His explosion had to be spectacular.

Creitz disappeared and off in a secluded section of his property, concocted a plan which included lots of blow-up stuff, a balloon and the darkness of the somewhat rural Tulsa nighttime.

Let me tell you a bit about Creitz. If he wasn’t working on his car to make it go faster and not blow up, he was looking for something to blow up … not to hurt anyone, of course.

The man just loved blowing crap up.

Anyway, Creitz emerged about 9 pm with his latest creation … an acetylene bomb attached to a balloon with the intention of lighting up the sky.

“Let’s send this baby up!” Creitz proclaimed.

And he did, with the fuse lit.

Shortly after Creitz lit the fuse he realized there was something really wrong with his plan. There was nothing wrong with the bomb, as it worked like it was supposed to. It flew high into the air with the lengthy fuse trailing it.

Creitz failed to look over his shoulder where there was a Tulsa cop making notes of his escapades. The look on his face when their eyes met was priceless.

Of course, we could only sit there in awe as the bomb went off and lit up the entire Tulsa sky.

Creitz went to jail that night. We finally bailed him out about 3 am. Several hours later, the newspaper hit the stands with the headline, “LOCAL DRAG RACER FOUND TO BE MAD BOMBER”.

As it turned out, the Mad Bomber title was given to a then unknown prankster who was sneaking into one particular bar’s parking lot – drilling a hole in the tailpipe, taping an M-80 inside and as the unsuspecting drunken driver was about to pull away, “The Mad Bomber” would light the fuse. The drunker the driver was, the more entertaining it was.

Oh yeah, about the drag race. Creitz was supposed to do some pre-race TV interview for the event but he was told he’d already gotten enough publicity.

For the rest of his life, Creitz always blamed me for getting him sent to jail. All I did was buy used ’58 Chevy, go figure.

One thing is for certain, hanging out with Creitz was a blast, literally.