Introduction and Overview of Iconic Cars

We just got this just a little over a month ago. This car will be able to tell the story about what Bill Elliot did forever. This is an authentic car. It actually finished second in the 1996 Daytona 500. I don't think this museum gets talked about enough for what it is. There's a lot of really neat stuff in here. You got a whole confiscated parts section in here. This How could you just walk right by this? I knew you would stop. This is the coolest cabinet in here. I knew you would stop. Well, it's sort of a hidden treasure here at Darlington. Not only were we the original super speedway 1950, we've got one of the earlier stock car museums here. Bill Elliot and the Elliot brothers, they were extremely nervous because no one had ever gone for a million dollars uh in our sport to win one race. And he had won two of the first three crown jewel events. Uh that was the Daytona 500 and the Winston 500 at Tallaladega where he made up almost two laps there under green. Um didn't win Charlotte. So, he came here with a chance to win a million. The first year of the program that Winston offered the the million-dollar bonus. And when they were putting this thing together, they put the number up here backwards by mistake. And it was said that they were just so nervous about it. And again, that race, Bill was not the fastest. Dale Nhard was faster, Kale Yarbor was faster, Harry Gant was faster, but all had trouble. and he wound up winning the million dollars, which was a as you can see back behind there, there's a there's a lot of symbolic um photography that sort of details that day. This is something pretty cool. We we talked about the Bill Elliot car earlier. This was one of the bills um one of the bills that was, you know, blown in victory lane after Bill Elliot won the race. So, I had this this $1 million bill. And so, what I did, I got I copied it on the back and I got Bill to sign it. But, it was a big- time day for the sport of NASCAR. It put Bill Elliot on the cover of Sports Illustrated. Um, it was it was something, especially the folks that were here that, you know, we will never forget. I was a I was a kid in the grandstand that day. I look at these cars, whether they're recreated or they're not, to me, they are just really, really cool because these machines get to tell the story when the drivers, we as humans, leave this earth. So, this car will be able to tell the story about what Bill Elliot did forever. Um, and so that's why I really love our museum…