The Race, the aftermath, and the Berkeley "Swarm of Bees"

Click on the pictures with the blue outlines for a full size image.

The cars lined up for a Le Mans start. The Berkeley is near the right, just to the right of the white Minor. The Berkeley team was given handicap credit for 33 laps completed. The team with zero laps handicap, theoretically the fastest, was a two car team of a Chrysler Special and a Corvette. In the event, a team of 2 Saab 93B's won - they'd had a 30 lap head start. The Berkeley "Swarm of Bees" team didn't finish. The "B" car of Fred Caruso flipped after about 30 minutes. The "C" car apparently never started due to clutch problems. Milton Schaefer's car, the only remaining after the accident, appears not to have finished for reasons unknown.

These documents relate to an interesting event held in May of 1958. Club races involving handicaps were popular in England (and possibly Canada?) but not in the US. They allowed smaller cars to compete with larger cars in the same event.	This confirmed the entry of the team of three Berkeleys, known as the Swarm of Bees, showed their target speed, and indicated they'd have a 34 lap advantage over the fastest team at the start of the race.
A local reporter seemed to overreact a little, at least according to the handwritten note at the top.	An apparently unsolicited letter from a corner worker regarding the accident - a wonderful gesture.
The Swarm of Bees team had three cars - A, B, and C. Pictured at the right is car A, the first of the team to start. Since this was a relay race, only one Berkeley was on the track at a given time. This is the car owned by Milton Schaefer. Here it is today.
Fred Caruso's car - the 'B' car - had transmission trouble during practice and never made it into the race itself.
The 'C' car on the team was Gary Stone's.	Here's Gary leading a gaggle of cars, shortly before flipping the Berk.