Photo: petersen.org
At the end of last month, Jessi Combs, nicknamed the fastest woman on 4 wheels, died in an attempt to break her own land-speed record in the Alvord Desert in Oregon. She is being honored with a special exhibit at the Petersen Automotive Museum in Los Angeles, California.
The exhibit, Jessi Combs: Life at Full Speed, offers fans a good look at all the facets of Combs’ career, including her work in design, television and racing. It will feature several of her motorcycles, many of her medals, original drawings, personal notebooks and other memorabilia. It was curated with contributions from Combs’ family and friends, as a means to offer a personal look at who she really was.
The exhibit runs through September 25, 2019, and admission is free of charge. However, donations are most welcome and will go to The Jessi Combs Foundation, which aims to inspire “the next generation of female trailblazers and stereotype-breakers.”
“Jessi Combs was an inspiration to the entire automotive community,” Petersen Automotive Museum Executive Director Terry L. Karges says. “This exhibit is an opportunity to move people, especially the future generation of women builders and enthusiasts, through Jessi's incredible life story.”
And incredible it was: Combs set her own personal record for land-speed in 2013, at the wheel of a North American Eagle Supersonic Speed Challenger: 398 mph. She broke the record several times in the following years, but it was never made official, so she was working on that at the time of her death.
Days before the accident, she was posting to social media and keeping fans up to speed with her progress. She wanted to drive the same Challenger to write history and become the fastest woman on Earth. The causes of the accident are still under investigation, but media reports say there was a fire.
Jessi Combs was more than just a racer: she was a television personality, a builder and a fabricator, and a role model for women, having attained international recognition in a male-oriented industry. She was 39.
The exhibit runs through September 25, 2019, and admission is free of charge. However, donations are most welcome and will go to The Jessi Combs Foundation, which aims to inspire “the next generation of female trailblazers and stereotype-breakers.”
“Jessi Combs was an inspiration to the entire automotive community,” Petersen Automotive Museum Executive Director Terry L. Karges says. “This exhibit is an opportunity to move people, especially the future generation of women builders and enthusiasts, through Jessi's incredible life story.”
And incredible it was: Combs set her own personal record for land-speed in 2013, at the wheel of a North American Eagle Supersonic Speed Challenger: 398 mph. She broke the record several times in the following years, but it was never made official, so she was working on that at the time of her death.
Days before the accident, she was posting to social media and keeping fans up to speed with her progress. She wanted to drive the same Challenger to write history and become the fastest woman on Earth. The causes of the accident are still under investigation, but media reports say there was a fire.
Jessi Combs was more than just a racer: she was a television personality, a builder and a fabricator, and a role model for women, having attained international recognition in a male-oriented industry. She was 39.
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