DARLINGTON, S.C. -- There was not a more conflicted relationship in NASCAR than the one between Darlington Raceway and the man who built it. When Harold Brasington stopped by to visit, he would park his rock-hauling truck in the wide median of the adjacent four-lane highway, as if being careful not to intrude. He bought his own tickets. Occasionally he would get in his Buick, drive through the infield tunnel to visit with a few veteran drivers he remembered fondly, and go home to watch the race.

He had constructed this place through his own means and his own vision, visiting civic clubs in an attempt to raise capital, facing criticism from his own preacher for running his bulldozer on Sundays. It was 1933 when Brasington visited Indianapolis Motor Speedway, and he returned convinced that he could build a similarly great speedway in his own hometown. It took years, but eventually he did just that -- striking the deal for the land, carving the egg-shaped oval out of a peanut field, building the racetrack that in 1950 would host NASCAR's inaugural 500-mile event.

"The man had a vision that was incomprehensible to any other person on this earth," said Harold King, a longtime Darlington resident and track official who knew Brasington. "Here he is, 1933, went to Indianapolis. Ever since that day, the thing has bugged him that we could have a 500 mile race here."

Yet later in life, it was difficult for him just to be at Darlington. And who could blame him? That first Southern 500 had been a historic turning point, a crystallized moment in time, stock-car racing's superspeedway era ushered in by a humble man from South Carolina who made his living hauling gravel and sand. But the finances were never quite right. The tax bills mounted. And over time, Harold Brasington began to slip away from his grand creation -- first by selling his interest, and then by growing estranged from both the racetrack and the series that competed upon it.

Harold Brasington, left, helped design Darlington Raceway without an engineering background.

And in the process, a man who should be celebrated, who should rightly mean to NASCAR what renowned course architects like Donald Ross and Alister MacKenzie mean to golf, has largely been forgotten outside of the simple agricultural town he called home. There's no mention of him in the historical section of NASCAR's media guide, not even in the one paragraph on the first Southern 500. He hasn't been enshrined in the International Motorsports Hall of Fame. Yet his indelible legacy is evident is the big, fast speedways that dominate the Nextel Cup circuit, the kind of venues Brasington dreamed of when everyone was still racing on short tracks and dirt.

No pioneer in this sport is as unsung as Brasington, who also built North Carolina Speedway in Rockingham as well as a handful of smaller tracks, and died 12 years ago at the age of 86. His legacy is largest at Darlington, where he was inducted into the track's hall of fame and his name was bestowed upon the multi-colored grandstand tower rising above Turn 1. But those are relatively recent developments, scattered elements of a reunion that took place later in his life. For the most part, Brasington's relationship with this 1.336-mile oval was complicated, awkward and bittersweet.

"He took me to a couple of races when I was younger," said his grandson, Harold Brasington III. "But all he would do is, we'd get in this big old Buick and drive into the infield through the tunnel. He might go into the pits and talk to some of the older drivers that he liked, people like Richard Petty and Bobby Allison. When I was a youngster in the '70s, those were the drivers I rooted for. He would drive around in the infield for a little and watch the race, and we'd go back home and watch it on television. He never did spend much time there."

He was a man adept at building racetracks even without the benefit of engineering, designing much of Darlington by thumb. The problem arose when he tried to run his facilities the same way. Visitors to his shop remember seeing money kept in a five-gallon jug. At the racetrack, it was kept in a cigar box. He ended up selling his interest in the track so he could reimburse the IRS for unpaid taxes that had accumulated. To build Darlington, he battled skeptics who didn't want the noise and doubters who threw tomatoes at him as he rode his bulldozer. Just four years after it opened, it was no longer his.

"He never really had the business savvy to really hold on to what he created and figure out the business end of it," said Brasington III, who worked with his grandfather on one of his final projects, a drag strip. "He was really very astute when it came to how to get a track built. But he didn't have that kind of keen business sense that Bill France had when it came to NASCAR. My grandfather, he always came up a little bit short on his business endeavors. He really didn't make any financial profit until he was an older fellow with the drag strip, the last project he made. He did make some money, but nothing on the scale of what people make nowadays."

Once he cut his ties with Darlington, a period of quiet bitterness followed. Events went on at the track he had created, and Brasington had nothing to do with them. Other big tracks opened across the country, but the man who risked everything to start the trend remained a relative unknown. He was never recognized for what he had accomplished, against overwhelming odds. "I think that he did have some resentment about that," his grandson said. "But he was the kind of guy who kept looking forward to the next thing. He went on to build at least five more racetracks after that."

The thaw began in 1993, when Jim Hunter, a South Carolina native and former NASCAR reporter who knew Brasington, was installed as the track's president. "We need to get him back out here," he remembers telling his staff. Hunter sent messages to acquaintances of Brasington, including son Harold Jr., encouraging them to tell the track founder that he was welcome back anytime. When Brasington did return, he had a seat waiting for him in the president's box. Even the governor stopped by to pay his respects.

When the track's newest grandstand was opened in 2006, track officials named it the Brasington Tower. "It was the No. 1 priority, to keep his name and what he's done for Darlington alive," track president Chris Browning said at the 2006 unveiling of the 3,000-seat seating area in Turn 1. "That's the No. 1 priority for us. We could have sold the naming rights, we could have done a lot of different things, but we wanted to make sure his name stayed alive and tied to Darlington Raceway. Because we know without him, we would not be here."

Brasington's son Harold Jr., who would pass away a few months later, was at the dedication as well. He was asked if he'd like to see his father remembered in the forthcoming NASCAR Hall of Fame, set to open in 2010. "I would, if they see fit," he said then. "Because what he did here, he put his whole livelihood and effort into this thing. And he never really profited from it. I think he deserves that. Yes. The answer is yes."

Brasington's grandson shares that sentiment. He's been in contact with officials from the Hall of Fame, who have expressed interest in adding some type of Brasington exhibit, a long-overdue tribute to a man who helped fuel NASCAR's national growth. "We certainly would support donating anything they might want to include in that," Harold III said. "I think that might become a reality one day."

The opinions expressed are solely those of the writer.