Thanks for posting that, Lee. Enjoyed it immensely.

Lee,
Great story.
Loved every word.
Larry

Smoky wasn't a human being - he was a wizard when it came to racing. Loved that "can't move the engine, but it doesn't say we can't move the body!!" Typical Smoky.

About the same time as Smoky was working his magic there was a fellow up Atlanta, GA, way name of Red Vogt. Red was a genius with the flat head Ford V-8's. He did things to those engines that Ford engineers said were impossible, couldn't be done.

The early days of NASCAR racing were full of innovation, unlike today. Some of it legal - most of it not. Richard Petty tells of the time, around 1975, 1976, that Cotton Owens showed up to a race with a Dodge that, according to Richard, didn't look quite right. Wasn't anything that could catch it, but the inspectors couldn't find a thing illegal in it - until they ran it thru the templates. Cotton had built himself a 7/8's size car. As Richard said "that damn thing could have gone thru the templates at full speed and not touched a thing. That's the way it was before nastycar started kow towing to rich sponsers and decided everything had to be even. I mean drivers today make more money in one season than the early drivers probably made in their entire careers The fun's gone out of it.

A very interesting 3 book trilogy is "Best Damn Garage in Town: The World According to Smokey". The first two volumes detail his early life, WWII years and his racing career. It was written by Smoky, done his way to the point he set up his own publishing company so he had control of what was published. As I remember the 3rd volume wasn't all that great. Amazon has a price of $165 for the set (paper back), but I'm sure it can be found cheaper somewhere else - or not.

I got the chance to meet Smoky at the 1999 Nashville National meet - two old deaf guys talking about racing. LOL Very interesting man to talk to.

Hudsonly,
Alex B