Chassis No. 301709
Engine No. 901811
Transmission No. 101745
There are certain cars that make an immediate impression on those who understand them, revealing greater depth the longer they’re observed. While historic motorsport Porsches are not explicitly covered in Malcolm Gladwell’s Blink, 1965 Porsche 911 chassis number 301709 is exactly the type of living, breathing object described therein whose initial impact is immediate and powerful, yet grows more nuanced and compelling under informed, critical examination.
Dr. Harold Williamson and 1965 Porsche 911 Chassis No. 301709
The Kardex warranty card for chassis 301709 captures a moment when Porsche’s Stuttgart-Zuffenhausen works believed they had finished just another street-going 911 destined for the United States that July, several years before the model would attract any formal attention from the Competition Department. Finished in Signal Red over a Black upholstered interior, this first year 911 was optioned with a Webasto heater, hub caps with Porsche crests, and tinted Catacolor glass all-around. The car was delivered through Brumos Porsche Car Corp. so named for their Telex handle (BRUndage MOtorS), who were the Southeast regional distributor for Porsche of America. The 911 was retailed though a local Tampa-area dealer of imported marques to Tampa-native Dr. Harold Williamson, no mere physician, much like the 911 he chose.
Fascinated by flight at an early age, and earning his pilot’s certificate at 17, Williamson joined the U.S. Army Air Forces following the bombing of Pearl Harbor at age 18. During the war he flew the P-38 Lightning and became a B-25 Mitchell flight instructor rising to the rank of First Lieutenant in U.S. Army Air Forces. After returning home, Williamson received his medical degree, later specializing in orthopedic surgery and settling in Tampa, Florida. The immediacy of flying fighter planes stayed with Dr. Williamson after the war and carried into his early-1960s SCCA racing with a Porsche 356, where he observed that “racing is very similar to flying,” requiring “coordination of hands and feet and accurate judgment of speed and distance.”
When the 911 became available by 1965, the newly minted Southeast SCCA Champion placed his order, not to race, but as his new street car. Interestingly, Porsche frowned on those who wished to race their new GT as they did not feel it was ready for competition even though its 2.0-liter flat-six saw use in both the 904 Carrera GTS and Carrera 6 to be introduced at the end of 1965. Little did they realize that a small group of American privateers would pay little heed to the Competition Department’s distinctly Germanic, paternal orthodoxy.
Perhaps spurred on by the success of the 1966 Daytona 24-Hour class winning RBM/Autohaus 911 (now part of the Revs Institute Museum collection), in the fall of 1966 Dr. Williamson began modifying his own 911, chassis number 301709 for competition. Unlike today’s purpose-built racing cars, modifying a well-engineered 1960s GT like a 911 for endurance racing was relatively simple. A roll bar, taped-up headlights, large forward mounted quartz-iodine spotlights, bucket seats, harnesses, light fender flares, a sport exhaust system, and sponsor decals were all that was seemingly needed. In fact, so early were these initial competition efforts, that Porsche, ever on the ball to sell customer racers all manner of racing performance parts, had not yet created the seminal Information Regarding Porsche Vehicles Used for Sports Purposes manual!
As it remains today, the 1967 Daytona 24 Hours marked the official kickoff of the racing season. The 24-hour race attracted the best entrants from Europe and the USA, both eager for an early escape from a frigid winter. The 1967 event fielded a who’s who of entrants (McLaren, Foyt, Gurney, Donohue, Revson, Andretti, Hill, Scarfiotti, Bandini, Amon, Rodríguez) from across the globe with each one of them racing a similarly spectacular car (Ford GT40 MkII, Chaparral 2F/2D, Ferrari 330 P2/P3, Porsche 906), and among them Dr. Williamson and his daily driver 911. The good doctor had an ace up his sleeve partnering with long-time Porsche racer George Drolsom. Not only was Drolsom a highly regarded finisher and had co-driven with Peter Gregg the year before in the Brumos 904 Carrera GTS finishing the race in 10th overall, but he was additionally helpful in prepping the 911 at Brumos’ Jacksonville garage prior to the race.
Entered under Drolsom’s name as start number 61, the two-man team qualified chassis number 301709 in 41st position in a full field of 62 around the 3.81-mile circuit. The weather for the race was nearly perfect for racing. Cloudy with highs in the 60s with no rain predicted. As is well-known, endurance racing rewards economy of pace, a cautious nature with mistake-free driving, a well-prepared car, and the team of Williamson and Drolsom played to their and the 911’s strengths. It was not long before those with different plans began to drop out and Williamson and Drolsom began to steadily climb through the field. After 24 hours of hard racing the duo finished a scarcely believable 10th place overall and first in their 2.0-liter Touring class with a bevy of ”faster” and more proven, pure competition vehicles behind them in the finishing order. Porsche’s victory poster from the race proudly lists the duo and their 911 as “Touring Car Winner.”
After the race, described by Dr. Williamson’s family as “pinnacle of his racing career,” his Porsche 911 was returned to street use blending into Tampa traffic while those around it remained blissfully unaware they were stopped next to a Daytona winner. That is the magic of a Porsche. Dr. Williamson continued racing his 356 that year but, probably missing the howl of the 911’s flat-six around the high banks of Daytona, returned it to SCCA competition later that year for the Paul Whiteman Trophy Races. Perhaps owing to a very active medical career, it is believed that Dr. Williamson and 301709 competed in a single event during the 1968 season, a 2-hour race in Osceola where he finished 3rd.
Daytona 24 Hours / Sebring 12 Hours – 1969
The 1969 season would see Dr. Williamson and George Drolsom reunite behind the wheel of 301709 at both the Daytona 24 Hours and Sebring 12 Hours races. Once again, the pair proved that good preparation, consistent pace, and a Porsche 911 were the order of the day for both events. The team’s 1969 Daytona 24 ran very similar to their 1967 class-winning campaign however the secret was now out about the 911’s endurance race acumen with Porsche developing the 911 R as a prototype and various 911s used in SCCA Trans-Am and European endurance races. In fact, compared to the two 911s at Daytona in 1967 there were now 11 entered by Brumos, Wicky, Opert, and RBM among others for the 1969 event! Entered by Dr. Williamson himself as start number 47 (the livery it appears in today), the duo finished 8th overall and 2nd in the Touring 2.0-liter class completing 577 laps and finishing ahead of all of the factory-entered Porsche 908 prototypes!
Unable to rest on their laurels from Daytona, Dr. Williamson entered their faithful 911, now prepared by Franz Blam of Elsco in Jacksonville in the 12 Hours of Sebring for the March race. Like Daytona, they were joined by a phalanx of nine other Porsche 911s on the entry list. Sebring, a notoriously demanding 5.2-mile circuit laid out on a former WWII B-17 combat crew training base, was often a venue for the unexpected, and in what would prove to be the final Le Mans start at Sebring, the team took the start from 45th position among 71 entrants. Again, surrounded by legendary drivers and cars, Williamson and Drolsom pushed their way through the notorious Sebring traffic for 175 laps around the torturous circuit to finish 3rd in class and 29th overall. With their class podium at Sebring, chassis 301709, driven by Dr. Harold Williamson and George Drolsom, completed an extraordinary hat-trick across the three major international endurance events they contested in 1967 and 1969, proving that this unassuming street car was, in fact, a giant among its peers on the world stage.
A Return to the Street
After thousands of racing miles, hours behind the wheel battling with the world’s best, and collecting the well-deserved accolades and trophies, Dr. Williamson parted with his 911 selling it to fellow Tampa doctor Claude Burpee, a noted hydroplane enthusiast, regatta chairman, and on-site race physician who used the car sparingly until it was placed into storage in 1978 with 40,842 miles on the odometer. The car would not emerge for 16 years until it was acquired by racer Dave White of Dave White’s Autosport and Dave White Racing also based in Tampa. It is undoubtedly the case that its years in storage surrounded by knowledgeable people aware of its local legend status kept it from being drastically modified in a vain attempt to remain competitive against the widebody and turbo 911 monsters of the 1970s and 80s.
White began a two-year restoration where each and every detail was considered when returning the Dr. Williamson Daytona-winning 911 to its 1969 Daytona 24 livery. Incredibly, after a short but highly successful career on track intermixed with over a decade on Florida roads, the 911 retained both its original flat-six (901811) and Type 901/0 transmission (101745). The odds of an early 911 racing car emerging from the 1960s in an unmodified state are highly unlikely. Locating one that retains its original factory-delivered engine and transmission? Unthinkable. In fact, it is the details that this car retains that make it so impressive today. Remarkably, it also retains its early 911 Recaro race seats, competition Torq-Thrust wheels, through-the-hood center-fill fuel tank, and lightly flared fenders. Following the completion of its restoration, in 1997, White offered the car to Dr. Williamson to pilot once again around the high banks of Daytona in the Rolex Legends event before that year’s Daytona 24 Hour. White also entered the car in the Historic Display at the 2003 Porsche Club of America Parade just north of Tampa in Wesley Chapel.
An Excellence magazine article from 2021 recounts the history of the famous 911 after White’s time with it. Under new ownership with racer Murray Smith in 2018, the car spent time with Automotive Restorations Inc. of Stratford, Connecticut. While there after his acquisition, the Daytona-winning 911 received a thorough mechanical service with invoices on file and available for review. Furthermore, the new owner requested that Automotive Restorations prepare the car for the 2019 Greenwich Concours d’Elegance where it captured “Most Outstanding Porsche,” triumphing in a spirited showdown against fellow 911s—a modern-day victory echoing its glory on Daytona’s high banks in the late 1960s.
1965 Porsche 911 Chassis No. 301709 Today
Smith parted ways with his Daytona winner in 2023 with the special car landing with a well-known and respected mid-Atlantic collector of racing cars. Under current ownership, the car was sent to Hudson Historics of Ossining, New York in January 2024 to be prepared for a return trip “home” to Daytona to participate in the high-speed 24 Minutes of Daytona preamble before the twice-around-the-clock racing marathon. The consignor notes that, “It’s easy to see how one could comfortably drive this car for 24 hours, it was amazingly stable at full speed around the banking at Daytona.” When recently driven by the consigning Broad Arrow Car Specialist, no novice to Porsche or high-performance driving, he remarked, “This car feels authentic the moment you sit in the driver’s seat and turn the key. Everything about it is special, from the history to the sound of the exhaust under full load and that clean upshift, driving this car is an event.”
Chassis 301709 is nothing short of extraordinary—a Daytona-winning 911 that has survived more than half a century with its original engine, transmission, and character intact. So few early 911s emerge from the 1960s with such authenticity, and even fewer with a documented racing pedigree of this caliber. Offered alongside its original trophies, factory posters, lap charts, and other pieces of remarkable ephemera from its storied racing career, it presents a fully realized snapshot of late 1960s motorsport history. Its combination of provenance and mechanical originality makes this a singular opportunity for collectors and enthusiasts alike—a chance not just to acquire a historic street-legal Sports Purpose racing Porsche, but to own a living, breathing piece of competition legacy.
1967 
1964 
1967 
1968 
