Lonsdale Arena, a relatively short-lived high-banked third-mile oval in Yankee, Rhode Island, hosted one of the most important events in stock-car racing history on Oct. 26, 1947.
The late Bill Tuthill, the man who organized it, believed “it was the most significant stock-car race ever run.”
The race, Tuthill said some 35 years later, “opened the way into the sport for everybody, and without it a lot of tracks that were built for midgets would have gone out of business.”
Tuthill was a “midget guy,” part of the huge success the sport enjoyed. Still, he saw signs of trouble ahead. “Big money,” was taking over. He decided to see if stock cars, running with some success on the dirt in the South, could run on small asphalt midget tracks. Lonsdale, with its high banks and 34,000 seats, was the place to do it.
Tuthill paid a young radio guy in Pawtucket, R.I., named Chris Schenkel (who went to national fame) $25 a week to help out and the Providence Journal didn’t hurt, especially when Rhode Island native Sammy Packard became the first entry.
When it became apparent Packard was the only entry, Tuthill called Bill France. France got involved and made the race part of his National Championship Stock Car circuit.
Buddy Shuman, the so-called “King of the Asphalt” signed on first and soon others followed. Race-day fans (an announced crowd of 9,000 paid $1.20 each) saw the likes of Fonty Flock, Red Byron and Junior Samples, all from the deep South, and Tommy Bradshaw, Tommy Coates and Pepper Cunningham, the latter New Jersey racers.
Johnny Brunner, who went on to a long relationship with NASCAR, was the flagman.
Byron won the pole with an 18.5 second run on Saturday with Samples and Shuman posting identical 19.1 runs for second fastest.
Shuman beat Byron in the first heat,with Samples and Cunningham also winning heats. “Pickles” Bicklehaupt won the consi and Long Islander Bill Frick won the “New England Championship” race.
Flock jumped to an early lead and never gave it up in the 30-lap headliner, claiming $625 from the $3,500 purse. He also gained momentum toward the 1947 NCSCC championship. Shuman, Samples, Byron and Bradshaw followed at the checkered flag.
“I remember being very surprised [learning the] crowd figure. I suspected it then and I still suspect that figure. I believe we had more people,” Tuthill told this reporter in 1980.
France and Tuthill split the $1,100 profit.