Two 83-year-old best friends in Portland are asking for help finding a rare piece of American racing history after thieves broke into their Sellwood property and hauled away a vintage sprint car they were counting on to sell. Tom Hanna and Marvin Price had cut through new locks placed on the storage site, only to find at least two people had already been there before dawn on August 9, cutting through their own new locks and driving off with a trailer holding the 1974 Grant King sprint car.
Hanna and Price have shared a passion for cars for nearly seven decades, since meeting at the school then known as Madison High School, now McDaniel High School, in Northeast Portland, according to KOIN. The pair bought the sprint car in 2006 and spent years restoring it, racing and showing it around the region as members of West Coast Vintage Racers, the club they helped start. According to the station's report, the thieves ripped through a fence while driving away with the trailer, leaving little behind beyond a break-in scene and an urgent police case.
A Car Built From Wrecked Indy Machines
The sprint car carries a pedigree few vintage vehicles can match. It was built in 1974 by Grant King, who repurposed components from two damaged Indy cars originally constructed by Gene White Racing Shop, according to Hanna's own description in an online sale listing. King, who died in 1999, was posthumously inducted into the National Sprint Car Hall of Fame in 1998 after building roughly 250 sprint and midget cars during a career that also included Indy cars for A.J. Foyt, Mario Andretti, and Al Unser.
The car was originally built for Tom Sneva, who drove it for Grant King Racing in 1974. Sneva went on to win the 1983 Indianapolis 500, capture back-to-back USAC National Championships in 1977 and 1978, and become the first driver to break the 200 mph qualifying barrier at Indianapolis Motor Speedway, per the Motorsports Hall of Fame of America. The restored car, fitted with a 360-cubic-inch fuel-injected Chevrolet engine, a two-speed transaxle, a clutch, and a starter, also carries history behind the wheel from other notable open-wheel drivers including Sheldon Kinser, Galen Fox, and Parnelli Jones, according to the listing. Hanna believes it is one of only four of its kind ever built, thanks to its four-wheel independent suspension, a feature that set it apart from traditional sprint cars of its era.
A Sale Meant To Cover Care Costs
Hanna and Price had listed the car for $39,995 in an August 2026 classified after investing more than $70,000 in its restoration, a package that included a vintage Shelby trailer, spare parts, and 10 Lotus-marked Halibrand cast magnesium wheels valued at over $1,000 each, according to the listing. Price has Parkinson's disease, and Hanna is helping care for him; Hanna and Price had begun selling off Price's belongings to help cover care costs that run up to $12,000 a month, per Hanna's account to KOIN. That figure fits within a broader pattern in Oregon, where a 2025 CareScout survey reported by Brevy Care found the state among the most expensive in the nation for senior care, with median assisted living running $6,875 a month and specialized memory care adding up to $1,500 more monthly.
“Just leave it someplace so we can pick it up,” Hanna said, addressing whoever took the car. Portland police are looking for the stolen sprint car and trailer and have asked anyone with information, or anyone who spots the vehicle or trailer, to come forward.
What Investigators Are Tracking
The Portland Police Bureau opened stolen vehicle case #26-2318J2 following the theft, seeking an enclosed 1987 TPD trailer bearing Oregon license plate U299233 that housed the sprint car, according to information shared through West Coast Vintage Racers. It remains unclear whether investigators suspect the thieves specifically targeted the high-value racing inventory after it was listed online, whether nearby surveillance cameras captured the vehicle towing the trailer away from Sellwood, or whether regional vintage auto communities might help track down the distinctive Lotus-marked magnesium wheels.
West Coast Vintage Racers, the club Hanna and Price helped found, is dedicated to vintage oval-track racing and operates under the motto “If you have an old race car, bring it out and run it,” hosting exhibition events at tracks including River City Speedway and Douglas County Speedway. If the stolen sprint car is recovered and a suspect is convicted, Oregon law could bring significant consequences: under Oregon Revised Statutes 164.061, first-degree aggravated theft of property valued at $10,000 or more carries an enhanced mandatory sentence of 16 to 45 months in prison when the victim is 65 or older, a provision that would apply given both Hanna and Price are 83. The case adds to a string of recent vintage racecar thefts nationally, including an Illinois racecar theft ring busted in St. Louis earlier this year, even as Portland's own reported motor vehicle thefts have dropped more than 50% between 2022 and 2025 following targeted strategies by police.
