He had the face of an angel, but he was hell on wheels. Before there was a NASCAR, so-called “stock car races” began sprouting up around the country, the hotbed being the southeast, where whiskey trippers and grease monkeys from the downtown garage plied their skill for sport, rather than survival.
The most skillful began making a name for themselves. “Reckless Roy” Hall’s approach was to get to the front as soon as possible..and stay there. Though he’d be better known as a central figure in the founding of NASCAR, “Big Bill” France could be found nimbly guiding his piece through the turns at the beach/ road course at Daytona. The cerebral Red Byron, who would later become NASCAR’s first champion, was getting his start. Others like Joe Littlejohn, Smokey Purser and the brothers Bob and Fonty Flock were other names you would hear about in the fledgling world of stock car racing.
Perhaps the best of these was Dawsonville, Georgia native Lloyd Seay. Like many of his peers, the lanky youth honed his prowess outrunning revenue agents on the backroads of the south. Though he was adventurous behind the wheel, Seay was considered a more even-keeled sort than his cousin Roy Hall. The pair were part of a racing “super team”, backed by Atlanta businessman Raymond Parks, who treated Seay like a son, and mechanical genius Red Vogt.
A race at Daytona’s famed beach/road course on August 24, 1941 triggered an
amazing run for the 21-year-old and seemed to foretell a promising future for the racer and stock car racing. Seay started from the 15th position at the wave of the green flag, but found himself out front by the time he completed the first lap on the 3.2 mile course.
While Hall might tend to use up his car trying to win a race, Seay had this way of taking his car to the edge, without going over the edge. One of the truly jaw-dropping maneuvers of the day was the “bicycle” move, where the driver would put his car up on two wheels going through the turn. Once in a while, Seay would flip the car, but on this day, stayed out front all day in the 160-mile event.
He wasn’t finished yet. On August 31st, Seay took the checkered flag again at High Point, North Carolina. The win would be his 7th of the season, outrunning France on the same track where contact between Seay and Big Bill caused the latter to flip multiple times in a crash he was lucky to walk away from.
On September 1st- luck struck again for Lloyd Seay, even though he abandoned his usual lucky number seven, going with the dreaded number 13. Lakewood Speedway was Seay’s home track and apparently, he was feeling pretty bullet proof after his two previous big wins. He even went as far as to race in a convertible.
While Hall wasn’t there, trying to escape legal trouble, a number of the region’s best were on hand to challenge Seay. Bob Flock, who’d later trade NASCAR paint with the likes of Red Byron and Fireball Roberts, was in the field. Jap Brogdon was another wheelman of note, as was Bill France and Carson Dyer. Seay started the day “P-13.”
It would take half the race, but Seay reeled in Dyer, fighting off fierce competition from Flock. Mechanical issues befell a goodly portion of the field, enabling Seay to snag a big lead. Seay himself experienced a heating engine and barely hung on for his third victory in nine days.
Seay stayed the night at his brother’s home near Dawsonville. The following morning, Lloyd and his brother Jim were awakened by a cousin- Woodrow Anderson- who said it was time to settle up a debt incurred in the manufacture of moonshine.
Police reports say Seay bought sugar on Anderson’s credit, allegedly in an amount far larger than Seay bought for Anderson with his own money earlier that summer. Anderson told the Seays they were headed to an aunt’s house to have her mediate the dispute. He stopped the car at his dad’s house “to add water to the radiator.” Stories conflict about the fight that ensued- Jim Seay says Anderson began throwing a fit, demanding Lloyd pay him on the spot. In court, Anderson said the Seay brothers ganged up on him.
Anderson pulled a hand gun from the house and shot his cousins. Jim was hit in the neck. Lloyd was shot in the heart. Lloyd Seay was dead. Anderson took the money he thought was owed from Seay’s shirt pocket- money he’d won from racing the night before. Woodrow Anderson was later arrested on murder charges and went to prison.
Hundreds turned out for Seay’s memorial service. In terms of his story, Seay was like the Dale Earnhardt of his day, a young man who found in auto racing an escape from the drudgery of life. Seay, like Earnhardt, had that moxy, that fearlessness that other man wished they had and a virile sexiness that was attractive to women.
France said Seay was the “greatest stock car driver who ever lived.” Though gone way too soon, the thrills Lloyd Seay provided and the following he enjoyed no doubt provided France and other promoters a vision of what the sport could be.
While no NASCAR record book contains his name, no historian or anyone knowledgeable of racing’s roots would deny Lloyd Seay’s feats of derring-do inspired other like-minded young racers who would become the pioneer legends of NASCAR.
PHOTO CREDITS- Lloyd Seay’s car by Ford Racing- Inside the Oval. To see more, visit flickr. com or click on the link.
NASCAR.com CONTEST WINNER- Congratulations to Wendell White. He was one of six correct entries into Bump Draft’s “Picks ‘n’ Previews” trivia contest. Wendell wins an online gift card worth $25 at the NASCAR.com store. Congratulations to everyone that played.
