I see some of our younger members use the term "Gasser" a lot.
I thought I would offer a very rough description of what usually fit into the gasser classes.
To qualify for Gas classes, the car had to have:
axles in roughly the stock location
4 fenders
a working door
head and tail lights
a hood
seats for two people
a rear bumper
a radiator
and the engine could not be shoved back more than about a foot behind the front axle. (10% of the wheelbase to the center of the first spark plug)
The body had to be stock, but could be chopped or sectioned up to either 4 or 6 inches.
Of course NHRA was the most popular U.S. santioning body, and most others were similar, but there were some small differences in the rules outlining the classes.
The one major set of rules that violated this basic outline was match racers on the West Coast, sometimes referred to as "California Outlaw Gas"
Eventually the Modified Sports, and Street Roadster classes were also merged into "Gas Classes", since the rules were almost identical.