411 International Dragway (Seymour)

The opening race at this eighth-mile track, beside the 411 Speedway dirt oval, was on Friday night, May 23, 1969, and it went terribly. Floyd James, 32, of Maryville lost control of his dragster at about 165 MPH when the accelerator stuck, and he died of his injuries after it flipped. Coy Floyd was the first owner, and Jim Blalock was the announcer in 1969. In 1970 Claude H. Raby bought the oval and the drag strip, planning $150,000 in improvements, and signed a 15-year affiliation with AHRA. A race on Saturday night, April 21, 1973, one of the earliest found in newspapers, featured “Big Willie” Robinson and his two match-racing 426 Dodge Daytonas. More than 300 entries ran the season’s final IHRA World Record Meet in mid-August 1974. Danny Sluper filed incorporation papers for the strip on November 7, 1975. Racing ended in 2014 when the lease wasn’t renewed.