11/18/2025
ROCKY MOUNT – A driver who has raced almost everywhere is coming home.
Joe Henry Thurman, 1968 NASCAR Late Model Sportsman national champion, will be among the area greats attending the 50th Anniversary Reunion of Franklin County Speedway May 5.
“I've raced from Oxford Speedway in Maine to Daytona,” said Thurman, a retired insurance agent who resides at Rocky Mount. “I love Franklin County Speedway as much as any track in the country. It was such a thrill to win there in my prime.”
He added: “There are hundreds of tracks all over the country and some right around here that didn't live to see 50 years old. It's a special thing for Franklin County this year. I'm going to do all I can to support the track.”
Thurman raced for 35 years and drove for 80 different car owners – including Taylor and former FCS owner Bill “Squeek” McGuire. “I may have put both of them out of the car owning business temporarily,” said Thurman, pausing to laugh. “I am proud of the fact I drove William Mason's car at FCS and won in it.”
Although he understands times are different, Thurman said he is amused to hear some younger drivers are not willing to race every Saturday. “I used to race four nights a week,” he said. “You might think I was crazy, but I loved racing. Back then, we put our heart and soul into it.”
For several years, Thurman raced on Thursday night at Columbia, SC; Friday night at Beltsville, MD; Saturday's at Langley Raceway; and Sunday's on a one-mile dirt track outside of Atlanta, GA.
“I was driving for other people most of the time,” he explained. “My father Bentley was retired and he went with me. My father would drive me home while I slept in the back seat so I could make to work the next day. I still worked a regular job, too.”
Thurman, who turned 79 in December, worked at Franklin Grocery and Grain from 1956 to 1983. He founded Thurman Insurance Group in 1979 and worked there until he sold it in 2006.
He and wife Cherold have five children between them. “I am blessed to have a great life, then and now,” he said. “I had a lot of fun during my time racing and met a lot of wonderful people.”
His love for speed started on the back roads of rural Virginia, where “Fords would come from miles around” to try to outrun Thurman's 1957 Chevy. “I found out I loved competition,” he said. “But I knew I had to get off the highways.”
The remedy was a 1935 Chevy that Thurman and friend Nelson Hall built to run the Hobby Division at (now defunct) Starkey Speedway's quarter-mile asphalt. “I didn't win that first year,” Thurman recalled. “But we had some good finishes.”
Thurman built his own car for the 1958 season. He still remembers his first victory: “It was the Hobby class at Starkey. Glen Wood (a NASCAR Hall of Fame member) was the Modified winner that night.”
Hooked on the thrill of speed and competition, Thurman worked his way up to the premier Late Model Sportsman division and began to venture away from home. He was second to future Grand National star Pete Hamilton in 1967 standings that determined a NASCAR Late Model Sportsman national champion.
Closing out the 1968 national championship was “one of the biggest thrills of my career,” said Thurman. “I was just being a racer, fulfilling my dreams. I wanted to keep moving up and get better. We raced all over the country and it made me a better driver.”
The national championship format for Late Model Sportsman drivers later morphed into the Busch Grand National series (now the Xfinity Series) where Thurman was a regular for many years.
Often racing against better-funded stars from the big league Cup Series, Thurman had six top five finishes and 31 top ten finishes in the Busch Grand National series.
“I led some (Busch Series) races and had some chances to win here and there,” he said. “I raced for the smaller teams and I am proud of our efforts. As the costs went up, it got tougher and tougher to compete at that level.”
Thurman was a co-owner of two cars for the 1991 Busch Grand National season. “We went to Daytona and got caught up in Bobby Labonte's wreck on the first lap,” he lamented. “Then I raced our other car at Martinsville that year. We ran about 50 laps and the transmission started smoking. So, I parked it. And that was it. I was done.”
There were few regrets in his career, Thurman said, but one stood out.
“They had just built Talladega Superspeedway in Alabama. I was down there running Sportman with a 1969 Mercury. My engine blew, so I headed on back home. When I got home, I found out I missed out on what could have been the biggest break of my career.”
Almost all of the top level drivers in the Grand National Series (now Monster Energy Cup Series) boycotted the main event, scheduled for 500 miles that Sunday on the 2.66-mile high-banked track. Brand new race tires were coming apart after just 20 laps on the new asphalt surface. Firestone withdrew its tires, admitting they were not safe for the record high speeds. Goodyear decided to stay.
To prove a point that the race was on as scheduled, NASCAR founder Bill France Sr. jumped in a stock car and ran a few blistering laps. “Most of us sat that one out,” the sport's winningest driver Richard Petty was quoted. “We didn't want to play Russian Roulette with those tires.”
“Many of the (lower division) Grand American and Sportsman drivers wound up running the big race that weekend,” Thurman explained. “While I was on the road home, one of the car owners (Ray Nichols) called my house looking for me. He wanted me to drive for him on Sunday.”
Who wound up driving the Nichols-prepared Dodge that Sunday instead of Thurman? None other than Talladega 500 winner Richard Brickhouse.
“That could've been me,” said Thurman. “Yes, that one stung a little bit. But you live the hand you are dealt in life. That's what I did and I feel very fortune. To be able to compete all those years and have my good health now, I'd say life has been very good.”
