Once in a lifetime you get to be part of an event that took years to develop. Such was the event in downtown Mooresville, NC on October 5.

Having been part of the drag racing media for the past 40 years, I have had the great honor of photographing and writing about some of the greatest competitors our sport has ever seen. When the board of directors of the NC Drag Racing Hall of Fame decided to honor the achievements of Mr. Rick Hendrick, some only know about the many outstanding honors bestowed upon Hendrick Motorsports and Mr. Hendrick in NASCAR, few know that he actually rose to fame in quarter-mile competition, much of which was of the liquid variety.

When I first became aware of the Hendrick name, it was on the side of a drag boat at the boat drags in High Point, NC on Oak Hollow Lake and the logo was for City Chevrolet. Hendrick Motorsports came along later and began under the name All Star Racing.  With Geoff Bodine driving and hall of fame drag racer Richard Broome as crew chief, immediate winning results were achieved and the rest, as they say, is history.

Few NASCAR fans know that the first win on an oval came with cylinder heads from the one and only Lee Shepherd, also known as one of only a few drivers to win the Pro Stock points title in both IHRA and NHRA. So it was that the Reher & Morrison connection was established.

The famous Camaro that was driven by Lee is now in the possession of Mr. Hendrick and has been restored to its past glory along with the ’82 Camaro. With the resources no longer a problem, Hendrick has honored the past by restoring several drag racing icons such as, the Snake and Mongoose funny cars, Darryl and Jerry Gwynn’s last top fuel car and AA/F altered, respectively. The Dave Strickler ’68 Camaro Z-28 has been acquired, as well as a Sox & Martin ’68 Cuda. In the works are several other pieces of drag racing history, surely to become like new again. Along with these iconic automobiles, are several of the new COPO Camaros, as well as great examples of the original ’69 version.

So on this beautiful day in October a very humble and appreciative Mr. Rick Hendrick became the seventh winner of the Jeff Byrd Memorial Lifetime Achievement Award, named for one of the original gang from the Sports Marketing group at RJ Reynolds that were responsible for putting racing on the map, particularly IHRA, NHRA and NASCAR.

With guidance from Ralph Seagraves, also an inductee into the NC Drag Racing Hall of Fame, Jeff oversaw not only the Reynolds connection in racing but the dramatic transformation of the Bristol Motor Speedway, an achievement Jeff was understandably proud of. But he was, of course, proud of the accomplishments of son, Christian, general manager of the tremendous ZMAX dragway and the only drag strip in the country to have four-wide competition.

Under the guidance of Mr. Jim Turner, executive director, the Hall of Fame has grown from a group of five inductees in that original 2007 class that included Don Carlton, Sox & Martin, Alan Starr, and Danny Johnson, to having a permanent position in Don Miller’s NC Auto Racing Hall of Fame, also in Mooresville. The group will honor its 11th class in February of 2017 that will include: Terry Adams, Jean Howard, Frank Teague, and the one and only Richard Petty. Also honored will be Thomas Pope with the Lifetime Achievement Award, and David Bishop, with the Pioneer Award.  

Also honored, on this day, with a place on the Walk of Fame, in Mooresville, was the founder of Richard Childress Racing, Mr. Richard Childress, and founder of the NC Auto Racing Hall of Fame, Mr. Don Miller, himself very accomplished in racing from the Bonneville Salt Flats to the round tracks of NASCAR. All if all, an unbelievable day and one I will never forget.  Greg Burrow