1001 NASCAR Facts. John Close
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18 feet (more than 50 degrees). Eventually, a total of 19 high-banked, 1-mile or longer wooden-surface speedways were built through the late 1920s, most hosting AAA National Championship IndyCar-style races during that period. The Board Track era proved to be short, however, as weather played havoc with the untreated wooden surface. Heat, cold, rain and snow caused warping, cracking, and rotting surface conditions. In the end, most Board Tracks existed two or three years before figuratively rotting into the record books, but they remain a forerunner to Bill France’s NASCAR high-banked superspeedway dream that became a reality at Daytona International Speedway in 1959.
31 While Charlotte Speedway on Little Rock Road was the site of the first NASCAR “Strictly Stock” race in 1949, another Charlotte Speedway circa 1924 was the original venue for the Queen City. A crowd estimated at more than 50,000 poured into the 1.25-mile banked oval October 25, 1924, to see an IndyCar-style race featuring top drivers of the day. The 200-lap, 250-mile AAA-sanctioned event featured 12 cars with Tommy Milton taking home the top prize of $10,000. In all, 15 races were held at the track, including 6 in 1926. After just three events in 1927, Charlotte Speedway closed due to the significant cost of maintaining the 2 × 4–inch green pine and cypress board surface that had deteriorated significantly in the hot North Carolina summer conditions.
32 Early auto racing was dangerous and fatalities were then (as they are now) an unwanted outcome. One of the most dangerous and deadly tracks of racing’s early years was Ascot Motor Speedway (later Legion Ascot) in California. The 5/8-mile dirt track opened on Thanksgiving Day 1924 and hosted open-wheel and early stock car competitions through 1936. In all, 24 drivers died racing at the killer track with 6 perishing in 1933 alone. The deaths prompted an outcry from local newspapers printing headlines such as “Legalized Murder” and “Is It Worth It?” After driver Al Gordon and his riding mechanic Spider Matlock were killed in a January 26, 1936, crash, Legion Ascot was shut down. A fire four months later destroyed the track’s grandstand; the speedway nicknamed “King of the Grim Reapers” was now closed forever.
33 Opened as a 1-mile dirt track October 17, 1931, Oakland Speedway was critical to the growth of auto racing in California. Located in San Leandro, the track was billed as “fastest dirt mile track in the country.” A half-mile dirt track was built inside the Oakland oval in 1935 and with it came “low-buck” stock car racing. Oakland stayed active throughout the last half of the 1930s helping to integrate short-track stock car, midget, motorcycle, and roadster races into the California car scene. Oakland Speedway shut down at the outbreak of World War II and the track’s grandstand came down in 1942. Never reopened, Oakland Speedway is now the site of the Bayfair Mall.
34 Opened in 1916, Atlanta’s Lakewood Speedway (a 1-mile dirt oval with a lake taking up most of the infield) hosted its first stock car race November 11, 1938. Lloyd Seay won the event in a 1934 Ford roadster owned by Raymond Parks, besting a top field of drivers including Roy Hall, Bob Flock, and NASCAR founder Bill France Sr. Shuttered during World War II, Lakewood reopened in September 1945 and stayed busy throughout the rest of the decade and into the 1950s with NSCRA-, AAA-, and, NSCCC-sanctioned events. NASCAR made its first appearance at Lakewood November 11, 1951, with Tim Flock besting brother Bob for the victory in the Strictly Stock event. NASCAR records show Lakewood hosted 13 events in the 1950s including a pair of Convertible Division races (1956 and 1958). Lee Petty is shown as the winner of the final NASCAR race at Lakewood in 1959 although his son, Richard Petty was originally declared the winner of the (now) NASCAR Grand National division event. The building of Atlanta Motor Speedway in 1960 marked the end of NASCAR at Lakewood Speedway, which eventually hosted its last auto race on Labor Day in 1979 when Georgia racing legend Buck Simmons took the checkered flag. While just a distant memory now, Lakewood Speedway proved to be one of the most important tracks of NASCAR’s early years; its big city Atlanta market and larger-than-most 1-mile length helped further legitimize the sport in the southern United States.
Here’s a Milwaukee Mile photo, circa 1915, compelling fans to vote for good roads, something that grew both general motoring and the sport. (Photo Courtesy Steve Zautke Collection)
35 With the departure of the land speed record runs to the Salt Flats in Utah, the city of Daytona Beach began looking for ways to continue both the excitement and the financial benefits of hosting auto racing events. In 1936, the city selected Sig Haugdahl to come up with a fresh concept. Haugdahl’s response was to create a new event, a race for stock cars on a track that combined both the beach and the paved surface of Florida Highway A1A. Haugdahl, a local racer who set the land speed record of 180 mph in his Wisconsin Special on the beach in 1922, designed a track that initially measured 3.2 miles. The oval track used one long paved straight on A1A and another running parallel on the beach connected by a pair of hairpin turns in the sand. Under Haugdahl and later Bill France Sr., the Daytona Beach Course hosted stock car races until closing down for the duration of World War II. After the war, France quickly went back to promoting races on the track, which had expanded to a 4.2-mile distance. That Beach Course has the distinction of staging the first NASCAR-sanctioned race of any kind (a modified event won by Red Byron) in February 1948. The track continued to host NASCAR Modified, Strictly Stock, Convertible, and Grand National races until the opening of Daytona International Speedway in 1959. Paul Goldsmith wheeled a Ray Fox-prepared Pontiac to victory in the last NASCAR race held on the Daytona Beach Course in 1958. Meanwhile, Banjo Matthews captured a 125-mile NASCAR Sportsman/Modified race. Curtis Turner grabbed top honors in the 160-mile NASCAR Convertible event that same weekend as racing on the beach at Daytona faded into history.
36 Recognized as the first 1-mile dirt speedway in America specifically built for auto racing, Langhorne Speedway opened in 1926. Langhorne was literally a circle with no discernible straightaways and hosted IndyCar, midget, sprint, and motorcycle racing throughout its early history. In 1940, the suburban Philadelphia track hosted the All American Championships, one of the first big stock car races held on the East Coast. Georgia ace Roy Hall won the 200-mile event with Bill France Sr. coming in second. Eventually, Langhorne showed up on the NASCAR tour as part of the inaugural 1949 NASCAR Strictly Stock season. Curtis Turner won the race, beating 44 other competitors. A total of 19 NASCAR events (including two Convertible Division races) were held at Langhorne Speedway through the 1957 season. The track remained open until 1971 when it was demolished for the development of a shopping center.
37 Born during the middle of the American Civil War, Henry Ford graduated from being an engineering assistant for Thomas Edison to one of America’s greatest industrialists. His early auto racing efforts not only helped establish the new form of transportation as a viable commodity in American culture and commerce, but they also fueled the sport into the 21st Century through technical innovation and financial support. Ford constructed his first car, the Quadricycle, in 1896. With Edison’s encouragement to build a better model, Ford spent the next 10 years doing that before introducing the Ford Model T, the first affordable car for America’s general public. Ford is also credited with implementing the first moving automotive assembly line, dealer franchising, increasing the minimum wage, shorter work weeks, and profit sharing for employees. In addition to being one of the wealthiest people in the world, Ford also ran for Senate in 1918 (he lost). He also consulted virtually every American president from the early 1900s through the 1940s. Ford also drew great criticism for his pacifist war, racial profiling, and anti-union activities. Prior to his death in 1947, Ford launched the Ford Foundation, created for the advancement of human welfare. He donated most of his wealth to the foundation, which today is worth an estimated $13 billion dollars.
38 Born in Wauseon, Ohio, in 1878, Barney Oldfield was the first great American race car driver. In 1902, the young bicycle racer agreed to drive Henry Ford’s famous 999 race car, a lofty proposition given Oldfield had never driven a car much less raced one. Undaunted, Oldfield and the 999 defeated a host of challengers during the next two years. He was the first driver to average faster than a mile a minute in a race car, turning the trick