Biography
Jim Fergusson was a successful
motorcycle, sports car and sedan racer, and rally driver. He was a team
manager, crew chief, mechanic, race and rally organizer, official,
sponsor and patron of the sport. He was also a racing car designer and
constructor. He was introduced to motorsport by members of the British
Empire Motor Club (BEMC) in the year it was founded, 1928. It was like
introducing a duck to water. He was a barnstorming fairgrounds
motorcycle racer and sometimes motorcycle road racer until he went off
to war in 1939. Alice Fergusson was one of Canada's pioneer women racing
and rally drivers. She was also a race and rally organizer and editor
of BEMC's Small Torque, probably the oldest racing club publication in
Canada and now an invaluable source for the history of motorsport in
central Canada. On June 25, 1950, Jim was president of theBEMC when the
club held a pair of sports car races at Edenvale, the first known sports
car races in eastern Canada. Jim finished third in both events; Alice
was 15th in the first and official scorer of the second. It was the
beginning of many years of racing and rallying for Jim and Alice. They
raced at Sebring, Watkins Glen, Harewood and other circuits. They
rallied in club events, national events and competed in a variety of
hillclimbs, ice races and economy runs. Jim designed a formula junior
car; Alice built a Flathead Ford stock car motor that set a track record
in 1952 at the CNE Speedway. Their last hurrah came in the early 1970s;
they were the only Canadian competitors in the very first (and highly
illegal) Cannonball Baker, Sea-to-Shining-Sea, Memorial Trophy Dash that
was won by Brock Yates and Dan Gurney. Jim passed away in 1976 and
Alice followed in 1997. Separately and together, Jim and Alice Fergusson
made a remarkable contribution to the development of Canadian
motorsport. Their efforts were purely voluntary. They did what they did
for the love of the sport.