kids encyclopedia robot

Wendell Scott facts for kids

Kids Encyclopedia Facts
Quick facts for kids
Wendell Scott
WendellScottRetiredNASCARDriver.jpg
Born Wendell Oliver Scott
(1921-08-29)August 29, 1921
Danville, Virginia
Died December 23, 1990(1990-12-23) (aged 69)
Danville, Virginia
Cause of death Spinal cancer
Achievements First African-American in NASCAR
First African-American winner in the Grand National Series
Awards International Motorsports Hall of Fame (1999)
NASCAR Hall of Fame (2015)
NASCAR Cup Series career
495 races run over 13 years
Best finish 6th (1966)
First race 1961 Spartanburg 200 (Spartanburg)
Last race 1973 National 500 (Charlotte)
First win 1964 Jacksonville 200 (Jacksonville)
Wins Top tens Poles
1 147 1
NASCAR Grand National East Series career
17 races run over 2 years
Best finish 7th (1972)
First race 1972 Bold City 200 (Jacksonville)
Last race 1973 Buddy Shuman 100 (Hickory)
Wins Top tens Poles
0 5 0

Wendell Oliver Scott (August 29, 1921 – December 23, 1990) was an American stock car racing driver. He was one of the first African-American drivers in NASCAR and the first African-American to win a race in the Grand National Series, NASCAR's highest level.

Scott began his racing career in local circuits and obtained his NASCAR license in around 1953, making him the first African-American ever to compete in NASCAR. He debuted in the Grand National Series on March 4, 1961, in Spartanburg, South Carolina. On December 1, 1963, he won a Grand National Series race at Speedway Park in Jacksonville, Florida, becoming the first black driver to win a race at NASCAR's premier level. Scott's career was repeatedly affected by racial prejudice and problems with top-level NASCAR officials. He was posthumously inducted into the NASCAR Hall of Fame in 2015.

Early life

Scott was born in Danville, Virginia, a town dominated by cotton mills and tobacco-processing plants. Scott vowed as a youth to avoid such labor, and began learning auto mechanics from his father, who worked as a driver and mechanic for two well-to-do white families. Scott also raced bicycles against white children in the neighborhood. As a teen he dropped out of high school, became a taxi driver, and served as a mechanic in the segregated Army in Europe during World War II. He married Mary Coles in 1943; they had seven children.

After the war, he ran an auto-repair shop. As a sideline, he took up the dangerous and illegal pursuit of running moonshine whiskey. The police caught Scott once, in 1949. Sentenced to three years probation, he continued making his late-night whiskey runs.

Racing career

In 1951, the officials at the Dixie Circuit, a regional racing organization, decided to recruit a Black driver as a marketing gimmick. Scott was recruited for this purpose and participated in his first race at the Danville Speedway.

In search of more opportunities, Scott repaired his car with the help of a black mechanic, Hiram Kincaid, and towed it to a NASCAR-sanctioned event in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. Upon arrival, NASCAR officials refused to let him compete due to his race. A few days later he went to another NASCAR event in High Point, North Carolina and received the same result. Scott decided to avoid NASCAR for the time being and race with the Dixie Circuit and at other non-NASCAR speedways. He won his first race at Lynchburg, Virginia, only twelve days into his racing career.

Scott ran as many as five events a week, mostly at Virginia tracks. Some prejudiced drivers would wreck him deliberately though his expertise also won him white fans, even amongst his fellow drivers. These other drivers would serve as his bodyguards at events with racist fans.

Scott began the 1953 season on the Northern Virginia circuit after winning a feature race in Staunton. He subsequently tied the Waynesboro qualifying record and won the Waynesboro feature race. The Waynesboro News Virginian reported that Scott had become "recognized as one of the most popular drivers to appear here." The Staunton News Leader said he "has been among the top drivers in every race here."

In 1954, Scott towed his racecar to a local NASCAR event at the Richmond Speedway and asked the steward, Mike Poston, to grant him a NASCAR license. Poston, a part-timer, was not a powerful figure in NASCAR's hierarchy, but he did have the authority to issue licenses. Scott's license was approved and he became the first Black driver in NASCAR.

Scott won dozens of races during his nine years in regional-level competition. In 1959 he won two championships. NASCAR awarded him the championship title for drivers of sportsman-class stock cars in the state of Virginia, and he also won the track championship in the sportsman class at Richmond's Southside Speedway.

In 1961, he moved up to the Grand National Series. He achieved the most points for a debutant in 1961. In the 1964 season, he finished 15th in points, and on December 1 of that year, driving a Chevrolet Bel Air that he purchased from Ned Jarrett, he won a race on the half-mile dirt track at Speedway Park in Jacksonville, Florida—the first Grand National event won by an African-American. Scott passed Richard Petty, who was driving an ailing car, with 25 laps remaining for the win. Scott was not announced as the winner of the race at the time. Buck Baker, the second-place driver, was initially declared the winner, but race officials discovered two hours later that Scott had not only won, but was two laps in front of the rest of the field. NASCAR awarded Scott the win two years later, but his family never received the trophy he had earned until 2021 – nearly 58 years after the race, and 31 years after Scott had died.

He continued to be a competitive driver despite his low-budget operation through the rest of the 1960s. Despite his successes, he never received commercial sponsorship. In 1964, Scott finished 12th in points despite missing several races. Over the next five years, Scott consistently finished in the top ten in the point standings. He finished 11th in points in 1965, was a career-high 6th in 1966, 10th in 1967, and finished 9th in both 1968 and 1969. His top year in winnings was 1969 when he won $47,451.

Scott was forced to retire due to injuries from a racing accident at Talladega, Alabama in 1973, although he did make one more start at the 1973 National 500 in which he finished 12th place. He achieved one win and 147 top ten finishes in 495 career Grand National starts.

Scott died on December 23, 1990 in Danville, Virginia, having suffered from spinal cancer.

Legacy

Wendell Scott 34 Chevrolet NASCAR Hall of Fame
A 1962 Chevrolet built by Scott for the movie Greased Lightning on display at the NASCAR Hall of Fame

The film Greased Lightning, starring Richard Pryor as Scott, was loosely based on Scott's biography.

Mojo Nixon, a fellow Danville native, wrote a tribute song titled "The Ballad of Wendell Scott", which appears on Nixon and Skid Roper's 1986 album, Frenzy.

Scott was inducted as a member of the 2000 class of The Virginia Sports Hall of Fame and Museum located in Portsmouth, VA. He also has a street named after him in his hometown of Danville.

Only seven other African-American drivers are known to have started at least one race in what is now the Cup Series: Elias Bowie, Charlie Scott, George Wiltshire, Randy Bethea, Willy T. Ribbs, Bill Lester, and most recently Bubba Wallace.

As reported in the Washington Post, filmmaker John W. Warner began directing a documentary about Scott, titled The Wendell Scott Story, which was to be released in 2003 with narration by the filmmaker's father, former U.S. Senator John Warner but instead Warner created a four-set DVD entitled American Stock: The Golden Era of NASCAR: 1936-to-1971 which documents many racers including Scott. The film included interviews with fellow race-car drivers, including Richard Petty.

Scott is prominently featured in the 1975 book The World's Number One, Flat-Out, All-Time Great Stock Car Racing Book, written by Jerry Bledsoe.

In April 2012, Scott was nominated for inclusion in the NASCAR Hall of Fame, and was selected for induction in the 2015 class, in May 2014. In January 2013, Scott was awarded his own historical marker in Danville, Virginia. The marker's statement is, “Persevering over prejudice and discrimination, Scott broke racial barriers in NASCAR, with a 13-year career that included 20 top five and 147 top ten finishes.” Scott was inducted into the NASCAR Hall of Fame on January 30, 2015.

Loosely based on him, a fictionalized version of Scott was given a minor role in the 2017 Pixar film Cars 3. He is portrayed by Isiah Whitlock Jr. in the form of an anthropomorphized car, with his name changed to River Scott.

A fictionalized version of Scott early in his career in 1955 was featured heavily on Timeless episode 2, season 2. Portrayed by Joseph Lee Anderson, Scott's history as a smuggler, mechanical and driving ability, perseverance, and past and future injustices due to racial discrimination were major themes of the episode.

Motorsports career results

NASCAR

(key) (Bold – Pole position awarded by qualifying time. Italics – Pole position earned by points standings or practice time. * – Most laps led.)

Grand National Series

NASCAR Grand National Series results
Year Team No. Make 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 NGNC Pts Ref
1961 Scott Racing 87 Chevy CLT JSP DAY DAY DAY PIF
17
AWS HMS ATL GPS 32nd 4726
34 HBO
13
BGS
11
MAR
24
NWS
15
CLB
11
HCY RCH MAR
15
DAR CLT CLT RSD ASP CLT PIF BIR GPS BGS
21
NOR
10
HAS
9
STR
8
DAY ATL CLB MBS BRI
24
NSV BGS
7
AWS
24
RCH
16
SBO
16
DAR HCY RCH
14
CSF ATL MAR
28
NWS
13
CLT
22
BRI
16
GPS
8
HBO
15
1962 CON
14
AWS DAY DAY DAY CON
8
AWS
12
SVH
7
HBO
12
RCH
18
CLB
16
NWS
27
GPS
4
MBS
9
MAR
14
BGS
16
BRI
8
RCH
8
HCY
16
CON
3
DAR PIF CLT
30
ATL BGS
6
AUG
9
RCH
14
SBO
10
DAY CLB
9
ASH
9
GPS
3
AUG SVH
8
MBS
7
BRI
19
CHT
12
NSV
15
HCY
15
RCH
21
DTS
7
AUG
5
MAR
19
NWS
28
CLT ATL 22nd 9906
89 HUN
14
AWS
14
STR
12
BGS
9
PIF
11
VAL
7
DAR
1963 34 BIR GGS THS
10
RSD
18
DAY DAY
25
DAY
26
PIF
5
AWS
12
HBO
23
ATL
DNQ
HCY
8
BRI
19
AUG
10
RCH
9
GPS
23
SBO
7
BGS
7
MAR
25
NWS
21
CLB
7
THS
8
DAR ODS
13
RCH
9
CLT
20
BIR
7
ATL
20
DAY
14
MBS
16
SVH
13
DTS
14
BGS
13
ASH
9
OBS
9
BRR
16
BRI GPS
10
NSV
11
CLB
9
AWS
11
PIF
15
BGS
11
ONA
16
DAR HCY
25
RCH
14
MAR
18
DTS
11
NWS
15
THS
13
CLT
16
SBO
12
HBO
11
RSD 15th 14814
1964 CON
17
AUG
18
JSP
1
SVH
15
RSD
DNQ
DAY DAY
20
DAY
38
RCH
24
BRI
19
GPS
13
BGS
12
ATL AWS
13
HBO
7
PIF
9
CLB
14
NWS
16
MAR
10
SVH DAR 12th 19574
Ford LGY
4
HCY
9
SBO
7
CLT
9
GPS
12
ASH
6
ATL
12
CON
4
NSV
7
CHT
12
BIR
9
VAL
4
PIF
4
DAY
17
ODS
18
OBS
9
BRR
23
ISP
11
GLN
12
LIN
4
BRI
27
NSV
16
MBS
6
AWS
9
ONA
22
CLB
7
BGS
18
STR
17
DAR
DNQ
HCY
9
RCH
21
ODS
6
HBO
4
MAR
26
SVH
5
NWS
14
CLT
22
HAR
6
AUG
27
JAC
11
55 Chevy DTS
8
1965 34 Ford RSD DAY DAY
7
DAY
20
PIF
8
AWS
17
RCH
20
HBO
23
ATL
35
GPS
10
NWS
11
MAR
16
CLB
9
BRI
5
DAR
15
LGY
7
BGS
6
HCY
8
CCF
13
ASH
14
HAR
9
NSV
4
BIR
14
ATL
9
GPS
7
MBS
16
VAL
15
DAY
13
ODS
21
OBS ISP
7
GLN
14
BRI
7
NSV
13
CCF
11
AWS
8
SMR
13
PIF
4
AUG
9
CLB
8
DTS
14
BLV
5
BGS
16
DAR
DNQ
HCY
19
LIN
11
ODS
22
RCH
7
MAR
25
NWS
13
CLT
31
HBO
14
CAR
20
DTS
22
11th 19902
Fred Goad 70 Ford CLT
26
Clay Eastridge 57 Ford DAR
10
1966 Scott Racing 34 Ford AUG
14
RSD DAY DAY
14
DAY
13
CAR
33
BRI
8
ATL HCY
14
CLB
9
GPS
20
BGS
18
NWS
4
MAR
18
DAR
DNQ
LGY
7
MGR
15
MON
3
RCH
14
CLT
7
DTS
5
ASH
6
PIF
18
SMR
17
AWS
12
BLV
31
GPS DAY
19
ODS
10
BRR
12
OXF
12
FON
9
ISP
13
BRI
27
SMR
12
NSV
9
ATL
7
CLB
13
AWS
6
BLV
14
BGS
6
DAR
24
HCY
6
RCH
7
HBO
8
MAR
38
NWS
11
CLT
17
6th 21702
25 DAR
26
Pistone Racing 59 Ford CAR
35
1967 Scott Racing 34 Ford AUG
11
RSD DAY DAY
19
DAY
15
AWS
10
BRI
9
GPS
10
BGS
9
ATL
40
CLB
6
HCY
11
NWS
13
MAR
21
SVH
6
RCH
20
DAR
12
BLV
11
LGY
6
CLT
18
ASH MGR
9
SMR
20
BIR
11
CAR
30
GPS
21
MGY
18
DAY
20
TRN
13
OXF
13
FDA
13
ISP
12
SMR
14
NSV
12
ATL
14
BGS
8
CLB
10
SVH DAR
22
HCY
28
RCH
6
BLV
17
HBO
27
MAR
13
NWS
11
CAR
18
AWS
25
10th 20700
Ron Stotten 94 Chevy BRI
21
GC Spencer Racing 49 Plymouth CLT
28
1968 Scott Racing 34 Ford MGR
27
MGY
11
RSD
DNQ
DAY
17
RCH
9
ATL
25
HCY
19
GPS
8
CLB
13
NWS
14
MAR
19
AUG
8
AWS
23
BLV
23
LGY
12
CLT
23
ASH
17
MGR
11
SMR
11
BIR
12
CAR
18
GPS
8
DAY
24
ISP
11
OXF
10
FDA
8
TRN
12
BRI
19
SMR
26
NSV
22
ATL
DNQ
CLB
8
BGS
8
AWS
9
SBO
14
LGY
15
DAR
15
HCY
15
RCH
13
BLV
10
HBO
19
MAR
15
NWS
16
AUG
21
CLT
19
CAR
27
JFC
14
9th 2685
GC Spencer Racing 50 Plymouth BRI
15
Roy Tyner 09 Chevy DAR
13
Gray Racing 19 Ford ATL
27
1969 Scott Racing 34 Ford MGR
13
MGY
19
RSD DAY
26
DAY DAY
29
CAR
20
AUG
14
BRI
17
CLB
12
HCY
13
GPS
11
RCH
24
NWS
15
MAR
12
AWS
10
DAR
15
BLV
9
LGY
10
CLT
35
MGR
11
SMR
22
MCH
12
KPT
10
GPS
12
NCF
6
DOV
7
TPN
21
TRN
13
BLV
21
BRI
19
NSV
11
SMR
14
ATL
19
MCH
27
SBO
9
BGS
9
AWS
12
DAR
17
HCY
16
RCH
8
TAL
Wth
CLB
8
MAR
19
NWS
19
SVH
14
AUG
17
CAR
9
JFC
14
MGR
14
TWS
18
9th 3015
Dennis Holt 23 Ford ATL
27
Robertson Racing DAY
39
GC Spencer Racing 8 Plymouth CLT
17
1970 Scott Racing 34 Ford RSD DAY DAY DAY RCH
10
CAR
8
SVH
9
ATL
15
BRI
21
TAL
20
NWS
24
CLB
11
DAR
16
BLV
9
LGY
10
CLT SMR
9
MAR
12
MCH
20
HCY
10
KPT
6
GPS
11
DAY
26
AST
8
TPN
20
HCY
19
DOV
36
NCF
20
NWS
15
CLT MAR
DNQ
MGR
21
CAR
20
LGY
19
14th 2425
George Wiltshire Dodge RSD
35
Brooks Racing 26 Ford TRN
25
34 BRI
18
Robertson Racing Plymouth SMR
25
NSV
29
ATL
31
CLB
12
ONA
15
MCH
22
TAL
22
BGS
11
SBO
17
DAR
17
RCH
16
1971 Scott Racing 34 Ford RSD DAY DAY
20
DAY
DNQ
ONT RCH
23
CAR
15
HCY
15
BRI
15
ATL CLB
14
GPS
21
SMR
24
NWS
21
MAR
17
DAR
13
SBO
10
TAL
19
ASH
14
KPT
6
CLT DOV
27
MCH RSD HOU GPS
8
DAY BRI AST
7
ISP
11
TRN
19
NSV
20
ATL
21
BGS
25
ONA
13
MCH
23
TAL
DNQ
CLB
12
HCY
17
DAR
20
MAR
DNQ
DOV
20
CAR
21
MGR
14
RCH
28
TWS
21
19th 2180
Garn Racing 96 Chevy TAL
26
Eddie Yarboro 13 Plymouth MAR
23
Cunningham-Kelley 07 Chevy CLT
41
Scott Racing 26 Ford NWS
17

Winston Cup Series

NASCAR Winston Cup Series results
Year Team No. Make 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 NWCC Pts Ref
1972 Scott Racing 34 Ford RSD DAY
DNQ
RCH ONT
DNQ
CAR
DNQ
ATL
DNQ
BRI DAR NWS MAR
16
TAL
DNQ
DOV
20
MCH
DNQ
RSD TWS
32
DAY BRI TRN
20
ATL
DNQ
TAL MCH NSV DAR RCH DOV
16
MAR NWS CLT CAR TWS 40th 1317.5
Howard & Egerton Racing Chevy CLT
22
1973 Scott Racing Ford RSD DAY RCH CAR BRI ATL NWS DAR
14
MAR 61st
Mercury TAL
55
NSV CLT DOV TWS RSD MCH DAY BRI ATL TAL NSV DAR RCH DOV NWS MAR
Faustina Racing 5 Dodge CLT
12
CAR
Daytona 500
Year Team Manufacturer Start Finish
1963 Scott Racing Chevrolet 41 26
1964 40 38
1965 Ford 14 20
1966 28 13
1967 38 15
1968 42 17
1969 49 29
1971 Scott Racing Ford DNQ
1972 DNQ
kids search engine
Wendell Scott Facts for Kids. Kiddle Encyclopedia.