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Inside Motorsports | April 2021
Bruce Ellis’ love for racing began at a young age when his dad, also named Bruce, took him to Evergreen Speedway in Hazleton. At age eight, the younger Ellis got into quarter-midget racing. It was during that time he would announce his first race. “My first announcing job came at a quarter-midget track as my car was out of commission that week and they needed an announcer, so I volunteered,” he said. Ellis was not interested in driving race cars past quarter midgets, but he kept his interest in racing by going to tracks like Reading and Selinsgrove. A native of Hazleton, Pa., Ellis, and his late wife Denise, are graduates of Bloomsburg University. Both went on to enjoy long-term success as educators with Bruce teaching high school English. Ellis began his writing career began in 1976 when he sent a letter to Gater Racing News, based in Syracuse, N.Y., and offered to do a column for them. Since then, he has penned articles and columns in National Speed Sport News, Racing Cars magazine, Stock Car Racing Magazine, Open Wheel Magazine, and since 2002, Sprint Car & Midget Magazine. In 1982, Ellis was hired by Nick Turo at Williams Grove Speedway to do the publicity for the track. The 2021 season marks the 45th year in which Ellis has been working in motorsports. While Ellis has interviewed the biggest names in the world of motorsports, there is one person who stood out as the most unique person he has ever interviewed: Kenny Weld. “I truly believe he was a mechanical genius and a great driver,” he said. “Kenny was getting tired of dirt-track racing and he wanted to go to Indianapolis and at that time it wasn’t going to happen for him, and he knew it as he wouldn’t play politics and he couldn’t buy a ride. He had done everything he could around Central Pennsylvania and he was looking for other options, so he built a race car that shocked the modified world: the famed Batmobile, which Gary Balough drove at Syracuse in 1980. Weld had quit racing because of a broken back. He landed in prison in August of 1983 on federal drug trafficking charges and carrying a firearm during a felony.
“He got back into racing after he got out of prison and he seemed like a different person when he got out,” Ellis said. “He was an excellent public speaker, he got into the development of racing engine heads. He was more laid back after prison, and he looked at life a different way.” Outside of motorsports, Ellis’ biggest passion is basketball: high school and the NBA. “I’ll travel anywhere in Pennsylvania to watch good players and good teams play,” Ellis said. It’s neat to watch a kid in high school and follow them through their careers. I’ve seen greats like LeBron (James) and Kobe (Bryant) play in high school.” For 25 years he was the radio voice of the Hazleton High School boys’ team on WAZL. During his tenure as the voice of the Cougars, Ellis announced the game between Hazleton and Lower Merion when the late Bryant was a junior. “We knew right then he was going places,” Ellis said of the talent that Bryant possessed. The game was the PIAA Class 4A Eastern quarterfinals as Hazleton defeated Lower Merion in overtime, 64-59, at Liberty High School in Bethlehem on March 15, 1995, even as Bryant scored 35 points. It was the last time Bryant lost a high school game in Pennsylvania. These days, even during the COVID-19 pandemic, Ellis is in his sixth season as the public address voice for the boy’s home games at Hazleton High School. Ellis was inducted into the National Sprint Car Hall of Fame in 2015. Along with Williams Grove, Ellis has announced at various tracks throughout the East Coast and has anchored the radio broadcast of the Knoxville Nationals. Ellis did not attend a race at Knoxville last year due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the first time he had missed a race at the track since 1987. Even with all that he has accomplished, there is one track where Ellis would like to have worked: Indianapolis. “When I was a little kid, I always listened to the radio broadcast from Indianapolis and I thought that was neat,” Ellis said. “Bob Jenkins (a longtime voice of the IMS network) told me to send him an audition tape, but I never did because at that time I was still teaching.” On the Thursday night of the 1987 National Open weekend at Williams Grove,
Photo: SHAWN WOOD
Ellis begins 39th year as Voice of Williams Grove
World of Outlaws champion
National Sprint Car Hall of Fame member Danny Lasoski, left, talks with track announcer Bruce Ellis in the pits at Williams Grove Speedway the National Open last year.
the phone rang at the Ellis’ residence. On the other line would be Turo. “Nick would often call and ask me to do him a favor and get something into my press release,” Ellis said. “I would tell Nick, sure, what do you need?” Except for this time, getting something into a press release wasn’t the reason Turo called. “Nick said to me that I better ask him what the favor is before you say sure,” Ellis said. “I said, OK, what’s the favor?” That’s when Turo told Ellis that he needed an announcer for the National Open as track announcer Tedd Reitz had quit. Other than his announcing at the quarter-midget track, Ellis had never called a race of any kind before. “It was my baptism of water, not fire,” Ellis said of the National Open weekend. “It rained most of the weekend. We got most of the show in on Friday night and we were rained out on Saturday and we got started late on Sunday afternoon. Joey Allen passed Dave Blaney and Doug Wolfgang to win the race.” Ellis has also worked in Television for Cable 4, from York, announcing the TV races from 1984-1986. “Originally, the announcing job was just for that weekend as I was doing a lot of writing and I considered myself a writer,” Ellis said. “At first, I wasn’t interested in the announcing job. But I then decided to apply. I sent in my resumés as did others and they hired me.” — SHAWN WOOD, FOR INSIDE MOTORSPORTS
