Jim Paschal

Jim Paschal was born December 5, 1926 and lived in High Point, North Carolina...One of the most successful Winston Cup drivers in the '50s and '60s, he won 12 poles and 25 races, all but two of them (the Coca-Cola World 600s of '64 and '67) on short tracks... won five Grand American races in an AMC Javelin in 1969.

The First Rebel 300's Nascar Convertible Stock Car Race tickets didn't have a rain date on them as most tickets do. It had "next clear day", and that's where the fun started. Because of South Carolina's blue laws a number of things were forbidden on Sunday. One of these things was "bull baiting" which sounded enough like early stock car racing to apply to our water-logged racers, So sure enough, when Sunday rolled around bright and sunny, so did the local police. When faced with thousands of screaming race fans who thought he was going to ruin their day he backed off long enough for Colvin to get in the pace car and get the race underway. But he was waiting on Bob when the pace car rolled back in and served the papers anyway. He must have been pretty shook up because when Colvin checked the papers they were for a bad-check warrant for some one else.

Colvin was just getting his legal affairs in order when his new race blew up in his face. Jim Paschal had just taken over for Ken Rush in his Mercury for what turned out to be the last pit stop for that car forever! Jim spun the car in the fourth turn and collected Buck Baker in the process. Both cars spun to a stop at the exit of the turn, almost completely blocking the track. Buck decided that he would rather be anywhere else and climbed the fence to safety. The caution flag comes out and it's alright---WRONG!!!! The practice in those days was to keep racing until you got to the accident and then slow down. The only trouble with this is the wreck is in the narrow fourth turn and can't be seen until you are right on top of it. The collectible dealers of today would have gotten rich with the sheet metal collected that day as almost the entire field, including Ray Fox chevy

the stars, got caught up in one of the biggest wrecks in Darlington history. After the dust settled two things became clear. First, and most important, no one was injured and second, the crash took out most of the factory-backed front runners. One very notable exception was the blue and white Sunliner Ford of Fireball Roberts. He told later that he had slowed and headed for the grass at the first sign of trouble because following the practice of the day to wait until you came up to the wreck to slow down seemed to always put him in the middle of whatever was going on. After the restart Fireball held the lead, with the exception of a stop for fuel, to win the first super speedway convertible race. A lesser known fact is that Fireball just missed winning the very first super speedway raced for stock cars when he finished second to Johnny Mantz in the first Southern 500 in 1950 at same Darlington Raceway where the Rebel 300 was held.

1970 News Article on Grand American Racing: Down south, Jim Paschal was running a Javelin on NASCAR's Grand American circuit. There are many more races on the GA circuit and for the first part of the season, Paschal kept hanging in there, but Tiny Lund was having an unbelievable streak of good luck and winning race after race. Finally the streak ended and Paschal began to win races and close the gap for the points championship. As of this writing, there are still a few races to go, and it is doubtful that Paschal will be able to catch Tiny Lund, but still it was American Motors most successful year on this circuit. All in all, 1970 must go down as the most successful for American Motors. Can David beat Goliath in 1971… only time will tell.

NASCAR Statistics

421 races run over 23 years.

Best Cup Position: 5th - 1956 (Grand National)

First Race: First race of 1949 season (Charlotte)

Last Race: 1972 World 600 (Charlotte)

First Win: 36th race of 1953 season (Martinsville)

Last Win: 27th race of 1967 season (Montgomery)

Wins Top Tens Poles

25 230 12