A Few Memories

[ancrdave]

1) Eldon Yarborough at New Smyrna 1968...
2) A shot from New Smyrna - also 1968 - of a wrecked car being loaded... The infield was a pretty barren place back then...
3) A 1968 "Action Racing" New Smyrna Speedway race report...
4) 1967 ad for Treasure Coast Raceway in Ft. Pierce

[oneoff]

Check out roll bars

It looks like the roll bars are made out of drive shafts. No soft walls at NSS, Ray G. busted the wall in turn 2. One of the hardest hits I've ever seen at NSS.

[Jim Fenton]

Wow, got me goin way back down memory lane here Dave!

That Treasure Coast poster from Ft. Pierce sure brought a memory back for one saturday night back in 1967. Unfortunately, it is a mix of good and bad memory.

This was before I started driving and I was crewing on my Brother-in-law's late model. We decided to pull down to Ft. Pierce from Largo for a hundred lap championship event. The good news is that we won, the bad news is that we (your's truly) crashed hard in Myakka City on the way back which severly injured the other crew member (shown on the right below) as well as totalled a brand new pickup, trailer and race car.

The first shot shown below is the actual picture taken on the front straightaway that night in the winner's circle after the race. I am on the left, my Brother-in-law, Kenny Faircloth, is in the middle and Stevie, the guy that was severly injured in the wreck is on the left.

The second shot shown below is of the actual car we took down there however that shot was taken the same year in the pits at Golden Gate Speedway.

I was driving the rig back home when I fell asleep at about 2:00 in the morning and ran off of SR-64 at full speed. We hit the bank of a ditch at about a 100 or so feet off the road but were still traveling fast enough that the racer came over the tire rack at the tongue of the trailer, split the sides of the bed down flat and came through the back glass halfway into the cab.

It pushed all three of us into the windshield which lacerated Kenny and I up pretty good but Stevie was sitting in the middle with the trophy between his legs with the wings of the figure on top pointing towards his neck so he got the worst of it. The trophy ripped his neck open but missed his carotid. I don't remember the name of the nerve it severed in his neck but I do recall the panic in seeing his blood spurting out over the hood with every heartbeat once we regained our senses enough to look at each other. Kenny held a towel tightly on his neck while I ran for help. I managed to flag a car down that let me in and took me to a pay phone in spite of the way I looked. It seemed to take forever but an ambulance finally came and the para-medics saved Stevie. Another miracle to be thankful for.

[Old Sunshine Fan]

YO Fenton

Was your eye sight that bad at such a young age to cause you to wear your watch that high on your arm. (that's where I were mine now - easier to see the little hand). (thats how Michael Jackson knows it time to go to bed - "When the big hand touches the little hand")

OSF

[Jim Fenton]

Was your eye sight that bad at such a young age to cause you to wear your watch that high on your arm. (that's where I were mine now - easier to see the little hand).
OSF

LOL - Funny you caught that.

Actually, at the time, the thing seemed to get in the way every time I turned around while working on the car so instead of taking it off like any normal person would do, I just slid it up there.

Jim F.