Glenn "Fireball" Roberts: Nascar Nostalgia Behind the Wheel

Before becoming a NASCAR legend Edward Glenn Roberts was just simply Glenn Jr., a small town boy with a father that owned Orange Groves in Apopka, Florida. While attending school there Glenn Jr. became interested in baseball and joined the Zellwood Mud Hens. It is there he became "Fireball" Roberts after teammates saw his abilities as a pitcher. Which of course stuck when the family decided to move to Daytona, Florida.

This is where he started his racing career circling a course on the Daytona beach for a total of nine laps before he crashed just at 18 years of age in 1947. By the following year he won a 150 mile race on the beach which he continued to run and as NASCAR changed from dirt tracks to speedways, Roberts stayed the course. Although still debated today as the greatest racer never to win a Championship, Roberts joined the Holman/Moody or known to many as the Ford Factory team in 1956 after dominating modified tracks for 5 years. He quickly became the cover boy of NASCAR for several years to come until is career was cut short.

While only seven laps into the World 600 at Charlotte in 1964 "Fireball" Roberts tried to avoid a wreck between Ned Jarrett and Junior Johnson and crashed his #22 into the the retaining wall flipping the car over. The vehicle burst into flames as witnesses at the event that day explained how they could hear Roberts screaming in agony. Jarrett pulled Roberts out of the car, but Glenn had been burnt over 80 % of his body with 2nd and 3rd degree burns. He was in the hospital for almost a month and a half until his death on July 2nd after contracting pneumonia and falling into a coma.

As many people grieved over the years for the loss of their racing hero, it was Roberts death that helped pave the way for NASCAR to build fire-safe fuel cells and prevent extensive spillage. Later there would also be fire-resistant uniforms that would be established and worn by all drivers looking like coveralls. Today both are mandatory.

During Roberts 17 year career he raced over 200 races winning 33 races and 32 pole positions. One of the greatest stats ever seen in NASCAR may be that Edward Glenn "Fireball" Roberts finished in the top 5 of races an astounding 45% of the time. He finish higher than 5th in the Points Championship, but earned many awards over the course of his career. Even elected in 1958 as the Professional Athlete of the Year by Florida Writers. Of his 33 victories his most important as is for all racers was his win at the Daytona 500 in 1962 where he also became the first person to win the Daytona Grand Slam. We can only wonder what else he had in store for the racing world.