Moments and People to Remember
A typical race night at the Peach Bowl from 1953.
“Anyway, the Peach Bowl was my home and I stayed for the duration of it’s existence, which was around 1970,” Mosteller continued. “I remember T.C. Hunt driving the Bugg-Mobile (J.C. Bugg’s car) to a bunch of wins. Every time T.C. won, his daughter Linda would jump down four or five rows. (I was) always scared that little girl was going to get hurt. And Gober Sosebee’s accelerator got stuck one night and plowed into a pole at the fourth turn. I thought he was a goner but two or three days later he was back again.
“I remember they used to call Charlie Mincey ‘Lucky Charlie’ after Charles Lindbergh. They both had the same modest manners and a quick smile. And ol’ Charlie Bagwell keeps going and going.”
“And the time Weyman Milam was injured there,” Mosteller said. “He had came out of his flagman’s stand to work a figure eight event. Anytime you put yourself on that track, you were at risk. I was really afraid he wasn’t going to make it after that car slid into him, but he did.
“Weyman and I went way back. We both joined with the Southern Racing Enterprise Association Circuit back in the fifties and joined up with the southern division of MARC (Midwest Auto Racing Circuit) and ran all over the southeast. Weyman was one of the best ever at flagging and putting on a race.”
“And another fellow I will never forget was Jerry Wimbish,” said Mosteller. “He is one of the very few men that could drive a race car, promote a race, score a race and flag a race. He could do it all. I really miss those guys that aren’t with us any longer.”
Athens Speedway, the scene of near disaster for Jimmy Mosteller.
We asked Jimmy about his brush with death.
“Well boys, in 1959 I got it too,” he said. “Just like Weyman, I left the safety of the stands and went to red flag the field while some water was being put down at the old Athens Speedway. Anyway, this fellow’s car knocked me up in the air and then ran over me. Charlie Padgett was the first to get to the scene and asked what he could do. I told him to get me a cigar because I had done chewed mine up like a goat. Charlie got me one, though it wasn’t a Hav-A-Tampa, but at that point I couldn’t be choosy. I was in braces for two years. The ambulance would back me up at the Peach Bowl and I would announce from there.
“People have been very kind to me. My doctor asked me the other day why my blood pressure was so good. I told him to go to the races with me one weekend and he could see for himself.”
We asked Padgett his version of Jimmy’s accident.
“I thought he was dead,” he said. “I don’t remember the car throwing him in the air, but it did run over him. He looked like a pretzel. I called his name, and could barely hear him whisper, ‘Get me a cigar.’ So I got him a cigar. I really don’t know how he survived.”