Gale’s mentor turns 102

Ed Iskenderian, the CamFather, turned 102 last week. Known to everyone as Isky, the motorsports legend is also a mentor to Gale Banks and was the first person to sponsor the innovative young racer. In the mid-60s, Isky donated a “cam and kit” for Gale’s small-block Chevy-powered Studebaker salt flats racer.

Gale remembers it like it was yesterday. “I camped out at his shop for an entire day,” he recalls with a smile. “Everything he did that day, I was with him. Sitting in his office talking with people… it was a marvelous experience. Coming into his shop in Gardena, there were hallways going in each direction. Around a corner was Ed’s one-man office. He defied gravity. There was stuff everywhere. It just went up the walls and levitated. I made my way through a narrow path to his desk. He cleared off a chair and I had a seat. There was an aquarium with about an inch of water in it… lots of green algae and the fish were all dead. There was a WANTED poster that said, ‘Notice to the night watchman, do not shoot this man on sight. This is Lothar Iskenderian. He’s Ed Iskenderian’s brother. He lives in the trailer on the back lot.’ In the middle of the poster was a photo of Ed wearing a sombrero. The guys that worked there were funny cats. I was Ed’s buddy for the day. He called me ‘pal.’ He called me pal for twenty years—until I did some s— that impressed him, then he called me Gale.”