Before Talladega Roared

Look beyond the banking for a moment. What was this ground used for before the first race?

Before the banking rose above the Alabama countryside, aircraft had used this ground. The place that became Talladega Superspeedway belonged to an earlier chapter of American speed: the military airfield known as Anniston Army Airfield and later Anniston Air Force Base. The Encyclopedia of Alabama identifies that former installation as the site chosen for the raceway. It also records old runway pavement being used for infield parking. [1]

That changes the way a visitor can look at the place. The track was not simply drawn onto an empty map. It was another use for ground already shaped by public investment, transport and war. Today’s municipal airport remains beside the speedway, but that does not make every present runway a surviving wartime runway. The city describes a separate, adjoining airport property. [2]

A place someone could see differently

The speedway’s own history credits Anniston insurance executive Bill Ward with helping Bill France find the Alabama site. Land, interstate access and the population within reach all mattered. A meeting with Talladega officials followed in 1966; a visit to Daytona helped them imagine what a major race could mean for their own community. Financing still had to be found. [3]

Construction began May 23, 1968, on a 2,000-acre site. France wanted a bigger, faster racing place. The result was a 2.66-mile tri-oval, with turns banked as steeply as 33 degrees. The first race, the Bama 400, took place September 13, 1969, and Ken Rush won. Richard Brickhouse won the first Grand National race the following day. The original name was Alabama International Motor Speedway; Talladega Superspeedway became its name in 1989. [1] [3]

The men who would not race

The opening was also an argument about who had to bear the risk. Tires were failing at the speeds the new track made possible. The Professional Drivers’ Association, with Richard Petty as its president, became the vehicle for drivers’ opposition. Many leading drivers withdrew. France assembled a field from those who remained and drivers from the other division racing that weekend. The race went ahead. [4]

NASCAR’s published excerpt from H. A. Branham’s biography of France describes scheduled caution periods that allowed tire inspection and replacement. That detail matters more than a simple story of courage overcoming fear. The organizer had a new facility and a race to run; drivers had a direct stake in whether the tires could survive it. Completing the race without a serious incident did not make their concerns imaginary. The excerpt comes from an official biography of France and should be read with that perspective in mind. [4]

Speed brought another reckoning

In 1987, Bobby Allison’s car became airborne and struck the catch fencing. The accident helped bring about measures to reduce speeds, including the restrictor-plate era at the fastest tracks. Talladega’s engineering history is therefore also a history of limits: what a car can do, what a tire can withstand, and what spectators should be exposed to. These were material questions, not just matters of sporting spectacle. [5]

Across the road, a different beginning

Talladega Short Track has its own story. Its official history dates its opening to April 29, 1977, under promoter Alfred Gurley, and describes its beginning as a flat limestone motorcycle track. World of Outlaws places the venue across the street and east of the superspeedway, in Eastaboga. It records Gurley and Lynn “Preacher” Phillips purchasing the property together in 1980. [6] [7]

The two names belong near each other on a visitor’s itinerary, but they are not interchangeable. One story centers on a huge paved speedway; the other on a separate short-track operation. Separate schedules, admissions and entrances matter just as much as the shared racing identity.

What about the curse stories?

A 2009 report circulated a track statement about a blessing performed by Creek medicine man Robert Thrower. That is evidence of a reported ceremony and of the stories people were telling about the speedway. It does not establish that the raceway was built over a burial ground, or that a supernatural cause lay behind accidents. [8]

This account has not established a burial site beneath the circuit through archaeological or tribal records. Nor has it reconstructed ownership of each parcel before the airfield. Those are open research questions, not gaps to fill with a dramatic legend. Native history deserves evidence and care; the people injured or killed in racing deserve more than being turned into supporting characters in a ghost story.

For a camper looking across the infield, there is already plenty of real history to consider: an airfield, a difficult investment, earth moved into immense banks, drivers willing to walk away, and another racing community growing across the road. The place is more interesting when those different lives remain visible.

Talladega camper help · Upcoming Talladega dates