Lil Bud Moore Tribute
|
By:
Tim Leeming |
R.I.P Paul “Lil Bud”
Moore 12/07/1941 – 08/01/2017 I
don't remember the specific date I first met him, nor the year. I do know, however, it was on a Thursday
evening during racing season because that's when the late model sportsman teams
of NASCAR would run their weekly races at Columbia Speedway. The impression Paul "Lil Bud" Moore
made on me that night was only enhanced by the way he drove a race car. By that I mean, I met this guy sitting on the
tailgate of a pickup truck just behind the pit area. He wore a white t-shirt and somewhat thick
glasses. My first impression was more
inclined to place him as an accountant, or perhaps a school teacher, as the
glasses gave the impression that he was very well educated and held some high
position in society. As
I walked by the man that evening, he was telling a racing story to three or
four guys standing around. The first
thing that caught my ear was the distinct accent of Charleston, South Carolina,
the home of Rhett Butler, and the lilt to the voice further convinced me of the
aristocracy of the young man telling the stories. I hung around just long enough to be
thoroughly entertained and to enjoy the uproarious laughter, mine included,
when the story was finished. The
track announcer called all drivers to the end of pit road to draw for positions
for the heat races and low and behold, this young man in the glasses jumped
from the back of the pickup truck and headed that way. I followed along behind him and it was then
that I discovered this young man was Bud Moore, nicknamed "Lil" Bud
Moore so as to avoid confusion with Walter Maynard "Bud" Moore, a car
owner from Spartanburg. I
don't remember where Lil Bud finished that night, but I do remember that he had
that half-mile dirt track in his pocket almost from the start. That would become a trait of his over the
years as Bud raced about the southeast at places like Columbia, Augusta, and
Savannah. Bud Moore could drive a race
car, especially on a dirt track. Lil
Bud ventured into the Grand National ranks of NASCAR in the 60s and in 1965 he
entered 14 races and would finish in the top five 3 times and the top 10 seven
times and would even earn a pole during that span. My fondest memory of his Grand National
career was watching him in the 1964 Southern 500. Bud was driving a year old yellow Plymouth
for Louis Weathersby, number 45, and would finish in 25th place after
collecting a spinning Junior Johnson on lap 149. Bud hit Junior so violently that the rear of
Junior's car was pushed up to the back of the seat. It was not the crash that made that race so
memorable for me, but it was watching Bud come roaring into what was then turn
three (I was on the infield next to the fence there). The Plymouth would sound like firecrackers
going off under a tin washtub when Lil Bud would backed off so we knew the car
was not running at 100%, but Lil Bud would drive that turn in such a way as to
gain on cars ahead of him each time.
Those were the days when the drivers allowed their cars to earn that Darlington
Stripe. Was
Lil Bud a good friend of mine? You bet
he was. Know how I can say that with
assurance? Because Lil Bud was a good
friend of everyone with whom he came in contact. I've never heard one negative word about Lil
Bud, even from the drivers he was whipping every week in the Late Model
Sportsman. It is a shame that NASCAR has
chosen not to archive the Late Model Sportsman results, although I hear they
have those records in boxes in storage.
Lil Bud is one of many whose legacy in racing is stored in a box in
Daytona and unknown to younger fans. So
much the pity. A
few years ago I was commissioned to write a magazine article about Lil
Bud. We arranged to do the interview
over the telephone. The morning he
called me, he had just gotten in his car in Charleston and was headed to
Charlotte for work. We spent over two
and a half hours on the phone and I filled up a yellow legal pad with
notes. I laughed often because you
couldn't be around Lil Bud without laughing at his stories. He told some of the best stories a race fan
would ever hear. Wish I had saved that
legal pad but when the magazine article was finished the yellow pad went the
way of the dinosaur. I
have, hanging on my wall before my eyes in my studio, a picture of Lil Bud with
the A.J. King Dodge he drove in Grand National.
Lil Bud signed it "To Tim, Lil Bud Moore". That was at an appearance in which he and I,
together with many racing folks, did at Memory Lane Museum in Mooresville,
NC. I thanked him and then he said to me
"you have to autograph one of yours for me". I remember looking at him to see the
twinkling eyes as he was surely joking, but he wasn't. I signed one of my cards for him and he took
it and put it in his bag he was carrying.
You see, Lil Bud was a friend of mine and the memories I will hold of
him in the years ahead will always make me smile, because that's what Bud was
about. Oh, and as he told me once, the
fact that he was born on December 7, 1941 had nothing to do with "The Day
that will live in infamy".