Thompson was born in Alhambra, California. His father, Captain Marion L. Thompson, was a former officer with the Alhambra Police Department. In his early 20s Thompson worked as a pressman for the Los Angeles Times while pursuing hot rodding, and he later became involved in drag racing.
In 1954, Thompson designed and built what is credited as the first slingshot dragster, the Panorama City Special. By positioning the driver's seat behind the rear axle, the design improved traction when existing racing tires could not handle the output of increasingly powerful custom engines. The car debuted at the first NHRA U.S. Nationals at Great Bend Municipal Airport in Great Bend, Kansas in 1955, reaching a best speed of 151.26 mph. That same year Thompson became the first manager of Lions Drag Strip in Wilmington, California.
In 1958, Thompson collaborated with Fritz Voight on a twin-engined dragster that reached 294.117 mph, providing technical lessons later applied to his next project. Thompson then built Challenger 1, a four-engined vehicle, which he drove at the Bonneville Salt Flats in 1960. He recorded a one-way top speed of 406.60 mph, surpassing John Cobb's one-way mark of 402 mph and becoming the first American to exceed 400 mph.
Thompson participated as a constructor and entrant at the Indianapolis 500 between 1962 and 1968, repeatedly introducing technical innovations.
Thompson entered three cars designed by John Crosthwaite powered by stock V8 Buick engines — the first stock engine raced at Indianapolis since 1946. The cars were rear-engined, unlike the front-engined Offenhauser-powered cars used by most competitors. Thompson's crew, led by Fritz Voigt, designed and built the cars in 120 days. Dan Gurney qualified eighth and ran ninth until a leaking oil seal seized the gearbox on lap 94, finishing 20th. The team received the Mechanical Achievement Award for original design, construction, and accomplishment.
For 1963, designer Crosthwaite produced the Harvey Aluminium Special, known as the "roller skate car," which featured pioneering 12-inch diameter wheels with smaller-profile tires. Thompson brought five cars to Indianapolis — two of the 1962 design with Chevrolet V8 engines and three roller skate cars, including the Harvey Titanium Special with a lightweight titanium chassis. Al Miller finished ninth despite qualifying 31st. Duane Carter qualified one roller skate car 15th before an engine failure on lap 100. Graham Hill, the 1962 Formula One World Champion, tested a roller skate car but refused to race it, citing poor handling and excessive body roll. The small tire sizes and low car weights prompted regulations mandating minimum tire sizes and minimum car weights for future events.
Thompson returned with three modified cars fitted with 15-inch tires as required by new rules. The Allstate-sponsored team used Ford engines. Eddie Johnson in car No. 84 qualified 24th and finished 26th. Dave MacDonald in car No. 83 qualified 14th and died in a fiery crash on the second lap.
Thompson failed to qualify a front-engined roadster in 1965, skipped 1966, and failed to qualify in 1967 and 1968. The 1967 attempt used a unique all-wheel-drive rear-engined design that steered both front and rear wheels, but driver Gary Congdon could not qualify any of the three cars.
In 1968, Thompson and Danny Ongais set 295 speed and endurance records at Bonneville using three Ford Mustang Mach 1s. Thompson, together with John Buttera and Pat Foster, developed a Ford Mustang Mach 1 Funny Car. Driven by Ongais, it won the 1969 NHRA Spring Nationals at Dallas and the NHRA U.S. Nationals.
In 1963, Thompson created Mickey Thompson Performance Tires to develop specialized racing tires, including tires for Indianapolis 500 competitors. He founded SCORE International in 1973 to sanction off-road racing across North America. With his wife Trudy, he formed the Mickey Thompson Entertainment Group (MTEG), which ran indoor motocross and off-road vehicle racing competitions in major metropolitan stadiums and arenas, bringing the sport from the backcountry to urban audiences.
On March 16, 1988, Thompson and his wife Trudy were murdered by two hooded gunmen outside their home in Bradbury, California. The attackers waited outside the Thompson home, shot Thompson as he headed to his car, killed Trudy as she backed her vehicle out, and then returned to shoot Thompson fatally in the head. They fled on bicycles. Expensive jewelry and cash were found on the victims, ruling out robbery as a motive.
Police investigation focused on Michael Frank Goodwin, a former business partner who owed Thompson a settlement of more than $768,000 and had repeatedly refused to pay. Goodwin and his wife purchased $275,000 in gold coins two months before the murders, wired $400,000 to banks in Grand Turk Island, and left the United States on their yacht five months after the murders, not returning for over two years. The case remained unsolved until 2001 when Goodwin was charged; an initial trial ended on jurisdictional grounds. Goodwin was recharged in 2004 in Los Angeles County and ordered to stand trial in 2006. On January 4, 2007, a jury found Goodwin guilty of two counts of murder. He was sentenced to two consecutive life-without-parole terms. No direct evidence connected Goodwin to the scene, but the court found the circumstantial evidence "overwhelming." The two gunmen have never been identified.
Thompson was posthumously inducted into the Motorsports Hall of Fame of America, the International Motorsports Hall of Fame in 1990, the Off-Road Motorsports Hall of Fame in 2007, and the Automotive Hall of Fame in 2009. He is ranked No. 11 on the NHRA's list of Top 50 Drivers from 1951–2000. His stadium racing concepts later inspired the Stadium Super Trucks series.
This article is based solely on the supplied corpus. No external sources were consulted; claims that could not be substantiated against the corpus were omitted under the drop-the-claim rule.
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