REAL NASCAR

The announcement that Danica Patrick will compete in NASCAR’s Nationwide Series this year has produced a media frenzy.  But women racing in NASCAR is as old as the sanctioning body itself.

Women racers in NASCAR were a product of occasional “powder-puff derbies”* common at weekly race tracks across the nation in the 1930s and 40s.  After World War II, as stock car racing grew increasingly popular such races became regular features at the growing number of tracks across the Piedmont South. 

In 1948, promoters Buddy Davenport and Joe Littlejohn began running powder puffs in conjunction with the main features at their South Carolina Racing Association (an early rival to NASCAR) events at Greenville-Pickens Speedway and Spartanburg’s Hub City Speedway.  Most of these races were dominated by Sarah Christian, wife of Atlanta-area bootlegger and stock car owner Frank Christian.  Another early woman pioneer was Greenville’s Louise Smith who not only raced but promoted races—including so-called “colored races” for African-American drivers.  In 1949, Smith began competing against men in SCRA races and Christian and others soon followed.

Bill France noticed the success of his SCRA rivals in attracting crowds with women drivers and recruited them for his own promotions.  Indeed, Sarah Christian competed in the first NASCAR Strictly Stock (predecessor of Sprint Cup) race at the Charlotte Speedway in June 1949 finishing a respectable fourteenth in a field of thirty-three.

For the second strictly stock race at Daytona, NASCAR heavily promoted the entry in the race of three women—Sara Christian, Ethel Flock Mobley, and Louise Smith.  NASCAR publicist Houston Lawing issued a press release asserting, “the woman auto racer is here to stay, like the atom bomb, rum and home hair waves.” 

The early women women racers did have some limited success.  Much to the chagrin of legendary NASCAR pioneers Bob and Fonty Flock and to the delight of fellow competitors—at least those who finished tenth or better—Ethel Flock Mobley finished ahead of her brothers at Daytona in eleventh place.  Sara Christian finished fifth in the Pittsburgh race and sixth in the demanding 200-mile race at Langhorne where NASCAR officials escorted her to victory lane to stand alongside race winner Curtis Turner. 

Christian ended that first season of NASCAR’s new top division by finishing thirteenth in points.   Her glory, however, proved short-lived as she rolled her car seven times in a late season NSCRA race at Lakewood Speedway and broke her back. The wreck scared her husband, her mother, and her young daughters as much as it did her.  They all encouraged her to quit.  She raced only one more time—“I just wanted to be sure I could”--in August 1950 at Hamburg, New York and finished fourteenth.

Louise Smith had the longest, and perhaps most colorful, career of any of the women who drove in NASCAR’s early days.  She competed in a total of eleven races in NASCAR’s top division—called Grand National after 1950--, three in the first season of strictly stock racing.  Her best finish in one of these races was a 16^th place in the 1949 Langhorne race and she finished generally near the bottom of the pack. 

One of the primary reasons she finished so poorly was that she wrecked so often.  Smith herself observed, “I needed wheels on top.  I’d a drove a lot better.”  As one writer succinctly put it, “Turning over was indeed a specialty of hers.” One of her most famous crashes came at Occoneechee Speedway in 1950.  Smith had gotten Curtis Turner to teach her how to do the powerslide.  She practiced with Turner until she was confident she could pull off the maneuver. 

Her powerslide, however, did not work as well when she tried to use it in qualifying.  According to Smith, “Man, when I hit that second turn, that tire blew and that thang never did straighten up.  It sailed off that bank down toward that river like a cannonball.  Hit three trees.  The radiator dove and I back-flopped against a tree.  They had to git me out with a torch.”  Most of the other drivers thought she was dead, but she came back to the track in time for the race—with plenty of cuts and bruises and several broken ribs. 

Smith fit in well with the rough crowd at early NASCAR races and could drink, cuss, and fight with the best of them. During, and after, her Grand National career ended in 1952, Smith regularly raced in modified races until she “got saved” in 1956 and quit going to the racetrack altogether.

In the early years of NASCAR, women drivers were a rare, but not an unusual feature at races.  In addition to Ethel Mobley, Sara Christian, and Louise Smith, other women, including Ann Slaasted, Ann Chester, and Ann Bunselmyer, competed in races in NASCAR’s top division in the 1950s.  

The women were there for one reason; as a gimmick to attract fans.  When the novelty wore off, the appearance money and other forms of encouragement dried up and NASCAR no longer welcomed the women.  Indeed, by the mid-1950s signs went up in the pit areas of most tracks reading “No Women allowed.”  The only woman one was likely to see in the infield of a racetrack—except for those occasions when promoters held “powder puff derbies”--was the beauty queen who presented the victor’s trophy.

Since the launching of the women’s movement in the late 1960s and early 1970s, there have been several attempts by women to make it in NASCAR’s top ranks.  Janet Guthrie tried to break into NASCAR’s Winston Cup division in the 1970s and raced in 33 Cup races but ultimately had very limited success.  In relatively recent years, attempts by Shawna Robinson, Patty Moise, Deborah Renshaw, Kelly Sutton, Erin Crocker, and Sarah Fisher have proven even less successful. 

Here’s hoping that Danica Patrick’s attempt at making it in NASCAR has more long range impact than earlier attempts and that Houston Lawing’s words from 1949 that “the woman auto racer is here to stay, like the atom bomb, rum and home hair waves” can finally prove prophetic.

*The term “powder-puff derby” was allegedly coined by comedian/humorist Will Rogers for long-distance air races for women.  The first such event was a 1929 race from Santa Monica, CA to Cleveland, OH featuring 19 aviatrixes, including Amelia Earhart.