A Racing History Minute-April 15, 1951

I am posting this "tax day" Minute late Sunday night because I have a very early dental appointment for a filling. I picked a good day for that because my dentist allows me the maximum nitrous gas allowable as I am a total and complete chicken in a dentist's chair so I won't care if it's tax day or not.

Today we are going back to 1951 to a place called Occoneechee Speedway located in Hillsborough, NC, a track I have become very familiar with over the past four years attending the Celebration of the Automobile presented by The Historic Speedway Group. I'm letting you know now that the event this year is scheduled for September 28th so you need to do whatever you need to do to be there. You won't regret it.

On April 15, 1951, Fonty Flock didn't regret being in Occonnechee. He started his Red Devil Olds 88 on the pole and led every lap to win the event. The race was scheduled for 150 miles on the one mile dirt track but a heavy rain storm moved over the track at lap 95 and put an end to the event. The track is located along the banks of a river and lying as it does, a rain storm of any magnitude makes the track totally unusable.

The Occonneechee track, as already stated, is ONE mile long. It has long straights and tight turns. There is a "bump" going into turn one which, I am told, is the result of a rock formation under the earth there. We have video on the site here from a race at that trackin 1957 or 1958 and to watch the drivers handle that turn and the entire track is worth the time it takes to watch that video. It is truly a fine example of some flat-out dirt track racing.

Bill Blair started along side Fonty but when the flag fell Flock put the inside grove on the track to work in his advantage. Blair gave Flock a good run in the early stages but there was no moving Fonty out of the lead. When the rains came, Flock had a 3/4 of a lap lead over second place Frank Mundy in a Studebaker. Oh, and this is a true story: Years ago I was telling the story on all the Studebakers in the Daytona modified-sportsman races in the sixties and there were two kids, 5 or 6 years old listening with their parents. The little boy asked "what is a Studebaker"? The little girl, to show her knowledge told him "it's something they bake studes in". Absolutely true and as I write this it still brings a smile to my face.

Top five finishers were:

1. Fonty Flock, Oldsmobile, winning $1,250.00

2. Frank Mundy, Studebaker, winning $800.00

3. Bill Blair, Oldsmobile, winning $600.00

4. Tim Flock, Oldsmobile, winning $500.00

5. Neil Cole, Oldsmobile, winning $300.00

Others finishers of note were Earl Moss 6th, Herb Thomas 7th, Jim Paschal 8th, Lee Petty 9th, Fireball Roberts 14th, Jimmy Thompson 24th, and Curtis Turner 27th.

Marshall Teague had been the points leader going into that race, race number 5 of the 1951 season, but he did not enter as he was in Phoenix, Arizona preparing for a 150mile race scheduled there on the 22nd.

I think it is interesting that the main source I use for these articles (Greg Fielden's Forty Years of Stock Car Racing) points out that the weather was extremely threatening long before the race started yet 11,267 folks showed up to watch the 33 competitors battle it out. Even in 1951 those folks in Hillsborough, NC were dedicated to that track and their stock car racing. Still that way today. Join us there on September 28th of this year and see what I mean.

Honor the past, embrace the present, dream for the future.

Your recap Tim (with an assist from Greg Fielden) is more extensive than what was reported in The News and Courier of Charleston, SC.

Chase, I have often tried to imagine how hard Greg Fielden worked to put out those books. All the information and the pictures are a collection I treasure. Wish I had "High Speed at Low Tide" but somehow that one got by me. Meeting Greg last year at Occonneechee was a real treat. He is every bit the gentleman I imagined him to be after all my conversations with his mother while ordering the books. I am really enjoying this series on history and I appreciate your additions to each post. Thanks.

I can tell you from researching many of those 1950s era Lee Petty victories that its durn impossible to find newspaper coverage on many of them. And for those where I've found a clipping, many of them aren't more than 50-100 words or 2" of copy. Its unreal the research he had to have gone through to publish his series.

I'm guessing he visited more libraries and paid for more articles than I'm able to do. But still, his documentation is second to none - especially considering the sanctioning body itself wasn't visionary enough in the historical area to capture the particulars of many of its own events.

That is so true about Greg, Chase. It had to be a labor of love for him because nothing else could have adequately compensated him for all the effort he put forth. I am so thankful to Greg for his dedication to those books.

Thanks, Tim, for the history lesson.

The start with Fonty Flock and Bill Blair on the front row. Blair was sporting number 41-1/2. - Getty Images