Oh the tales those Petty's tell

from The Crossville Chronicle - Crossville, TN April 4,2007

by Joe Dunn / joe@onpitroad.net
BRISTOL, TN - Richards Petty’s dad Lee wrecked him in his first race, and Kyle Petty gives credit to a seagull for his first win.
On Thursday March 22, as thousands of race fans were arriving in the Tri-cities area for the weekends racing at Bristol Motor Speedway, King Richard Petty and son Kyle told tales of racing as a fundraising event for the International Storytelling Center.
FOX TV’s Mike Joy joined the father and son team on stage as they relived some of the most memorable times in their racing past. Racing has been a long time family tradition for the Petty family, Richard got started following in the footsteps of his father Lee Petty one of Nascar’s original drivers.
At the beginning of his career Richard was asked by his daddy how he wanted to get paid, did he want a percentage or get a flat rate? “I was working at the shop making $87.50 and I like the sure thing so I took the salary.”
“ I run my first race in 1958” says Richard, “daddy was headed on what they called the northern circuit, when they ran a bunch of races up north. So my first race was in Toronto, Canada at the exhibition grounds up there. Daddy and Cotton Owen were fighting for the lead when they came up on a lap car, me. Cotton was in the lead, but while he was messing with me, Daddy went around him, but I was still in front of them. When Daddy got back up to me, he just knocked me into the wall.”
“Daddy would go on to win that race and I left a 1957 Oldsmobile bumper that weighed about 1500 pounds hangin up there on the fence. And Daddy was mad at me cause I bent up the car.”
The next year Richard would win his first race at Atlanta, or at least he thought he did. “We were racing and the track got real dusty, it got so bad, the flagman had to come on the infield by the scorers to find out how many laps they were running. When it all settled down, they flagged me the winner and we was a bunch of 21 year old kids jumpin around like we had really done something. Somebody came by and said ‘you been protested’, the steam started coming out of my ears and I got to the scorers table and Daddy’s up there arguing with them. Daddy said “ I won the race” and he ended up winning the race.
It was good for the team explained Richard, “Cause they were paying a $500 bonus if you had a current model car, daddy had a ‘59 Plymouth and I had a ‘57 Oldsmobile, so it was an extra $500 for the team.” Mike Joy leans over at this point and asked Richard, “And you got some of that bonus?” Richard replies “ I got my $87.50.”
The stories that evening moved around and the subject of young drivers came up. Kyle talked about how many of these drivers at Bristol had come up in the sport, racing at the local short tracks and how that really helped them at a track like Bristol. “Not me” says Kyle “When Daddy decided it was time for me to start racing we got a car and headed for Daytona for an ARCA race. Well I set on the outside pole for that race, and I was supposed to finish second, but a Seagull helped that day. A guy by the name of Phil Finney was going to win the race, and this is how long ago it was, these cars had glass windshields. He hit a seagull with about 8 laps to go, caused a caution, knocked the windshield out. That was a fairly common occurrence 25 years ago - there were so many seagulls in the infield, cars would hit them, knock holes in the fronts and knock out the windshields. Anyway, we were very blessed and went on to winning that race.” Kyle got a big grin on his face and said “next week we went to Charlotte and I wiped out about 6 race cars.”
Kyle joked that you might have to question a fathers love when he sends you to Daytona, over 100 mph on your very first race.
Richard sat with a grin and replied “Before the race, I said . ‘Your starting on the outside pole and that’s good’ and we all agreed that we would sort of idle along and we’ll let 8 or 12 ahead of us and sort of follow along and learn to drive. The first lap he came by leading the damn race, I said ’well strategy went out the window.“
Times were not all happy in racing, as Kyle talked about a couple of his bad wrecks, the story came to a bad one at Indianapolis where he was knocked senseless and literally didn’t know if he was dead or alive.
“I was praying that I was alive, but I couldn’t move or open my eyes, and after what seemed like an eternity of this I realized that I wasn’t alive. So my prayer instantly changed and I started praying ’please God when I open my eyes make sure St Peter is standing there’. I was praying and I could hear people talking, and all of a sudden out of nowhere I hear Sterling (Marlin) talking.”
“And y’all might be from Tennessee, and y’all might like Sterling a lot, but if I’m dead and Sterling is dead, we ain’t in heaven. So then my prayers go back to ’please God let me be alive”
Kyle was still unconscious when they tried to lift him out of the car, but according to Sterling, every time they lifted him Kyle ’screamed like a little girl’. “Sterling said ‘They’d try to pick you up and you’d scream like a girl, and they’d set you back down” stated Kyle. “After they did this about three times, the guy that was hooking the car up (to the wrecker) told the paramedic, ‘he won’t scream if you’ll get off his ponytail when you try to pick him up’.”
“I tell people all the time, you’d scream like a girl too if somebody did that to you. I still see that paramedic up there about every two or three years, and he’s like, ‘Remember when I was stepping on your hair?.”
The evening was a lot of fun for the folks that gathered in the Bruton Smith Building at Bristol Motor Speedway. 2007 was the third year that the Speedway hosted the event as a fundraiser for the International Storytellers Center in Jonesborough, Tennessee. The Center is the host of the National Storytelling festival which began in October of 1973.
This year the 35th annual National Storytelling Festival will be held October 5-7 in Jonesborough, Tennessee. Some of this years featured Storytellers include. Roy Book Binder, who has been a Blues singing, guitar picking, song writing raconteur for the last 30 years. Book Binder learned his craft from a legendary blind street singer. Four-time Grammy award winner David Holt, driven by a passion to become an old-time banjo player, traveled in 1968 to remote mountain communities searching for the best traditional musicians and storytellers. And Kevin Locke (his Lakota name, Tokeya Inajin, means "The First to Arise") is known throughout the world as the preeminent player of the indigenous Northern Plains flute as well as an inspiring hoop dancer.
Jonesborough is about a 3 hour drive from Crossville and the Festival is worth the drive and the time. It’s a great time for the whole family. Tickets are available on line or at the festival. For more information on the Festival check out their website at www.storytellingcenter.net or you may call them at 800-952-8392. Write them at International Storytelling Center 116 W. Main St. Jonesborough, TN 37659