Yello Belly Drag Strip (Grand Prairie)

History

The track’s website dates the first races to 1955 and says it was built by O. L. Nelms, an eccentric millionaire. It’s in Grand Prairie, near Irving, and has served Dallas-area racers for seven decades. It also has the deadliest record of any Texas strip. At least eight drivers have died there. The first, James Goodson, died of natural causes: he stopped his car near the end of the track and collapsed with a heart attack on September 15, 1957. Ten spectators have also died, four from stabbings or shootings and the rest in racing accidents. On June 10, 1979, a 1967 Camaro driven by D. C. Thomas went out of control into people standing in a prohibited area, killing four and injuring six. A witness said the announcer had warned people again and again, and that they would step off the strip and then climb back on after each race, until the starting-light operator ran down to order them off.

From the start the strip catered to amateur and family racing. In 1957 one racer took on all comers in a 1941 Chevrolet with no body at all, only a seat and gas tank. Mrs. Billie West often let her three young children ride with her, and crowds loved it when she raced her husband. For color, the track staff, from announcers to starters to timers, were young women in shorts or pedal pushers. In December 1958 Edward Walker sued the track, saying poor lighting kept him from seeing a chuckhole that caused his crash in a 1951 Ford pickup on August 7, 1958, which broke his neck and left him paralyzed. On August 19, 1962, police arrested fifteen people in a raid on the Sunday night race on charges including indecent exposure, illegal alcohol, interfering with an officer and gambling. Three months earlier several men had beaten a track security officer and taken his gun.

According to the website, racial tension in the 1960s led Nelms to build steel structures with metal roofs and dock-high foundations along both sides of the track, so they could become warehouses if the track ever had to close. It never did, and the website calls Yello Belly the oldest continuously operating drag strip in Texas and the only one known with covered trackside spots where fans can park and watch. Charlcie Townson bought the property in 1968 and added a control tower with a public address system and start-to-finish lights, a lighted ticket booth, restrooms, a concession stand and parking lot lights. Admission went up to $1, though many people still watched part of the races free from the highway. She ran the track herself until shortly before her death in 1986, when four of her sisters inherited it. Since then it has been repaved several times and given concrete barriers on both sides, aluminum bleachers, a computerized pro tree and timing system accurate to a thousandth of a second with printed time slips, and racing fuel for sale. Law enforcement required an 18-foot wall along Highway 180 in front of the track, and in 2004 metal siding replaced the brick front of the concession and storage building.