Real NASCAR: White Lightning, Red Clay, and Big Bill France

In this history of the stock car racing circuit known as NASCAR, Daniel S. Pierce offers a revealing new look at the sport from its postwar beginnings on Daytona Beach and Piedmont dirt tracks through the early 1970s, when the sport spread beyond its southern roots and gained national recognition. Real NASCAR not only confirms the popular notion of NASCAR's origins in bootlegging, but also establishes beyond a doubt the close ties between organized racing and the illegal liquor industry, a story that readers will find both fascinating and controversial.

Daniel S. Pierce is professor of history at the University of North Carolina at Asheville. He is author of The Great Smokies: From Natural Habitat to National Park.