Let's go kyle

[a25rjr]

That is some very cool stuff, 25. My recollection is nil since it was all before my time but I've tried to look at, and read, as much as I can from those days. I've read where Ralph Earnhardt was as good as there ever was on dirt.

My wife has immediate family living in Port Orange and we began going to winter Speedweeks in 1985, so I got to experience a few races at Big D prior to the restrictor plates. One year they had a gathering of cars and drivers from the era of which you speak doing a parade on the beach near the Dunlawton beach ramp and after the parade they put the cars on display and the drivers hung out out at the flea market just west of I-95. We got to hang out with and talk to guys like Ray Fox, Herb Thomas, Tim Flock, Rebel Mundy and a few more whose names escape me. There was a guy from the northeast (New Hampshire, Vermont, can't remember exactly where) who owned, and had on display, the only 1955 Kiekhaefer hemi powered Chrysler 300 known to still exist. It had been driven by Tim Flock and was essentially untouched from the time it had been last raced. The owner said they still find sand in the interior and frame from when it was raced on the beach in Ponce Inlet. It was incredibly interesting!!

I'll bet you've spent a little time at The North Turn restaurant. We make an appoint to go there for steamed shrimp and a beer every time we're in the Daytona Beach area. The ambiance of that place given the hallowed ground it sets on is very compelling to people who are interested in that sort of thing. I actually have a glass container full of sand setting on our mantle from the area where the north turn was located!

In the late 50's Nascar sold shares of its stock for $1.00 a share, to help build DIS. My dad was one of the first to buy 1,000 shares. He later sold them for $.50 a share when he needed the money. I always kidded him about kicking him in the rear for that "smart" business move. At one time that stock was up to $350 a share and had split many many times! Im glad he got a lot smarter in his older years! lol

Him and his brother-in-law, Larry Flynn, raced at the beach course several times. They used to call that race the Permatex race as it was the precursor to Arca!