HPC 013002 - Laserfiche WebLink

Browse Search

58 NPS Form 10.900 -a OMe Approval No. 1024 -0018 (8 -86) United States Department of the Interior National Park Service National Register of Historic Places Continmation Sheet Occoneechee Speedway Orange County, N.C. Section number 8 Page to Jersey. Cars raced around tracks surfaced in wood and banked at the outer edges to prevent the racers from going off course. France dropped out 'of high school and worked in auto garages where he built racecars and occasionally raced them. In 1931 France married an Ashe County, North Carolina, native and after having a son, Bill France Jr., the couple moved to Florida in 1934 in search of a warmer climate. In 1936 France competed in the disastrous Daytona Beach Chamber of Commerce Beach Road Race, after which he became involved in race promotion at the urging of a friend and because of a lack of organization in the sport. Following World War II, France and his wife Ann staged races on a one -mile former horse track outside of Orlando, events that proved exceedingly popular and well attended.? Throughout 1947, Bill France conducted approximately thirty -five stock car races in the Deep South under the National Championship Stock Car Circuit (NCSCC), a loosely organized pre - NASCAR touring series. From these races, France recognized the potential of organized stock car racing to create drivers who would appeal to a growing sports- minded society.$ At the end of the NCSCC's first season in December 1947, France called a meeting of thirty -five leaders from numerous racing associations. The group, which included drivers and racing promoters, met for four days at the Streamline Motel in Daytona Beach, setting rules and standards for the races, modifications to cars and driver safety. The new organization was named the National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing or NASCAR.9 NASCAR initially established three divisions for races: Roadster, Modified and Strictly Stock. Popular in the Northeast and Midwest, the Roadster division was never successful in the Southeast where fans labeled it a "Yankee" sport. The Modified division consisted of older cars that had been souped -up, much like the high - performance cars created for and by the trippers. The Strictly Stock division was for cars that the average person could buy off the showroom floor. The cars were to be street legal, family sedans built since 1946.10 The first NASCAR race was a Modified race held at Daytona on February 15, 1948 and NASCAR was officially incorporated days later on February 21. The Modifieds raced on fifty= two dirt tracks in the first season. t1 Occoneechee Speedway was one of eight North Carolina 7 Wilkinson, 19 -27. 8 Greg Fielden, Forty Years of Stock Car Racing, Volume 1. The Beginning, 1949 -1958 (Surfside Beach, South Carolina: The Galfield Press, 1987), 31 -32. 9 McLaughlin, "In the Beginning. 10 Calinoff. 11 McLaughlin, "In the Beginning..."; and Chengelis.