Saturday of Labor Day weekend, when the race was still on Labor Day (changed to Sunday with the running of the 1984 event) was always "preparation day" for us. When I was young and going with Uncle Bobby, my day consisted of washing and waxing his car (which I enjoyed) and getting sandwiches made. Also, back then, we would drive across town to the big Ice House and buy a block of ice just the right size to fit inside the little tin box that went into the blue cooler that my folks had. Back in those days, coolers weren't nearly what they have become, but they did work well at keeping things cool for extended periods. We would also pack up some chips and some cookies, mostly Oreoes as I recall. When I started driving over to Darlington myself, about 1963, we always left before the sun came up on Sunday morning so we could get our spot next to the fence going into turn three. It was 1974 when my parents go their first motor home and we assumed the spot just behind Victory Lane where we always assembled our traveling band of race fans.

Back in the early days of The Southern 500, Saturday mornings in Darlington would start with The Southern 500 Parade. Plenty of high school marching bands, lots of Beauty Queens, the local Shiners with all their antics so famous to those who wear the Fez, and celebrities from Hollywood, such as James Arness (Matt Dillon from Gunsmoke) and Alan Hale, Jr. (The Skipper from Gillian's Island). I was able to see that parade in 1959 as we rode over to Darlington (78 miles from my home). There were also "Rebel Flags", otherwise known as "The Stars and Bars" everywhere you looked, even in the official Darlington Raceway Logo. While it is no longer polictically correct to display that flag, in those days it was as prevalent as ants at a pic-nic. On that day in 1959, at least three of the marching bands came by playing a rousing rendition of "Dixie", which is also no long politicially correct.

Saturday nights in Darlington meant the "Miss Southern 500" Beauty Contest to select the young lady to represent the Speedway in Victory Lane and in other beauty competitions such as The Miss South Carolina Pagenant. Proceeds raised from that event went to the Darlington Police Department. Darlington Raceway was very involved in the town of Darlington, not only with the race, but other events to highlight, promote, and raise money for different good causes in the area. Golf Tournaments were a mainstay of events leading up to the race and promoted the Darlington-Florence area well.

The first Southern 500 held qualifying for FIFTEEN DAYS. Drivers were given the opportunity to run their best speeds for over two weeks. That had to represent a financial influx to the small community which relied mostly on farming (tobacco mainly, along with peanuts). It is not well known, but there was a woman driver who attempted to qualify for that first Southern 500. Dorothy Shull from West Columbia, SC, attempted to qualify on the 15th day but spun out in turn two three times and failed to make the field. Had she made it, that would be more lore to add to the legend of Darlington.

When Darlington opened for that first race, it was 1.25 miles around but not a true oval as Harold Brasington had to take into account Sherman Ramsey's minnow pond outside of what was then turn two (now turn four). The unique "egg shape" track came about as the result of the minnow pond (wonder if Alan Hale realized that as his boat in "Gillian's Island was The Minnow) and thanks to that minnow pond another park of race track magic came about.

Through the years, as have all tracks, Darlington has progressed. The Darlington Stripe is no longer acquired on the third and fourth turn steel guard rail but now on concrete walls. The infield is no longer the place where fans are free to assemble their motorhomes and converted school buses and converted bread trucks, build campfires, and enjoy the company of like-minded race fans for the weekend. The races no longer run on Labor Day or even Labor Day weekend, nor, in fact, even in daylight. The track has lights now and runs on the Saturday night of Mothers' Day Weekend. I will not go into my long diatribe here about why I feel that is so wrong.

I was too young to remember the first or second Southern 500. It was shortly before the third one that my Uncle Bobby and my Grandfather took me to the local half-mile dirt track known as Columbia Speedway for my first race. I have a recollection of listening to the 1952 Southern 500 with my uncle and grandfather on the front porch of my grandfather's house which was across the street from my parents. In fact, I have memories of the 1952, 1953, '55, and '56 races as they unfolded before my listening ears on that front porch in the old wooden rocking chairs as my uncle put the radio on the window sill in the living room where the muffled sounds of the race cars were puncuated with the announcer telling us what was happening. Starting in 1957, I was seeing the race from the infield, at first from the entry to turn three. Television can't do it justice, radio does it better because of my ability to imagine what is happening, but nothing, and I mean nothing can compare with seeing it happen before your very eyes as it did "back in the day".

I remember how excited I used to be on the Labor Days mornings when I walked down that long Cedar Tree lined driveway to my Grandfather's front porch for a day of listening to the Southern 500. I remember the excitement of all my trips to the Darlington infield, and finally as a member of the press granted access to every place I wanted to go at the track. I remember that I never knew Jerry Lewis had a Labor Day Telethon until 1984 when I was actually at home on Labor Day. I guess, most of all, I remember all the drivers I watched race that track now known as "Too Tough to Tame". The track was, thanks to overly active marketing folks, given a personality of its own, but, in reality, it was the drivers who raced there that gave it that personality. Curtis Turner, Joe Weatherly, the Flock Brothers, Fireball Roberts, Buck Baker, Lee Petty, Herb Thomas, Speedy Thompson................ and so many more.

Like the Cedar trees that line my Grandfather's long driveway, the tradition of The Southern 500 is gone now. I can't get excited about a glitzy made for television event in Atlanta on Sunday night before Labor Day. Maybe, just maybe, I may pull out my DVD of "Thunder in Carolina" and watch it on Monday. I know we can't go back to what was, but there is nothing to stop me from remembering what was!!!!

Join us here at the Racing History Minute as we go back to The Southern 500 the entire week. Please share your memories and any pictures you may have as we chronical this important chapter of racing history.

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

You have recalled great memories, Tim. Thanks for painting such a vivid picture of your family's preparations before leaving home for the Southern 500 and the activities leading up to the Labor Day race.

Neither my daughters nor my grandsons have ever had the pleasure of visiting an ice house at dawn and watching the attendant chip off the exact size block you needed with perfection and use those huge ice tongs to lift it into your cooler.

In the 50s - early 60s, our family always traveled with a 7-Up cooler absolutely identical to the one pictured below selling for $125 on e-bay:

Our cooler was lined with galvanized steel and had a galvanized steel tray at the top. The big cooler handle fitted into a groove atop the handle on the lid, locking the lid in place. We called it the "ice chest." My sister and I would beg to be the one allowed to unscrew the metal cap on a chain on the little drain plug just as it is pictured in the photo above to let out water when the ice was to be replenished..

I remember dad scraping the salt and pepper off a huge Smithfield ham (from the peanut fed porkers of Smithfield, Virginia) then soaking it overnight in the bath tub. Mom then boiled that ham in a huge roasting pan on top of the stove, before coating it with brown sugar and cloves and baking it in the oven.

As a nine year old, I rode to the local ice house with dad at dawn on a hot Richmond August morning in the summer of 1958 to get the block of ice that went in that cooler. We were beginning a 275 mile journey from Richmond to a cottage we'd rented for a week on the oceanfront at Carolina Beach near Wilmington, NC. That same cottage appeared in an Associated Press wire photo in 1959, torn down by a hurricane.

Our Smithfield ham was placed on top of that block of ice with the precision of a surgeon. The top tray was loaded with deviled eggs, potato salad and other such necessities before the cooler was placed in the trunk of dad's '57 Chevy.

There was no I-95 in 1958 - just the Richmond-Petersburg Turnpike before getting on U.S. 301 South headed toward North Carolina. We traveled in tandem with our good friends, the Newsome family, also driving their '57 Chevy.

After a hearty breakfast at the home of Mrs. Newsome's sister in Emporia, Virginia, we continued south, before turning off at Wilson, NC onto U.S. 117 toward Goldsboro and eventually the coast. Somewhere on U.S. 301 in the heart of tobacco country we stopped at a Stuckeys and I was allowed to buy a colored postcard of a goat (must of been an early prediction of a Goat Rodeo) with a hind leg lifted over a tobacco plant. The caption on the cartoon asked, "Do Your Cigarettes Taste Different Lately?" I kept that postcard tacked up on a bulletin board in my bedroom until I left for college 8 years later.

For some reason, I remember stopping in Mt. Olive, NC - home to the Mount Olive and Cates pickle factories for gas. Dad went into an Amoco station on one side of the road and the Newsomes into an Esso station directly across. Mount Olive was full of '57 Chevys that day!

Eventually we arrived at Carolina Beach for one of the best vacations our family ever had. That old ice chest served us well the entire week at the beach.

I realize my response has nothing to do with Darlington, but your memory, Tim, of your family getting ice for the tin box in the blue cooler really struck a nerve and took me back 55 years to the summer of 1958. Thanks for rekindling a particularly pleasant memory.

I look forward to more tales of Darlington Southern 500s past.

I've only been to Darlington once. At the time, it was thought to be the last Southern 500. It had already been decided California Speedway would get the Darlington's traditional Labor Day weekend, and Darlington would be reduced to a single spring event. So the Southern 500 I attended was actually the Mountain Dew Southern 500 held in November 2004. I've got the ticket stub and hat pin from the race, but I knew it wasn't REALLY a genuine Southern 500.

They could have called it just the Mountain Dew 500. Instead of steamy PeeDee heat and the 500 Parade, we arrived on a foggy, misting, overcast late autumn day. Perhaps it was fitting to have that type of weather for the end of an era. The "Southern 500" in the spring now? Please.

Regarding the parade and Miss Southern 500 pageant, I kind of hoped earlier in the year you might eventually bring them up in some way. I've found newspaper photos along the way from some of them. Not the best resolution obviously, but maybe it'll still help tell the story. Plus, I bet folks here have plenty of their own to add. Let's see how many years we can cover...

1957 - Bobby Johns with Miss Southern 500 ( Jack Walker collection)

1960

1963 with Clint Eastwood

1967

1968

1969

1971

1974 (from Woody Delbridge 's gaggle of parade photos)

Even George "Goober" Lindsey got in on the parade action in 1969.

1968

1982 - Hmm, wonder if she is related to Chad.

1987 - selection involved an auditing snafu. Whoops

1990

The one Southern 500 celeb pic I'm trying to find - and have for many years - is of Donna Douglas who played Elly May on The Beverly Hillbillies. She was the grand marshal or whatever for the race in the early 70s. She was referenced in Jerry Bledsoe's classic book The World's Number 1, Flat Out, All Time Great, Stock Car Racing Book . And I've seen articles about her being there. But thus far, I've not found a photo. Anyway, a couple more...

1963 - Clint Eastwood

1967

Dave, thank you!!! Galvanized steel is what I was trying to think of when describing that ice chest. Always felt funny on my fingernails when I would scape against them. Our chest was red when we got it in the 50s but by the time we quit using it and switched to the plastic ones, we had it painted Petty Blue.

Chase, awesome photos on the Beauty pagenant and celebrities in the parade. I had forgotton Sgt. Carter! So many big times celebrities were in that parade or served as Grand Marshal of the race. Great time for all. Thanks for posting those.

In 1958, my father's employer, Liggett & Myers Tobacco Company, sent the star of one of the television shows it sponsored to Darlington. To this day, most agree that James Arness of Gunsmoke was the most popular Grand Marshal / Southern 500 Parade participant in Darlington history. A month later in October, Liggett & Myers brought Arness to Richmond where I saw him as Grand Marshal of the Grand Illuminated Tobacco Festival Parade. Dad got his autograph for me when he toured his Richmond operation making Chesterfield and L&M cigarettes.

In 1965, Liggett & Myers went to the well for Darlington once again, sending the popular Doc and Festus tandem from the same Gunsmoke show they sponsored to the Southern 500 as seen in the NASCAR Newsletter. The Charleston News & Courier covered the visit by Arness.

Arness went from Darlington to Richmond in October 1958 for the Tobacco Festival Parade as seen in the Richmond Times-Dispatch:

Tobacco Festival with James Arness

Photo: TD Staff

In October 1958, National Tobacco Festival parade grand marshal James Arness (Matt Dillon from TVs Gunsmoke) gave a kiss to that years Tobacco Queen, Judy Ann Austin. The festival ran in Richmond from 1949 to 1984 and was a top event in the city during its run. A predecessor festival was held in South Boston before World War II.

Dad's company, Liggett & Myers Tobacco Co., then sent Doc and Festus to Darlington in 1965:

Chase, according to numerous South Carolina newspapers all carrying the same news release in late August 1972, it was the Southern 500 of that year that Donna Douglas was to appear at. I was at that Southern 500 with 5 other Wrangler employees and I don't remember seeing Elly May.

Perhaps you can check the Bobby Allison victory lane photos from the 1972 Southern 500 and see who's kissing winner Bobby Allison.

Release as run in the Spartanburg paper on August 23, 1972:

Wonderful memory, Dave. Thank you for sharing it.

The 1972 Southern 500 program has a full page story, and pic about Elly May's appearance. Her scheduled duties include appearing in the Southern 500 Festival parade, taking part in the Miss Southern 500 Beauty Pageant, and riding in the pace car prior to the start of the race. The 1973 Southern 500 program has a color picture of Elly May at the Southern 500 Beauty Pageant, along with some of the contestants. No victory lane kiss for BA, though.

Thanks, Robert. can you post a pic of her in the pace car?

Really enjoyed reading this, Tim.

Pappy had a green galvanized cooler and a red one. I recall one being used for drinks at the track and I remember seeing the red one used for freshly caught fish. That's Pappy on the right (back in the day), sunglasses.

Tim's memory of his family's cooler really struck a chord.

Love the photos, Chase and Dave. Thank you!

The only picture I can find in the 1973 program, is of Elly at the '72 beauty pageant. And as I barely know how to turn the computer on and off, I don't know how to post it. Sorry.

Thank you for providing the reference, Robert.

Devin... this is the EXACT postcard I bought driving from Richmond to Carolina Beach in 1958! I guess that is actually a dog... my memory really wanted it to be a goat.

TMC, The 1960 first alternate Yvonne Quick from Bennettsville was in the Rockingham Speedway Beauty Pageant several times.

In it's coverage of the 1972 Southern 500 Parade, the Charleston News & Courier didn't mention Elly May / Donna Douglas until the story's 8th paragraph. I'm guessing Leverne of the Charleston paper was a gal.

A nice memory, Devin.

My family always carried a large round blue thermos jug filled with good NC well water when we went to the beach. That way, we didn't have to drink the awful, salty tasting beach water. That I know of, my daddy never attended a race in his lifetime, but he did like to listen to the "Southern 500" on the radio. One year, (1963) as we headed to Myrtle Beach, (in the '61 Chevy) he said "let's ride by Darlington, and look at the track". Boy was I ever excited as I climbed the steep, narrow stairway to the top of the grandstand, knowing that I was going to see the actual track that I had heard described on the radio so many times. That look, along with the covered grandstand that seemed a mile long, is a memory I will never forget.

That had to be a real thrill to unexpectedly see Darlington for the first time. Awesome memory.

Kinda close!