Throughout the year drivers Buck Baker, Marvin Panch, Fireball Roberts, Larry Frank, Speedy Thompson, and Bob Welborn would pilot these now classic vehicles.
After an incident in the May 20 Virginia 500 at Martinsville Speedway that injured five spectators, including a young boy, ended the race with 59 laps remaining, Ford, General Motors and Chrysler became less passionate about providing financial and administrative support for the teams.
[3] Late in the season at the North Wilkesboro Speedway, a wheel from driver Tiny Lund's car was thrown into stands, and a spectator was killed.
The ground-breaking ceremony takes place one month to the day after Buck Baker wins the final event of the season at Central Carolina Fairgrounds in Greensboro, N.C;[3] thus securing his second consecutive championship.
Fireball Roberts, Cotton Owens, Jack Smith, and Ralph Moody all notched wins during the next four events before Buck Baker took his first trip to victory lane at Hillsboro, North Carolina in March 1957.
[4] During the Eighth Annual Southern 500 on September 2, driver Bobby Myers was killed in a crash on lap 28 at Darlington Raceway.
On October 12, 1957 Fireball Roberts won a 100-mile race at Newberry Speedway; and the event holds the dubious distinction of having the smallest crowd in NASCAR history as only 900 spectators looked on.
Detroit auto manufactures saw NASCAR as a big business opportunity, and by the beginning of the 1957 season, GM, Ford, Mercury, and Plymouth were all backing one team or another.
[8] Driver Billy Myers crashed his Mercury through the Martinsville Speedway fence during the Virginia 500, and landed in an area marked "off limits" to spectators, and young Helsabeck lost his life.