Dusty Relics of Arkansas History
February 5-11, 2018
Memphis-Arkansas Speedway
By Bob Denman
The Daytona 500 kicks off the NASCAR season each February. Arkansas is full of NASCAR fans but most don’t know the role the state played in the formative years of the organization.
It was originally called Grand National Series and Arkansas was a regular stop for many NASCAR Hall of Fame Drivers. They came to Lehi, a small community just a few miles west of West Memphis, attracted by a large racing purse and one of auto racing’s earliest super speedways – The Memphis/Arkansas Speedway. As many as 20,000 fans paid 50 cents each to see future the future legends of NASCAR race at Lehi.
The track was a mile and a half oval and known far and wide for its steep banking. Seven time NASCAR champion Richard Petty said, “I remember going there a long time ago, we raced there in the summer time and I went with Daddy, the track had a lot of banking.” During the 1954 Mid-South 250 Daddy, Lee Petty, a NASCAR Hall of Famer, led 150 laps before he was passed late in the race by eventual winner Buck Baker, also a member of the hall of fame.
It was a dangerous track. Two racers, Clint McHugh and Cotton Priddy, lost their lives on consecutive days in June of ’56. McHugh, an Iowa native, approached turn three at over 90 miles an hour during qualifying, went over the guard rail and landed upside down in the nearby pond created by the excavation to build up the steep track banking. Priddy lost his life the next day in the feature race in an accident on lap 37. Both deaths were covered extensively by regional and national press.
The track only operated for four seasons. Lehi was hard to find, and sadly the interstate which now runs just a few hundred yards north of the old track, wouldn’t open in time to save the facility. It would have made it, had the owners been willing to pave the track like the Daytona, Talladega and Darlington Speedway track owners did. In fact, had the track owners spent the estimated $100,000 to pave the surface, it would likely remain a popular stop on the NASCAR circuit even today.
The track was eventually abandoned after the ’57 season and sold to Clayton Eubanks who farmed catfish, rice and soybeans in the infield.
Remarkably this piece of NASCAR history is still there, everything intact except the stands which burned down years ago. It’s easy to spot on satellite imagery and easily seen from the interstate, approximately one half mile west of mile marker 271, just a few hundred yards south of Interstate 30.
The old superspeedway in Lehi is a Dusty Relic of both Arkansas and NASCAR history.
PHOTO CAPTION:
When NASCAR was called the Grand National Series, Arkansas was a regular stop for drivers at Lehi’s Memphis/Arkansas Speedway.
(Photo by Tom Lambert via Encyclopedia of Arkansas)
