Bill Elliott was well up to the long journey
Tom Higgins
ThatsRacin.com
The incredible, "Only-In-America" journey began in 1976 in an abandoned, dusty schoolhouse in the mountains of North Georgia.
The trip took 12 years, eventually leading to the stage in a glittering Grand Ballroom at the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel in New York.
"It has been a long road," Bill Elliott said with a sigh, and then a smile, just prior to being honored as NASCAR's Winston Cup Series champion in early December of 1988.
"Lordy, who would ever have thought it would come to this?" continued the lanky, red-headed driver who someone once said looks like Huckleberry Finn and sounds like Gomer Pyle. "Certainly not me."
During the past quarter-century perhaps only the late Alan Kulwicki, big-time stock car racing's 1992 title winner, appreciated becoming the sport's champion as much as Bill Elliott. Recollection of Elliott's triumph and exciting week as the honoree in Manhattan returns to mind because the major NASCAR teams presently are there again for the annual post-season awards program, this time to officially crown Jimmie Johnson and his Hendrick Motorsports team as the points winners for the second straight year.
Elliott openly, frankly conceded that he just might be NASCAR's most incongruous champion during his sport's so-called modern era, which began in 1973.
"It's simply hard to imagine that we did it," continued Elliott, speaking of his Ford team owned by Michigan industrialist Harry Melling and led by Bill's brothers, Ernie and Dan. "Especially when I look back to the years we were trying to break in from 1976 through '81.
"We were usin' the ol' Riverview Elementary School in Dahlonega (Ga.) as a shop. Our daddy, George Elliott, had lined it up for us to use 'cause we rented it cheap and it was convenient to our hometown, Dawsonville.
"We had dreams back then, of course, like all young racers do. But for us to think about coming to New York in the capacity as champions? Why, we might as well have thought about going to Mars. It seemed light-years away for us."
George and Martha Elliott, both now deceased, owned a small Ford dealership in Dawsonville. George had a fondness for speed, and his sons inherited it.
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