Sunday, January 03, 2010

Ken Carter StuntmanKen Carter (1938 – September 5, 1983), born Kenneth Gordon Polsjek, was a Canadian stunt driver.Contents1 Early years2 St. Lawrence Seaway jump3 Peterborough jump4 External links//Early yearsCarter was born in Montreal and grew up in a working class neighborhood. With little education, he dropped out of school to perform car stunts with a team of traveling daredevils. Soon he was a solo act, jumping at racetracks all over North America. He became a notorious showman, earning the nickname "The Mad Canadian" for his death-defying antics.St. Lawrence Seaway jumpIn 1976, after 20 years of car jumps, Carter launched his most ambitious project: an attempt to jump over the Saint Lawrence Seaway -- a distance of over one mile -- in a rocket-powered Lincoln Continental. The preparations for the jump were the subject of a documentary called The Devil at Your Heels, directed by Robert Fortier and produced by the National Film Board of Canada.For months, Carter prepared his car and looked for sponsors, with his persistence in self-promotion paying off when U.S. broadcaster ABC gave him $250,000 to air the stunt on the episode of Wide World of Sports scheduled for September 25, 1976. Carter anticipated a live audience of 100,000. Construction of a 1,400-foot takeoff ramp began on fifty acres of farmland near Morrisburg, Ontario. Evel Knievel visited the site as a special correspondent for ABC and concluded that there was little chance of success. Delays in finishing the car and completing the ramp caused Carter to miss the broadcast date and ABC withdrew its support.Carter resumed preparations the following year and again in 1978, but the jump was cancelled both times. On September 26, 1979, Carter got to within five seconds of takeoff before aborting the jump following a mechanical failure. The planned jump had been sponsored by a film producer in exchange for exclusive film rights. Believing that Carter had lost his nerve, the film crew secretly arranged for another stunt driver, American Kenny Powers, to perform the jump while Carter was in his hotel room in Ottawa. The Powers jump was a failure, with the car travelling only 506 feet in the air and falling apart in flight before crash-landing in the water. Powers broke eight vertebrae, three ribs and a wrist.Peterborough jumpCarter returned to stunt driving and in 1983 attempted to jump a pond in Peterborough, Ontario. During the jump his car -- a modified Pontiac Firebird -- had a malfunction and Carter crashed badly but vowed to try the jump again. Several months later he did. The vehicle overshot its landing ramp by 30 meters and landed on its roof. Carter was instantly killed. He is buried in a unmarked grave at the Notre-Dame-des-Neiges Cemetery in Montreal.External linkshttp://canadiannews1.com/archive/StuntDriver1/stuntdriver1.com/Ken_Carter.htmCategories: Canadian stunt performers 1938 births 1983 deaths Accidental deaths from falls