Do you have 1950s era NSSN or similar?

Do you have access to 1950s era issues of National Speed Sport News, local newspaper clippings about races, Southern Motorsports Journal, etc.? I'm trying to track down any sort of article I can on wins by Petty Enterprises drivers.

I've managed to find something via Google News Archive or other sources for all but about 20 of Petty Enterprises' 73 wins with a driver other than the King. The ones I still need info for all wins by Lee Petty during the 1950s.

I'm curious if you have anything in your collections about 1950s races at places like Martinsville, Richmond, A-W, B-G, Hickory, Hillsboro/Occoneechee, and Columbia. Northern races would be a bonus: Grand Rapids, Sharon PA, Plattsburgh NY, Rochester NY, Morristown NJ, and Old Bridge NJ.

If you have info from that era & could scan and email it to me, please send me a message here or e-mail me at toomuchcountry (at) gmail (dot) com. I'd like to include the info in a blog series I've got planned for 2013. I'll be sure to include credit/courtesy for any material I use.

Thanks!

I'm down to 13 races won by Lee Petty without an old news article, National Speed Sport News clipping, Illustrated Speedway News issues, etc. I have Greg Fielden's Forty Years of Stock Car Racing books to draw from as well as Perry Allen Wood's Silent Speedways of the Carolinas for a couple of them. But I'd like some old news articles to help round out the blog entries I'm preparing for these races.

If you have old newspapers, racing periodicals, or an interest in visiting a local library to crawl through microfilm for the following races, please e-mail me at toomuchcountry (at) gmail (dot) com. Thanks!

6-19-1955 - Plattsburgh NY

6-25-1954 - Rochester NY

7-11-1952 - Morristown NJ

7-11-1954 - Grand Rapids MI

7-31-1951 - Rochester NY

8-7-1955 - Winston-Salem NC (Forsyth County Fairgrounds)

8-13-1954 - Charlotte (Southern States Fairgrounds)

8-16-1957 - Old Bridge NJ

8-29-1954 - Corbin KY

9-11-1959 - Hickory NC

10-11-1959 - Weaverville NC

10-17-1954 - Martinsville VA

10-29-1950 - Hillsboro NC

Chase, I don't know if you have looked at the "History of Airborne Speedway" videos, but they may contain some information about the 6-19-1955 Lee Petty win. I haven't waded through them, but here are links:

http://www.plattsburgh.com/index.php/viewvideo/4227/our-little-corner/history-of-airborne-park-speedway-part-1.html

http://www.plattsburgh.com/index.php/viewvideo/4228/our-little-corner/the-history-of-airborne-park-speedway-part-2.html

Again, related to the Airborne Speedway race at Plattsburg, found this interesting tidbit in an old Bill Ladabouche column from "Racin' Paper" about Catamount Stadium history and competitor and flagman, Pat McGrath:

Pat McGrath had always been fascinated with the big-time racing since he had watched a Grand National at Airborne Speedway in the 1950s. At that particular race, Lee Petty had won the race, but the human interest story was with Glen Fireball Roberts, whose car had been wrecked the night before at Fonda. Roberts was running for points and he could not arrange to borrow any competitors car. As it turned out, a fan stepped forward, Roberts took the mans car, taped up the headlights, put a belt around the door post, and raced the car as carefully as he could, garnering needed points for the night. Happy driver; happier fan.

This small photo shows two Grand National Oldsmobiles in the pits at that Airborne race.
[Bob Mackey Photo Courtesy of John Rock]

What is particularly interesting about this story to me is that I don't see Fireball Roberts listed as being in the race in the rundown at Racing Reference.

Ooh. Good lead. Thanks so much Dave. Despite efforts to look in all directions, I've developed a bit of tunnel vision with my search for info about these PE wins. Once I started digging into Google News Archives, its been a real treasure trove of info about Petty wins - as well as all sorts of NASCAR stories.

I've also combed SCR, SMR, SMJ, NSSN, Google, YouTube, eBay, etc. to dig for info. But I have no idea how many niche sites are out there such as this one for Plattsburgh.

While Fonda did take place the night before Plattsburg, I also don't see Fireball lsited in that race. Wonder if it was another driver Mr. McGrath remembered?

Have to laugh about fractured memories to go along with a lot of fractured "official" NASCAR records. As you say, Fireball isn't listed in the Airborne / Plattsburgh rundown - nor in the previous Fonda race. But in looking at his career, he NEVER ran a GN race at Fonda. haha