Summer of love for Petty fans

By DAVID GREEN

Chroniclers of pop culture remember 1967 for its "summer of love" and the epicenter of the hippie movement, the Haight-Ashbury district of San Francisco. Stock car racing fans old enough to remember and younger ones with an appreciation of the sport's history remember it for another reason -- an electric blue Plymouth Belvedere with the number 43.

Forty years ago, Richard Petty annihilated the NASCAR record books. He won 27 times in 48 races and went to victory lane in 10 consecutive races. Neither record is likely to ever be challenged, unless expansion of the schedule gets us back toward the 1964 level of 62 races per year. (Some fans, I know, would love that.)

But we won't worry about what may come. For today, we'll remember what happened in a memorable NASCAR season long ago.

Mario Andretti stole the early thunder, winning the first major event of 1967 -- the Daytona 500. This was two years before Andretti would get an Indianapolis 500 victory, but he was readily recognized as a rising star in American auto racing.

Petty's season was a little slow in getting started, but after he won his third victory of the year -- on April 6, 1967, in the 11th race of the year -- Petty showed no mercy to the competition. He won 24 of the final 37 races of the year.

The 10-win streak began, coincidentally, with the victory that put Petty into a tie with Tim Flock for most victories in a season -- 18, which Flock had set in 1955. Petty got his 18th win of '67 on Aug. 12 at the quarter-mile Bowman Gray Stadium oval in Winston-Salem, N.C. He broke Flock's record five days later at Columbia (S.C.) Speedway, and then proceeded to win at Savannah, Darlington, Hickory, Richmond, Beltsville, Hillsborough, Martinsville and North Wilkesboro.

The streak finally ended when Buddy Baker won the National 500 at Charlotte Oct. 15. Petty never led, and was eliminated by engine failure after 268 of 334 laps. He finished 18th.

The season effectively installed Petty, already a NASCAR superstar, as the elite driver of full-bodied racecars.

Critics can correctly point out that a goodly number of those 27 victories came in minor events on small tracks on what was then called the Grand National circuit. Competition was sometimes token, at best, for the Petty Enterprises dynasty.

But it must also be acknowledged that one of the victories during the 10-race streak was a thorough thumping of the field in the Southern 500, in which Petty led all but 19 of 364 laps.

Credit is due the Petty family for establishing their dynasty, in an era in which the opportunity was there for anyone who could pull off such a feat. It was Richard, his brother Maurice, cousin Dale Inman and others, who took what Papa Lee had started and turned it into one of American sports' all-time great organizations.