April 15, 1963 - Jim Paschal bags Bowman Gray
Stock Car Racing History
Interesting stuff. Never knew Smokey had a Mustang. Dennis and Wayne Andrews might further enlighten us on the GT/Grand American deal. Thanks, Chase & Randy.
Forum Activity for @dave-fulton
Stock Car Racing History
April 15, 1963 - Jim Paschal bags Bowman Gray
Stock Car Racing History
Published on March 3, 2006, Fayetteville Observer, The (NC)
Ex-racer Blackburn dies at 69
By Thomas Pope
Motor sports editor
Fayetteville native James Ronald Bunkie Blackburn, who raced in 71 NASCAR events during the 1960s and '70, died Tuesday at his home in Columbia, Tenn.
Mr. Blackburn, 69, began his racing career at Cumberland Speedway, a dirt track that opened in the late 1940s off of Wilmington Road.
April 15, 1963 - Jim Paschal bags Bowman Gray
Stock Car Racing History
Associated Press wire service report from 2006:
Posted 3/3/2006 4:22 AM
Former NASCAR driver 'Bunkie' Blackburn dies at 69
COLUMBIA, Tenn. (AP) James Ronald "Bunkie" Blackburn, a former NASCAR driver who once won a race at Daytona International Speedway, died Tuesday. He was 69.
Blackburn died at his home, according to an announcement from Oakes & Nichols Funeral Home in Columbia, Tenn. His cause of death was not available Thursday night.
Blackburn drove in the Grand National and NASCAR circuits from the late 1950s to the early 1970s, driving for teams run by Smokey Yunick and Petty Enterprises.
He had four top-fives and 14 top-10s in the Grand National series, The Daily Herald in Columbia reported. Blackburn ran 71 races at 26 different tracks in his career.
His top finish was in 1968, when he won from the pole in the Permatex 300 for Late Model Sportsman, a fore-runner to the Busch Series. He also won poles at Talladega and Bristol and was inducted into the Pure Darlington Record Club in 1964 after posting a record qualifying time. He finished in the top 10 twice in the Daytona Firecracker 400.
Blackburn grew up surrounded by racing his father owned and operated a dirt track in his hometown of Fayetteville, N.C.
Blackburn also competed throughout the Middle Tennessee area on dirt tracks and at Nashville Speedway against drivers like Darrell Waltrip, who lives in Franklin, Tenn., and Coo Coo Marlin, the late father of current Nextel Cup driver Sterling Marlin, also of Columbia, Tenn.
He retired from racing after an injury and went to work for General Electric in Columbia for 20 years before retiring.
He is survived by his wife of 41 years, Nancy Hedrick Blackburn, three daughters, a son and 12 grandchildren. A memorial service is scheduled for Saturday at Oakes & Nichols Funeral Home.
April 15, 1963 - Jim Paschal bags Bowman Gray
Stock Car Racing History
I was asking on chat last night if anyone which Fayetteville, NC track Bunkie's father operated?
April 15, 1963 - Jim Paschal bags Bowman Gray
Stock Car Racing History
Bunkie drove Amelia Court House, Virginia "revenooer" Worth McMillion's (he worked for the Virginia Alcoholic Beverage Control Board) Pontiac to it its best ever finish, a 4th place at Charlotte's 1962 National 400.
April 15, 1963 - Jim Paschal bags Bowman Gray
Stock Car Racing History
I have a son-in-law who is a native of the "City of Brotherly Love" and one grandson has run up the steps there like Rocky.
I am sad to report that I once got terribly lost in a pretty scary part of the city in my rental car on a Sunday night after dark following a Dover race as I "attempted" to find the Philly airport Sheraton where I had reservations before a Monday morning flight to Dallas.
Thanks for your post. Eat a cheesesteak for us!
Thunder Alley---- Thats whats on the wall
Stock Car Racing History
100% in agreement with Johnny's observations.
A Racing History Minute-April 15, 1951
Stock Car Racing History
Thanks, Tim, for the history lesson.
NRA at Texas ,I will start it off.
Current NASCAR
Chase, you are right about NRA not purchasing advertising on the telecast.
The FOX network's contract with NASCAR mandated one mention per hour of the event sponsor and that's what they did.
For many years the networks weren't required to provide ANY event sponsor mention. TBS was a great one to NEVER mention an event sponsor who didn't buy advertising. That's why the Pontiac Excitement 400 at Richmond was called the Richmond 400 on the telecast and the Coca Cola 600 still the World 600 on their telecasts. This happened on telecasts by ALL the networks. Don't buy adverting during the event telecast, don't get mentions.
I'm not a supporter of FOX, but they haven't done anything with the lack of sponsor mentions at Texas that hasn't been done since the original days of race telecasts.
I saw the reports of the shooting suicide in numerous news outlets. Very bad timing for NRA, but I don't think it was mentioned during the FOX race telecast.
Hornaday Penalties After Bubba Rock Truck Hook Under Yellow?
Current NASCAR
William & Dennis.... I would never in a gazillion years have remembered as you guys did whose car was sacrificed to get Benny through that American 500 and the 1973 Championship.
I did find a reprint in the February 2009 issue of Stock Car Racing Magazine of an earlier interview with Benny. Here's an excerpt from that Benny Scrapbook interview:
Miraculous!
People who were in the garage at Rockingham for the October 21, 1973 race, when I miraculously won my first and only Winston Cup championship, still tell me they experienced one of the most dramatic hours in racing. It certainly was an anxious moment for me. I had a 194.35-point lead (under the old points system) over Richard Petty going into the season finale.
I qualified the L.G. DeWitt Racing Chevrolet fifth, and the race started perfectly. The first four or five cars pulled about a half-straight ahead of me and the next group was a half-straight behind, leaving me where I wanted to be--by myself. At that time we had two-way radios, but no spotters. On the 13th lap (of 492), I came off Turn 2 and saw a car that had spun sitting in the track between me and the leaders. I tried to turn under it but caught the front end right behind my right-front tire.
There was a big collision, but my car didn't spin. I got the engine fired, but the car wouldn't roll. The right side was gone, I don't mean sheetmetal, the rollbars were gone. My greatest fear, a wreck, was reality. My heart sank because we had everything there to fix the car except rollbars. I was just sick. I knew I was going to lose the championship. We neglected to put a wrecker on standby, so we lost four or five valuable minutes getting the car to the garage. We looked at the damage and said, it's over.
Somebody suggested cutting the rollbars out of another car. Ralph Moody, whose engine shop furnished power for our team after he left Holman-Moody, came (to the race) with another team and driver Bobby Mausgrover. The car was parked in the garage and was the only one there that hadn't made the field. Moody said to cut the bars out of the car, he'd explain and settle up later. While the bars were being welded in place, members of my team and numerous volunteers from other teams replaced the rear-end housing, the trailing arms, steering linkage, and made other repairs. One hour and 15 minutes later, at the 136-lap mark, I got back on the racetrack.
As I drove my air-conditioned modified down the backstretch, people stood in the grandstand in a wave effect as I approached, and the wave preceded me all the way to the far end of the front grandstand. Watching that wave was incredible. We made 308 laps and finished 28th, enough to save the championship and beat Cale Yarborough, who finished third in the race, by 67.15 points.
Read more: http://www.stockcarracing.com/featurestories/scrp_0000_benny_parson...