Grand marshals have fuzzy history in NASCAR

So you want to be a grand marshal, eh? That's wonderful. Go ahead and sign up right here on NASCAR.com for a chance to be one at "a NASCAR Winston Cup Series race at North Carolina Speedway in 2004." Or so says the Official Rules.

Notice it said "a" race. Not "the" race. But that's semantics.

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But if you're the lucky winner of the contest, and you go to Rockingham, enjoy the race, have fun being grand marshal and get to hob-knob with everyone, maybe then you can answer some questions that have plagued us for, well, several minutes.

What the heck is a grand marshal? Why have them? What do they do? Who started this tradition?

We've all seen them at race tracks. "Introducing today's grand marshal ..." This year, John Travolta was the grand marshal of the Daytona 500. And then Clay Henry was the grand marshal of the Subway 400.

Fitting huh? Daytona gets an internationally known superstar, and Rockingham gets a guy who eats sub sandwiches. If you win, you can say you followed Clay Henry.

There have been some other famous folks serve as grand marshals this year. And then some not-so-famous folks. And, of course, a politician.

There was Jimmy Davis at Las Vegas. Jimmy Davis? (Some UAW-DaimlerChrysler bigwig). Wouldn't it have been better to get Terrell Davis?

At Atlanta, there was Bill Dance (OK, maybe you've heard of him. The guy with the orange-and-white hat who talks about fishin' all the time), Johnny Morris and Rob Keck. We could tell you who the latter two were, but it would just confuse you. Suffice to say it had something to do with Bass Pro Shops, one of the race sponsors.

Next up was Darlington. Politician. Geez. As if Darlington didn't have enough trouble. Maybe South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford can grease some palms at NASCAR. At Bristol, right after the war against Iraq started, the track used representatives from the Army, Navy, Air Force, Marine Corps and Coast Guard. A good call.

Howie Long was the grand marshal at Texas. No doubt he mentioned RadioShack as much as possible. Last week at Talladega, it was Jim Kelly. Hey! Where are some baseball guys? Sammy Sosa didn't want to do it?

But back to more important questions. Let's go way back, in fact. Where did grand marshaldom start?

Gotta be Indianapolis, right? They started racing there in the Revolutionary War, didn't they?

"They've never done a grand marshal," Indy 500 historian Donald Davidson said.

	Brtiney Spears served as grand marshal at the Pepsi 400 in 2001. Credit: ASP

There goes that idea.

But wait. Davidson tells us Indy used "honorary referees" back in the 1930s. Folks like Amelia Earhart, Jackie Cochran and Gene Tunney served in that capacity when Eddie Rickenbacker owned the track.

Davidson couldn't say whether an honorary referee was a pre-cursor to a grand marshal, but we'll say it was. Still, Indy never had them, though the 500 Festival parade has used one for years.

That's probably where the grand marshal gets its start. No, not at the Indy 500 parade. But parades in general. Did you know the Tournament of Roses (is that a field of 64?) has had a grand marshal since 1890?

That's all fine and dandy, but how did they become part of NASCAR?

NASCAR historian Bob Latford said the tradition started because tracks needed "something else to sell."

"That came with the commercialization of the sport," Latford said. "With the naming of events for sponsors, that's when they started sticking them in."

Latford doesn't remember when the first grand marshal appeared in NASCAR. And that's probably a good thing. You'd have to wonder about a guy who knew that kind of trivia.

Latford guessed it was probably sometime in the 1980s or perhaps a little earlier.

"I don't remember any in the 1970s, or before that in the '60s," Latford said.

Lowe's Motor Speedway president Humpy Wheeler -- arguably the smartest man in the sport -- wasn't sure of the exact time, either.

"It's been an evolutionary thing," Wheeler said.

But what if you're a creationist? But we digress.

"The original grand marshals were really called honorary starters," Wheeler said. "I don't know where the first grand marshal came, but it was probably somewhere in the '60s. I think what probably happened -- and I don't know this -- but having been through it, maybe you had two extremely important people that the sponsor or somebody else wanted at the speedway."

A tough position to be in, obviously. Whose back needs the most scratching? Both!

"Well, I've got an honorary starter," said Wheeler, imitating a possible conversation from long ago. "What am I going to do with the other one?"

The question we're all pondering.

"You came up with the grand marshal name," Wheeler said. "That's probably what happened."

Money, it seems, makes the grand marshal world go around. Wheeler said his track leaves it up to the race sponsors to pick the grand marshal.

"It's gone that way almost with everybody," Wheeler said. "They're paying a big price for admission, so there's certain things you do for them. There's always room for other celebrities once you get the grand marshal and honorary starter."

There's always room for ANY celebrity at a racetrack. You're famous and you want to come to a race? Please join us! By the way, do you want to sponsor our team next year?

Sure, we're being cynical. There are some genuinely good deeds being done in the name of grand marshals.

But we still don't know when the first one appeared in NASCAR.

Buz McKim, the head archivist for International Speedway Corp., couldn't recall exactly when Daytona first started using that title. But he did say that Daytona has paraded local dignitaries -- the mayor of Daytona Beach, local business owners, etc. -- around the track since it first opened in 1959.

And the first big name McKim could recall was Walter Cronkite, the CBS News anchor who was the pace-car driver in 1965. Not the grand marshal, but close enough for us.

Nowadays, grand marshals have any number of duties. Texas Motor Speedway allows sponsors to pick the grand marshal, TMS director of media relations Sarona Winfrey said. The grand marshal is announced as grand marshal -- you wouldn't want him or her to be announced as Miss Winston. Well, maybe you would -- goes on stage to greet the drivers and gives the command to start engines.

You've heard them. They are the four most famous words in Motorsports. No, not "Mario is slowing down."

"Gentlemen, start your engines."

Remember when John Boy and Billy, the famous (or infamous) morning radio hosts, did that at North Wilkesboro several years ago? "Gentlemen -- and Jimmy Spencer -- start your engines." Beautiful.

But Wilkesboro isn't around anymore. Las Vegas Motor Speedway is, and that track lets sponsors pick the grand marshal and honorary starter. The grand marshal gives the command to start engines and even presents the trophy in Victory Lane, LVMS director of public relations Jeff Motley said.

(By the way, both Winfrey and Motley wondered how the tradition got started. Told you it was an important question.)

Wayne Newton did it one year at Vegas. And recently, Gene Simmons and Paul Stanley of KISS were grand marshals for an NHRA event there, and they went above and beyond the call of duty. Of course, the duties were slim, so they didn't go too far above.

But Simmons and Stanley spoke to the crowd, watched the races from the starting line -- no doubt used to the noise -- walked through the pit areas and signed autographs. Real troupers.

Finally, there's Daytona. Well, not really finally since it is the first race. Daytona is different form most tracks, especially for the 500. Notice it's not the Highest Bidder 500, but the Daytona 500. Daytona actually picks the Daytona grand marshal

"We tap into a variety of different resources to get them here," said David Talley, director of media relations at the track. "The bottom line is we're looking for someone with broad appeal."

And he wasn't being sexist, though Daytona did bring in starlet Britney Spears one year.

That's the beauty of being Daytona.

"The Daytona 500 is the premier race on the NASCAR circuit, and we want to choose talent that will reflect that," Talley said. "When we throw out a name, everybody goes, 'Oh, I know how that is.'"

You won't see any national sales managers or vice presidents of marketing as Daytona's grand marshals. No, sir. Only top-quality celebrities.

"John Travolta. 'Yeah, I think I know who he is,'" Talley said.

Talley did say that the track considers its sponsors, TV partners and current events when picking the grand marshal.

"All of that plays into who we think we want, who we think would be the right fit for the Super Bowl of motorsports," Talley said.

How about Jon Gruden for next year? Talley wasn't giving any hints.

The duties for the Daytona grand marshal are a bit different. Well, maybe. Daytona has a dinner to honor the grand marshal, also he or she goes into garage area and is basically seen by the right people. Talley even said the grand marshal does a lot of glad-handing.

"It's a great way for them to get involved in the sport if they're interested in doing that," Talley said. "They're meeting drivers, they're meeting sponsors, the TV partners are there."

Hey, why can't we be a grand marshal? Would be a great way to network, and we could get plenty of good stories. Again, we digress.

Some of the more famous Daytona grand marshals have been Clarence Thomas, Ronald Reagan and Britney Spears. We swear he mentioned those three in the same breath. Who doesn't belong?

"That's what pre-race is all about," Talley said. "It's giving the fans a little more bang for their buck. This is a chance to say, 'I went to the Daytona 500. Not only that, I was down on pit road during pre-race, and I saw John Travolta.' It's an added pop for the fans. Bottom line, that's what we want to do. We want to continue to offer amenities and things they can't get anywhere else."

How about a hot dog for $1?

Or maybe you could finally tell us how this silliness got started in the first place?