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Four out of five to Chrysler with only Herb Thomas in Smokey Yunick's Hudson keeping it from being a clean sweep. Race six was running at Columbia, SC, a 1/2 mile dirt track and they were doing 200 laps. Nobody knew that history was about to happen that memorable weekend.

Tim Flock, fresh off a win at Daytona with the new Mercury Outboard Chrysler 300 took a week off at the Savannah, GA race and showed up in Columbia to prove he was a force to be reckoned with. The Flock fans got their money's worth when Tim put his #300 on the pole and they had reason to cheer. Tim had sat out a year from NASCAR after protesting a technical disqualification from the 1954 Daytona and in a reverse of fortune had captured the 1955 Daytona after Fireball Roberts got disqualified from his win. But for the Flock fans there was something else to cheer about.

Seems Ol' Fonty Flock was back to running NASCAR too. Fonty had a little feud with NASCAR and had quit to run for a rival race series, SAFE (Society of Autosport and Fellowship Education). He had just returned in time for Daytona (NASCAR made him post a $1,000 "good faith" bond) and was back in Frank Christians Oldsmobile. Frank had all the Flock brothers drive his car at one point or another and his wife, Sara had run his car as one of the "Founding Mothers" of NASCAR racing. But nobody drove it like Fonty!

1950: 5 starts, 2 poles and a win
1951: 33 starts, 14 poles and 7 wins
1952: 28 starts, 7 poles and 2 wins
1953: 33 starts, 3 poles, 4 wins
14 wins before quitting 3 races into the 1954 season!

But the Christian Olds/Fonty Flock crowd was in for a surprise that March 26th weekend. That traitor Christian showed up with a Chevy! A brand spanking new 1955 Chevrolet. The crowd gasped, "Ain't never been a Chevy in winners circle in NASCAR history!" What was wrong with them fools! When the qualifying dust settled Tim was on the pole but big brother Fonty had placed that Chevy in the top 10. And like Daytona Tim Flock was running fast. Sure, he got beat by Fireball two weeks earlier but Roberts mechanic, Red Vogt, had done a little illegal engine tweaking so Tim was fastest of the "legal" cars. After the disqualification of Roberts he was credited for leading every lap. Columbia was no different and Tim was cruising for a win leading for the first 132 laps until a spectacular crash brought out a caution.

Gober Sosebee got together for a little short track rubbing and wrinkling with Jim McLain, Joel Million, and Billy Myers. Unfortunately Sosebee drove through the scoring stand, causing the NASCAR scorers to seek other positions to score from. When the dust and wood splinters had settled and the race returned to green it seemed there had been a swap in positions on the track, too. Ol' crafty Fonty was out front and little brother had settled back in 5th. The short track traffic and some grand defensive driving by Fonty made the last 65 laps a Chevy showcase and for the first time in NASCAR history a Chevrolet claimed the checkers, beginning a long string of victories for the Bowtie Brigade!

Oh, by the way, no official speed for the win. Seems the crash at lap 132 took out the timing too.

Now we know!