"Beauchamp Wins 500-mile Stock Car Race at 135 M.P.H. Average"
Newspaper article
By: Frank M. Blunk
Date: February 23, 1959
Source: Blunk, Frank M. "Beauchamp Wins 500-mile Stock Car Race at 135 M.P.H. Average." The New York Times, February 23, 1959, 30.
Introduction
In 1959, Bill France, the father of NASCAR (National Association of Stock Car Racers), opened the Daytona International Speedway for the inaugural Daytona 500. He had come quite a long way since starting NASCAR in 1949, and his proposal for the asphalt speed-way in 1954. Stock car racing was a distant cousin of the far more popular Indy car racing (from the name of the cars that race in the Indianapolis 500). The stock cars were raced primarily in the South and the Midwest, and incorporated standard car bodies with modified engines and safety measures to make them faster and safer. In Daytona, the big stock car race every year was one that was driven half on the beach...
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1950's Sports Primary Sources
The 1950's: Primary Sources
