N. Wilkesboro's legacy to be etched on N.C. marker

Appropriately, it was a road sign that stopped him. Driving south to Florida on his honeymoon, Robert Mardsen noticed the marker for North Wilkesboro Speedway, and pulled off the highway to visit the racetrack he had previously only seen on television. It was a chance encounter that resonated with the New York native, and spurred an attempt to remember or perhaps even rescue a facility that for half a century hosted NASCAR's best.

It began two years ago with a petition, blossomed into the idea of a granite monument, and expanded into a search for a buyer who might breathe life into a short track that's sat idle since NASCAR last raced there in 1996. Thursday brought the first simple but tangible fruits of that effort, when the North Carolina Office of Archives and History mailed a letter approving a request by Mardsen's group to have a historical marker erected near the speedway site.

"I think it's great," said Mardsen, a resident of Scio, N.Y. "We started what were doing a couple of years ago, just trying to get something done with the track. Up until that point, nothing had been done. We'll do anything we can to generate some exposure for the track, especially now that it's up for sale, officially. Anything we can do to preserve the history that was made there is great, as far as we're concerned."

The black and silver marker will be erected in or about November, at the intersection of Old U.S. 421 -- also known as Speedway Road -- and N.C. 115. It a few simple words, it will denote that North Wilkesboro was a pioneering NASCAR dirt track that was built in 1946, was paved in 1958, and hosted sanctioned events until 1996. The strict committee of 10 history professors that considers such proposals nixed original language referring to the sport's bootlegging past.

That the marker was approved at all is something of an accomplishment, given the layers of criteria any proposed sign must meet to become reality. North Carolina is particularly stringent when it comes to sports -- there are no roadside markers honoring legendary college basketball coaches such as Everett Case, or arenas like Reynolds Coliseum. In fact, there aren't any basketball markers at all. For years, the only sports markers in the hoops-crazy Tar Heel State were those mentioning horse racing, or visits by Babe Ruth and Jim Thorpe.

That changed two years ago when the committee approved marker L-105, which honors the site of the original Charlotte Speedway, the facility that hosted the first Strictly Stock NASCAR race in 1949. Committee members were swayed by one of their own, NASCAR scholar and UNC Asheville history professor Dan Pierce, who opened their eyes to the billion-dollar impact the sport has on North Carolina, and set the precedent for the forthcoming North Wilkesboro marker.

"We believe they help bring us into a modern age in a modern-day North Carolina," said Michael Hill, research supervisor for the North Carolina Office of Archives and History. "For now, we think we've taken the right steps with the old Charlotte Speedway and the North Wilkesboro track."

Mardsen's group, called Save the Speedway, has bigger plans. They're trying to pull together funds to build a granite monument, which would bear the names of race winners at North Wilkesboro as well as a passage from Thomas Wolfe's The Last American Hero, a chronicle of Wilkes County resident and NASCAR legend Junior Johnson. The top of the monument would be slanted, banked at the same 14-degree angle as the corners of the racetrack.

And then there's the grand dream, the restoration of the facility itself. Racetrack magnates Bruton Smith and Bob Bahre bought North Wilkesboro in 1996, and split its two Cup dates between their respective venues in Fort Worth, Texas, and Loudon, N.H. With a few exceptions, such as a Roush Racing reality show, it's sat quiet ever since. Johnson once explored pulling together a group of investors to buy the track, but the idea never came to fruition.

The property is for sale, listed through North Wilkesboro's United Country Johnson Realty for $12 million. But thus far, Mardsen has found no takers.

"The problem that we have is the price," he said. "That's been the sticking point ever since Day 1. Twelve million dollars is a high price tag, especially considering the work that needs to be done. We have estimates on everything that needs to be done as far as resurfacing and renovating and everything, and I think if the price was right, it could be a feasible venture for somebody. But I just don't think it's going to happen for $12 million."

Right now, a highway marker will have to suffice. North Wilkesboro's legacy will live on in etched metal, even if its doors remain shut.