RELATED: Sam Ard dies at 78
FLORENCE, S.C. — Gold chandeliers and dark wood may have suggested a more somber mood, but subdued wasn’t an apt description of the crowd filling in to pay their final respects to Samuel Julian Ard on Tuesday evening.
Spirited perhaps. But respectful, too.
It was an unusually warm evening, with the sun casting long shadows across the parking lot of the Stoudenmire-Dowling Funeral Home. Outside, folks milled about, some smoking and talking and others simply talking. Traffic moved along out on the highway, sporadic but at a respectful pace as the day was coming to an end.
Inside, they lined up to express their sorrow and offer comfort to the family — widow Agnes Josephine "Jo" Ard, a tiny woman with a big heart; the children Melinda, Joane, Robert and Sharon; and the grandchildren and great grandchildren that make up a big, close-knit family.
"Mama wanted me in dresses and Daddy wanted a wrench in my hand,” Melinda, the eldest of the children, recalled.
They came here to remember and say farewell to Sam Ard, one of the best racers to ever suit up and slip behind the wheel in what is now NASCAR’s XFINITY Series.
Ard, who was 78 and a Pamplico, South Carolina, resident for most of his life, passed away in the early hours of Sunday morning. An Air Force veteran, he served his country during the Vietnam War.
In the early 1980s, Ard was one of a handful of tough and talented local racers who helped breathe life into NASCAR just one rung beneath its top series. While it shared billing with what’s now the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series at places such as Daytona, Darlington, Bristol and Charlotte, the series didn’t stray too far, too often, from its grassroots beginnings.
Hickory and South Boston, Rougemont and Asheville were regular stops in those early years, and drivers such as Ard and Jack Ingram and Larry Pearson and Tommy Houston were among its stars.
The familiar No. 00 Oldsmobile, white with red lettering and sponsored by Thomas Brothers Country Ham, was a frequent sight up front. Ard won 22 races in just 92 career starts and he finished 10th or better 79 times. He was the series’ first two-time champion (1983-84) and finished second in the standings in 1982.
He had eight wins, and the title in hand, when he was injured in a crash early in the ’84 Komfort Koach 200 at North Carolina Motor Speedway. He missed the final race of season, but still outpointed Ingram for the title.
He made no starts the following year and in June of ’85 officially announced his retirement from NASCAR competition.
"Between him and Jack Ingram, you didn’t win a Sportsman race," Dale Earnhardt Jr. recalled Tuesday. "They won everywhere.
"It was incredible to me that they could come out of Asheville or wherever they raced and go to Charlotte, a big mile-and-a-half track, and outrun Robert Gee’s cars, or those Cup cars that all those Cup drivers were competing in. You would think they would get dusted. But Sam could show up and run better than even the Cup guys with Cup-influenced race teams.
"It was incredible the speed that they had, and they had it everywhere, Sam and Jack could compete with anyone on any race track in the Sportsman series back then."
His season win mark of 10, set in 1983, stood for 27 years before Kyle Busch won 13 times in 2010. But Ard’s record of four consecutive wins, also set in ’83, remains the standard for the series.
Ard won at South Boston, Martinsville, Rougemont and Charlotte to establish the consecutive win record.
"The Charlotte race was always a big deal to me because it happened around my birthday," said Earnhardt, who was born Oct. 10, 1974. "I think it was ’82 or ’83, Sam whipped Daddy in the 300. I was so upset because I wanted Dad to win (for) my birthday. I remember watching in the infield with all our family, all the Earnhardts and Eurys. We ran second I think, second or third, but that 00 smoked ’em.
"Unfortunately, it was just after that where he got injured. I raced with his son (Robert) at Myrtle Beach quite a bit and Sam would come around with him. We became friends and I got to see Sam a little bit then."
He was inducted into the National Motorsports Hall of Fame, located on the grounds of Darlington Raceway, in 1999 along with 1992 Monster Energy Cup Series champ Alan Kulwicki.
And on Wednesday, Sam Ard was laid to rest, wearing his Hall of Fame blazer, at Mt. Zion Baptist Church cemetery.
