{"id":2566,"date":"2017-12-09T08:00:51","date_gmt":"2017-12-09T13:00:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/?p=2566"},"modified":"2017-12-08T20:09:34","modified_gmt":"2017-12-09T01:09:34","slug":"hometowns-nascar-stars","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/2017\/12\/09\/hometowns-nascar-stars\/","title":{"rendered":"The Hometowns of Some of NASCAR Stars"},"content":{"rendered":"
It’s been over a week and the tracks are dark.\u00a0 Drivers and team members have all returned to their hometowns to re-energize their batteries for the 2018 season.\u00a0 NASCAR drivers’ hometowns scatter across the country and, in a few cases, the world.\u00a0 Many of these places are relatively unknown to the masses\u2014unknown, perhaps, but interesting nonetheless. \u00a0It seems in every small town there are\u00a0stories about who lived there past or present, or what has happened since. Many NASCAR stars’ hometowns have their fair share of wonderful and interesting stories.\u00a0\u00a0Here are a few.<\/div>\n

Hometowns of Some of NASCAR Stars<\/h1>\n

Dawsonville, Georgia<\/strong><\/h3>\n
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Any list of NASCAR driver\u2019s hometown must start at the headwaters of NASCAR.\u00a0 This small city with a population of less than 2,500 has produced many NASCAR stars.\u00a0 All NASCAR fans are familiar with Bill “Awesome Bill of Dawsonville” Elliott and his son and current rookie Chase Elliott<\/a>. \u00a0But they are not alone, nor are they the entire story.<\/div>\n
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Early stars, Roy Hall, Raymond Parks and Lloyd Seay were part of a group of moonshine runners.\u00a0\u00a0 They took their Ford V8 powered cars through the dirt country roads delivering the moonshine stilled in the hills of Georgia to the thirsty bunch in Atlanta.\u00a0 The speed and mobility of their cars made them nearly impossible for law enforcement to capture.\u00a0 Soon they began to hold races in farm pastures in the area with spectators standing unprotected around the track. NASCAR was born.\u00a0 Moonshine runners are no longer in Georgia but the proud tradition of stock car racing is as strong as ever here.<\/div>\n
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Cato, New York<\/strong><\/h3>\n
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A small village in Western New York is the home of Regan Smith<\/a>.\u00a0 Cato was born from a Vermonter who started a Mill there.\u00a0 Like most towns, Cato has had its share of major fires.\u00a0 In 1918, an entire block was lost in a devastating fire.\u00a0 The Cato Fire Department owes its existence to this fire as the village understood the need for a more formal firefighting operation than its informal bucket brigade.<\/div>\n
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Rochester Hills, Michigan<\/strong><\/h3>\n
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You would think that Brad Keselowski<\/a> would be far and away the most famous person from this small city in Southeast Michigan.\u00a0 In fact, it\u2019s not even close. Madonna Louise Ciccone\u2014yes, that<\/em> Madonna\u2014was born in 1958 and moved to Rochester Hills shortly after.\u00a0 Finishing second to Madonna is no small feat, though.\u00a0 Rochester Hills, a suburb of Detroit, was also home to four Major League Baseball players and a boy named Marshall Bruce Mathers III. \u00a0You\u00a0may know him as entertainer Eminem.\u00a0 What\u2019s in the water there?<\/div>\n
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Roscoe, Illinois<\/strong><\/h3>\n
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Danica Patrick was raised in this suburb of Rockford and has a population of just under 6,250 people.\u00a0 There is a museum in Roscoe which until recently held the tombstone of Lee Harvey Oswald, the assassin of President John F. Kennedy.\u00a0 The funny thing is the tombstone was stolen from Oswald\u2019s grave and the rightful owners soon claimed that the person who sold the tombstone to the museum was not authorized to do so.\u00a0 The fight over the tombstone appears to be over as it no longer is displayed at the museum and has been returned to Dallas, Texas.<\/div>\n
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Enumclaw, Washington<\/strong><\/h3>\n
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Kasey Kahne<\/a> calls Enumclaw home.\u00a0 Enumclaw gets its name from Native Americans which translate into \u201cplace of evil spirits\u201d.\u00a0 A Native American mythology story says a father turned his two sons into thunder and lightning.\u00a0 The name Enumclaw means thundering noise.\u00a0 But the area may be most famous\u2014or infamous\u2014for the 2015 sex case in which an aerospace engineer was killed after having sex with a horse.\u00a0 Maybe the old question about a rocket scientist is overstated?<\/div>\n
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Los Gatos, California<\/strong><\/h3>\n
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This is the hometown of AJ Allmendinger.\u00a0 AJ better win some races if he wants to continue to call Los Gatos home as it was listed as the 33rd wealthiest city in the United States according to Bloomberg Business Week.\u00a0 The next time you rent a movie from Netflix, think of Los Gatos, which is the entertainment giant’s headquarters.\u00a0 Also, Author John Steinbeck wrote \u201cThe Grapes of Wrath\u201d while living there.<\/div>\n
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Riverton, Illinois<\/strong><\/h3>\n
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NASCAR Xfinity Driver and good guy\u00a0Justin Allgaier hales from this small town in rural Illinois.\u00a0 Like most Midwestern towns, Riverton was formed around a mill and later a distillery.\u00a0 It seemed to be a favorite hideout of sorts for some very famous criminals. Train robber Jessie James once spent the night in town before robbing a bank in Minnesota the following day.\u00a0It is also said that mobster Al Capone used Riverton as one of his hideouts.\u00a0 It’s hard to believe a town with such a soiled past could produce such a nice guy as Allgaier.<\/div>\n
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St. Helena, California<\/strong><\/h3>\n
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Rising star and Camping World Truck Series racer Rico Abreu is from here.\u00a0 Nestled in the wine country of California, St. Helena is not for you if you\u2019re a fast food junkie.\u00a0 Chain restaurants are not allowed and only one exists as it was there before the local law was enacted.\u00a0 Definitely not the \u201cHome of the Whopper\u201d.<\/div>\n
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Hinckley, Ohio<\/strong><\/h3>\n
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Xfinity Series driver Matt Tifft calls Hinckley home.\u00a0 What\u2019s interesting about Hinckley is that they celebrate buzzards, also known as turkey vultures.\u00a0 You see, buzzards flock to this area every March 15th as if on some sort of biological clock.\u00a0 The town began celebrating the arrivals of these birds in the 1950\u2019s and today more than 50,000 visitors arrive to celebrate the arrival of these birds.\u00a0 Visitors partake in hikes, storytelling and arts and crafts.<\/div>\n
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Corning, California<\/strong><\/h3>\n
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Xfinity Series driver Tyler Reddick is a rising star in NASCAR and certainly a person to watch in the future.\u00a0 His hometown of Corning is famous for its olives.\u00a0 Corning is home to Bell-Carter Food Inc., the second largest olive producer in the United States.\u00a0 Since 1946 the city has held its annual Olive Festival, the longest-running olive festival in the United States. The festival includes such activities as a bed race and a pancake breakfast.\u00a0 But my favorite is the olive pit-spitting contest.\u00a0 In case you were wondering, this year\u2019s winning spit was a distance of 25 feet 3 inches.\u00a0 No word if this was wind-aided.<\/div>\n

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Main image credit:
\nEmbed from Getty Images<\/a>