In Knoxville, a small museum has a superb collection of “sprint cars”, which are different from the “stock cars” that are see in the more popular NASCAR races. Those cars are based on cars provided by Ford, Chevy, or Toyota. Sprint cars are built from scratch, sometimes by their drivers, and the race course is a dirt track rather than the paved racetracks that NASCAR races require. Racing on such a course calls literally sliding sideways around many of the curves, always with the possibility of spinning out. It’s a dangerous sport and one found predominantly in the Midwest.

Some of the first sprint cars looked like the blue one below, built in the early 1950’s. In later years, this original design was significantly altered by the addition of “wings” which were used to manipulate the air passing over the car to improve its performance, like the red and white car below.

The racetrack is built from local Iowa loam, which becomes like fly-paper when it’s prepped with water, to the extent that if you walk on it with sandals it will suck them off your feet. The track was being prepared for a race the following day, and the water trucks were steadily watering the track as we watched.

In the Hall of Fame section of the museum, some of the winners license plates were arranged to decorate one of the walls in an unusual and appealing manner.


The remainder of the day was spent traveling to western Iowa to be in a good location to reach Vermilion, South Dakota the following morning to tour the National Music Museum at the University of South Dakota. And at last we left behind the humidity of the high temperatures of the East and slept well in cooler, drier night-time breezes.