Donald Campbell (1921–1967), a flamboyant and superstitious Scot, already held three-world records piloting a speedboat. Nonetheless, in 1957, he visited the 32-mile-long Lake George to determine if the waterway, located in the Adirondack Mountains, would be a suitable for his next attempt at racing immortality.
In late February 1957, Campbell, on his way from the United Kingdom to the Miami national boat show, stopped at the “Queen of American Lakes.”
The racing-boat king met with Lake George Chamber of Commerce officials, examined lake charts, and said he was “definitely considering Lake George for a possible racing site this fall.” One of his requests, however, was for a hefty-appearance fee.
At the time, Campbell owned the speedboat record of 225.63 mph. He set that in 1955 at Coniston Water in England.
In early 1957, Donald Campbell was considering two locales for his next assault on his-speedboat record. One site was 32-mile-long Lake George, and the other was one of the Finger Lakes, Canandaigua Lake, which 16-miles in length.
Two-months later in April 1957, the speedboat king met with New York Governor W. Averell Harriman in Albany. By that time, a third waterway, the seven-mile-long Greenwood Lake near the New York-New Jersey border, was also an option.
Campbell said at the meeting with the governor in April 1957, the boat pilot said he required a lake with a six-mile straightaway and also that was free of boats and islands. Campbell not only desired a new-world record, he also was anxious to break the 250-mph barrier.
Donald Campbell selected Canandaigua Lake and made several attempts aboard his jet-engine-propelled hydroplane named Bluebird K7. However, Campbell never reached his goal.
He tried his luck later in 1957 at Onondaga Lake near Syracuse. There, he was likewise plagued with boat problems and poor weather. Campbell then abandoned racing in New York State.
Later in 1957 at 5.5-mile-long Coniston Water in the United Kingdom, he established a new world record of 239.07 mph and then turned his attention to the land speed record, then held by fellow Brit John Cobb‘s run at Bonneville Salt Flats in 1947 – 394 miles per hour.
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n 1960, During land speed trails in Utah Campbell lost control of the car going more than 360 mph and crashed, but miraculously survived.
In 1964, Donald Campbell set both the world land and water speed records, the first person to do so in the same year – 403 miles per hour on land, and 276 mph on water.
In all, Campbell garnered a total of one land and seven water speed records. He was following in the footsteps of his father Malcom Campbell, who has set several land and water speed records in the 1930s and was the first person to break 300 mph on land. (American Gar Wood had set several water speed records in the 1920s and 30s, and was the first to drive over 100 mph.)
Donald Campbell, was only 46 when he was killed in 1967 in a hydroplane crash on Coniston Water. Shortly afterwards, Royal Navy divers found Bluebird K7, but not Campbell’s body. His lucky charm, a small-teddy bear named Mr. Whoppit, was retrieved floating with other debris.
Finally, in 2001, Bluebird K7 was relocated by sonar and was raised from 140 feet of water. Donald Campbell’s body, spotted near his sunken watercraft, was recovered, too.
The current water speed record in 317 mph, set by Australian Ken Warby in 1978; and the land record of 763 set by British driver Andy Green.
Illustrations, from above: Donald Campbell sits in his hydroplane Bluebird K7, 1967; and Bluebird K7 in 1960 (photo by Neil Sheppard).
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