We have all seen the dramatic video of Bobby Allison nearly going through the catch fence and into the grandstands at Talladega in 1987, an event that brought on the dreaded restrictor plate.
We are also aware of the tragedy the Allison family has endured.
You may or may not be aware that 20 years before the Talladega incident, Bobby had an earlier encounter with a catch fence that almost resulted in tragedy. No video is available to my knowledge, but perhaps there is some 8mm film.
On September 10, 1967, Richard Petty in a 1967 Plymouth captured the Capital City 300 on the Richmond half-mile dirt track, beating Dick Hutcherson's Ford to the line. Petty would ultimately claim 13 Richmond wins before his 1992 retirement.
It was a strange race. Rain had made for a muddy track and competitors drew for position. Lynchburg, Virginia's Earl Brooks started on the pole.
Bobby Allison had the little, lightweight, J.D. Bracken maroon & white 1965 Chevelle #2 cranking at Richmond that day, as he usually did. However, just over 100 laps into the rich dirt track event, Bobby broke a tie rod coming off of turn 4 onto the main straight.
Back in those days ( until that day ) the scorers at Richmond sat in folding metal chairs on a concrete pad beside the flagstand. When the tie rod broke, Bobby's car got airborne, clearing the guardrail and smashing through the heavy chain link catch fence.
Bobby landed right beside the scoring pad, almost on top of his wife, Judy. After that day, scorers were moved inside the old Richmond 1/2-mile track.
For many years I've tried to find a photo of the aftermath of that Bobby Allison excursion through the Richmond catch fence that preceded his Talladega fence encounter by twenty years.
Today, I discovered a number of Associated Press Wire Photos of this event exist in the Google News Archives.
I am not smart enough to know how to post the actual photo, but if one of you know how, please do. At the time it was a very dramatic incident and we thought Bobby was going to land on top of all the scorers.
Here is a link to the aftermath, with the chain link fence wrapped around Bobby's little Chevelle. This particular link is to the Charleston, SC paper. You may need to bring the page down a little to see the photo:
http://news.google.com/newspapers?id=MlRJAAAAIBAJ&sjid=9QkNAAAAIBAJ&pg=2005,2267227&dq=capital+city+300+richmond&hl=en
Click Link Above to See Bobby Allison Catch Fence Crash
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"Any Day is Good for Stock Car Racing"
updated by @dave-fulton: 12/05/16 04:00:58PM
