Moving a 7,600-pound granite monument so that more people can just read the names carved into it is a quiet act of spirituality. Back in the beginning of the year, a three-piece display honoring the Ozarks Area Racers Foundation was put up along the south side of the Missouri Sports Hall of Fame in Springfield. It had been at the Ozark Empire Fairgrounds for years, mostly going unnoticed except for when the fair was in late summer. At this point, it stands where sports fans walk.
There are 207 names on the monument. Most of them won’t be known to people outside of southwest Missouri. That is the whole point.
The President and Executive Director of the Missouri Sports Hall of Fame is Jerald Andrews. He grew up on a dairy farm outside of Bolivar. Being able to watch races at Humansville on Tuesdays, Bolivar on Saturdays, and, if things worked out just right, the asphalt track at the Springfield Fairgrounds on Friday nights was an ideal week for his family. Under the summer sky, he saw men drive 1957 Chevys and late-model stock cars around those tracks. He remembers their names. The worry is that most people younger than him don’t.
The Ozarks Area Racers Foundation has worked for decades to close the gap between what one generation went through and what the next generation will have. About thirty years ago, about twenty retired drivers and fans got together to share stories. Now, more than a thousand people come every year, and the room is full of cars, photos, and other memorabilia. Legends are the drivers, and Pioneers are the crew chiefs, engine builders, promoters, flagmen, and journalists who kept everything running. The Foundation inducts a new Hall of Fame class every January.
The 2019 class of inductees shows the range. That name might be Dick Trickle, the famous short-track driver from Wisconsin who made his name at Springfield Fairgrounds Speedway before moving on to NASCAR. But along with him are people like Leslie Essary, a Crane driver who raced on Ozarks dirt tracks for more than 20 years, and Mike Edwards, a morning radio host who was also a popular track announcer. Marty Denney owns a Larry Phillips tribute Camaro. He is known as one of the best motorsports artists in the region. These aren’t well-known names. But they were the stars in their towns, on their tracks, and during their years.
The racing culture in that area at that time is harder to describe than to feel. It wasn’t just sports; it was the main thing people did for fun on the weekends in towns where there wasn’t much else to do. Andrews talks about Friday nights at the Springfield Fairgrounds in a way that makes it sound like the memories are still fresh. People did not go to see well-known drivers. They went to check on the people next door.
The racing wing gives a fuller picture inside the Hall of Fame. There is an O’Reilly Auto Parts NASCAR simulator, a tribute to Rusty Wallace, Bill Elliott’s real race car, Jerry Clinton’s race suit, and a tribute to Larry Phillips, a Springfield driver who won seven national championships and is still thought to be Missouri’s best short-track racer. It’s hard not to think about how much of this would seem vague without the personal context that the Foundation’s work gives. Fun to use the simulator. The 207 names on the granite monument outside, on the other hand, is what makes you stop.
The Ozarks Area Racers Foundation moved the monument because races aren’t held where it used to be. Local stars like Larry Phillips, David Goldsberry, and Lester Friebe used to bring a lot of people to the fairgrounds every Friday night in the 1960s and 1970s. But things have changed. The pit road that the old monument was on is now only a west entrance. A living piece of history slowly becoming a footnote in a place that has moved on. That makes me feel a little sad.
That’s why the move to the Hall of Fame is important. Preserving things is not fun work. It doesn’t get much attention. But somewhere between the granite slabs and the old race suits, memories from a generation are being kept from quietly fading away. That’s worth some money. Most likely, more than most people know.
