Frank Maratta Award

FOR OUTSTANDING CONTRIBUTIONS TO AUTO RACING IN NEW ENGLAND

Frank Maratta was a pioneer for drag racing in Connecticut. During his time as tech advisor for the Hartford Hot Rod Council, he led the efforts that eventually resulted in the 1961 opening of the Connecticut Dragway. Frank was also an accomplished car builder. His 1930 Ford Model A drag coupe, known as “The Rake”, was known throughout New England. The car would earn Maratta two New England region A/Gas Championships and a featured story in the October 1960 edition of Hot Rod Magazine.

In 1961, Frank held his first National Rod & Custom show at the state armory in Hartford, CT. It became an annual tradition in southern New England for over 55 years.

The Frank Maratta Award has been given out every year since NEAR was founded in 1981. It was presented at the annual NEAR banquet from 1981 to 2014. Since 2015, it has been presented at the Hall of Fame induction ceremony.

YEAR	RECIPIENT	YEAR	RECIPIENT
1981	Jim Bosco	2003	Lew Boyd
1982	Tom Galan	2004	Bones Bourcier
1983	Harvey Tattersall Jr	2005	Al Fini
1984	John Hoenig	2006	Dan Pardi
1985	John Kershaw	2007	Johnson Jones
1986	Ben Dodge Jr	2008	Mark Arute
1987	Sonny Fleury	2009	Matt Buckler
1988	Dexter Burnham	2010	Jack Bateman
1989	George Clark	2011	Bruce Cohen
1990	Bill Slater	2012	Steve Kennedy
1991	Rolli Jacobs	2013	Billy Greco
	Paul Tremaine	2014	not awarded
1992	Moe Conrad	2015	Dick Williams
1993	Charlie Stebbins		Jim Schaefer
1994	Carl Merrill	2016	Russ Dowd
1995	Frank Ferrara	2017	Scott Tapley
1996	Joe Tinty	2018	Jack Doyle
1997	Jack Arute	2019	Kenny Smith
1998	Irene Venditti		Charlie Elliott
1999	R.A. Silvia		Russ Conway
2000	Pete Zanardi	2020	no ceremony
2001	Phil Smith	2021	Skip Matczak
2002	Walter Renner	2022	Ric Mariscal
	Ronnie Renner	2023	Lloyd Hutchins Jr