Sunny King

He's been dead some years now, but I was thinking of Sunny King when we've been discussing some of the colorful folks in racing. I don't know how many cars he was on over the years, but a few that come to mind belonged to Junie Donlavey, Elmo Langley and Banjo Matthews. Sunny had a dealership(s) in Anniston, Al and a larger than life personality. He talked fast, wore the brightest madras sports coats you've ever seen and had a powerful handshake to go with his perpetual smile. The folks like him are fast disappearing... the independent businessman who'd put their dollars into a car sponsorship on the bigtime circuit. Don Naman at Talladega introduced me to Sunny and we were soon running a deal where anybody that test drove one of his Fords got a free pair of Wrangler Jeans and Sunny bought a ton of them. He also had a Honda dealership and would let us have cars at no charge for the Talladega races. Another of those larger than life personalities that's no longer around.

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"Any Day is Good for Stock Car Racing"
updated by @dave-fulton: 12/05/16 04:02:07PM

I never knew he was a "real person" if that makes sence. I just knew the Ford dealership was on a lot of race cars, from the 60s to 1990. Nice to learn the backstory here.

Tommy Gale was a driver I remember who drove cars sponsored by Sunny King. I think it was Elmo Langley's red 64 car. I forgot about that Banjo Mathews 27 Talledaga from 1969 driven by Donnie Allison. The first Nascar race at Michigan had Donnie Allison on the pole in that 27 car. Car was beautiful, but broke and didn't finish.

mr. sunny king was awsome guy.when i went to talladega i alway went to his suite.