WHERE DO WE BEGIN?
Stock Car Racing History
As promised, or perhaps some consider it "as threatened", I am beginning, today, a series here on the Form about the Mystery of History as applicable to stock car racing. Many sources are used for what will be forthcoming over the next few weeks, but rather than list all sources as they will not be quoted directly, I have chosen to only provide sources when exact quotes are used. As always, my sincere thank you to Greg Fielden for his "Forty Years of Stock Car Racing" series from which I obtain most of my statistical data. Thanks to a book shelve stocked with dozens of books on the sport, many thirty or more years old, written when the events were happening. Additionally, I have a few scrap books from the sixties I check for facts maybe otherwise unavailable. Of course, one of my most accurate and valuable resources if the wonderful memory of Bill Blair, Jr. I would say I pick Bill's brain but I'm sure he would get me for that in the end.
I have long held the opinion that folks who choose to make videos and write books about the history of the sport for monetary gain should at least take the time to verify information about their subjects. In each and every book I've read I find inaccuracies, sometimes to the point of fabricated stories which I know as such because the events they describe actually happened right in front of me and my memory, although not so good on some things, is much better on the racing of the 50s through the 70s. I guess after 1980, racing became so much different that the sport that intrigued me as a almost 6 year old. I am still a fan. As my friend, Bill Rhine, has said, "I like NASCAR racing today but I LOVE what NASCAR racing was". Bill is a historian who actually finds the historic race cars of the past and restores them to brand new condition. I would be remiss if I did not include Billy Biscoe and Bob Hissom in the column of those who help be almost every day with memories of the early days. And there are so many more; Frances Flock, Rex White, Lil Bud Moore, Ronnie Russell, and so many more. So, this series is written by my fingers with information supplied by my six cylinder brain, but I am hoping it becomes an enjoyable part of your weekly reading.
When working on an opening sentence, the thought of "In the beginning" crossed my mind, but that has already been used for centuries by a guiding text for Christian believers so I decided not to go there. Finally I decided I didn't need an opening line. Just jump in a do it.
"The first auto race was held when the second car was build". That has been attributed to both Henry Ford and Richard Petty and if you research it on line you find out there are many other options. But the truth is that is probably totally accurate. Man has always felt the need to compete. Thinking back, remember the famous chariot race in "Ben Hur", the movie, which has just been re-done with fast chariots with less down force? Remember the horse races throughout the history of European royalty which moved on to the U.S.A., and still remains as a special part of sports? The buggy races? Bicycle races? Motorcycle races? Speed is the essence of such competition and the thought that the first auto race had an average speed of just under 10 mph and now we are limited to only 20 mph in school zones. Daytona, Talladega, Atlanta, and Indy, and probably others, see speeds in excess of 200 mph, at Indy, FAR in excess of 200 mph. We've come a long way in the speed department.
In the early days, driving a race car was akin to having a suicide complex, but men did it. Men died at the race track but the sport continued. The small dirt tracks all across the country,but specifically in the Southeast, became a mile dirt track (Hillsborough and Raleigh to name two) and then to mile and a quarter egg shaped track in the farm lands of South Carolina. Then 2.5 in Daytona, then 2.66 in Alabama. Speeds are unreal. Drivers continued to race, some to die, as we just experienced this week (August,2016).
Every time I drive in the mountains of North Carolina, Tennessee or Northern Georgia, I can't help but imagine where the early race shops (dirt floor converted barns) were located, or even more exciting, in which of the many wooded area was the best moonshine still located? Driving those roads at night, when I am alone, I would sometimes pull over in a designated pull over area and shut off the engine. I would get out, sit on the hood, and imagine I could see the headlights of the old 39 or 40 Fords coming down the mountain, soon to hear the powerful, throaty rumble of a moonshine prepared engine. Sometimes I would even imagine a second pair of headlights racing after the moonshine hauler and that second pair of headlights were always those awful "revenuers". Oh the imagination of a dreamer!
I do admit that two of the most influential movies of my life where "Thunder Road" starring Robert Mitchum and "Thunder in Carolina" starring Rory Calhoun. Both of those movies also influence what I, and several of my friends did with our bicycles. I did discovered that you cannot break through a road block of two bicycles on another bike as Mitchum did in "Thunder Road". Those two movies just served to further enhance my love of speed and automotive contest.
Stock car racing, which is the essence of my existence began, as already stated, in the Southeastern U.S. Some claim Georgia was the birthplace, others, North Carolina. I've never heard South Carolina mentioned, but had it not been for Darlington Raceway opening in 1950, the growth of the sport would not have expanded as it did. I'm convinced of that.
The stories I've heard from those who were there in the early days is that many times, one the Sunday afternoons when running "shine" was off the table, a small dirt track would be carved out of a cotton field, tobacco field, or just a plot of land, and men would show up to race. Fans would show up as well to watch. The sport, if indeed you could call it a sport then, was so unorganized it would rival and cat trainer trying to do his job. We all know you don't train cats.
As the years progressed, several organizations were put together to support the racing and endeavored to provide a common set of rules. There were many such organizations about which I will go into more detail in later posts in this series and while some did an admirable job in their own local area, there were just as many using the "organization" as a front to make money which was rightfully due to the drivers.
Many races ended in fighting in the pits between drivers and crews, and I've heard stories of massive fights in the grandstands between fans not satisfied with the ruling of race officials. It is all sort of comical to think back on those days, but in reality, without those events, we would not be where we are in stock car racing these days.
I often ride across town to visit the Historic Columbia Speedway where I actually attended my first race in August or September of 1952. Memories overflow my mind as I think of all the years I was there to watch the sport grow. That speedway is just one of many which are now just a part of so many peoples' lives. At least the footprint of Columbia Speedway still exists. So many, many more tracks, where the sport was born, nurtured and grew, are gone. All traces removed completely. Some are shopping centers, some apartment houses, some residential neighborhoods. I have story upon story of folks living right where a historic track was located and never even knew about it. Part of my mission in life is to spread the word about what a wonder sport envolved from the "good ole boys" trying out their powerful cars on those ghost tracks.
The history of the sport is somewhat sacred to me because it is also the history of me, not that the history of me is important to anyone but me, but nonetheless, it is what I am. I watched a movie recently with that title, or something like "It's What I Am". Made me realize that the sport kept me out of trouble most of the time, got me into trouble some of the time (ask the South Carolina Highway Patrol Racing Team), but for the most part, gave me a chance to be more than I would have been by following any other trail in life.
My Uncle Bobby, who past away three years ago, collected cars. He has, in his collection, a 1930 Plymouth. I remember growing up marveling at the size of the headlights on that car. They are as big as huge dinner plates and mounted on a curved bar that runs across the front of the car. Although I never imagined it was those headlights I saw coming down the mountains, I sit here now and remember when Uncle Bobby would drive that car. I was just a little kid but when he turned on those headlights at night it was an attempted to see maybe 50 feet ahead. With that thought this morning, I am imagining that the early pioneers of stock car racing saw only that limited, dimly lighted future in what they were doing. I sure early critics found plenty of reasons to condemn the sport as it was starting.
The men who build the sport, the hard working men of the South, never imagine where this would end. They gave their all to doing something they loved which just happened to catch on with the public. How much more quickly would it have grown had it not been for December 7, 1941? We don't know, but I think, from the history I've read, the end of the war spurred the sport as would nothing else. Men returned from the war, still young, and still full of the adventurous spirit. This only added fuel to the first in the bellies of men like Nelson Stacy, Larry Frank, Bud Moore and so many more. After all, racing was tame after landing on beaches under heavy fire, handling a tank for General Patton, or fighting off battleships and subs at sea. A new generation of racers emerged from all this and the men who had started the sport before the war added their knowledge and guidance as things moved forward.
This post is a prelude to what I hope will become a series to which many of you will contribute your personal memories or just special comments as to your connection with the sport. Tonight I may just sit out on my deck, under the stars, and imagine I hear the rumble of one of those flathead Fords coming down the mountains near Asheville. I'll feel the ground shake under my chair as the Ford roars past me with a backwash of wind from the speed. Before I go in, I'm sure I'll see the huge headlights of the '30 Plymouth as it searches out it's way down that same road. That same road is going to take us down the path of the history of stock car racing.
Thanks for reading. Further contributions and comments are welcomed and appreciated.
updated by @tim-leeming: 12/05/16 04:00:58PM
