[DAD]

I just read on face book that Roy Robbins an outlaw before there were outlaws passed away to day. Roy's claim to fame was in winning the first Knoxville Nationals. To him it was just one of many $1000.00 to win races that he had gone to and won. They never succeeded in getting Roy back there to honor him.

Roy was an Iron Worker by trade. I was fortunate to work with him when I was a teenager, he was both a friend and mentor. He was a gentle giant, very quite, very polite and very very strong. He raced what we called back then modifieds, and traveled the countryside looking for the race that paid the most money, all the while holding down a job. That is how he ended up in Knoxville in a borrowed car with a borrowed engine. He was just a great race car driver who was never given much credit for his ability, perhaps that goes back to his quite personality, he just was not one to brag on his self.

I guess about 50 years ago or so Roy gave up driving gave up Iron Working and settled down just outside Scottburg Indiana working on equipment. To my knowledge he never again traveled to a race track except for one time and then only briefly.

I understand he will be at Collins Funeral Home in Scottsburg Sunday and will be laid to rest on Monday at Little York Cemetery in Little York Indiana .

Rest In Peace Roy

Bill Jones

[Bill W]

We didn't get a chance to get him back to Knoxville, but we did get a chance to visit with him at his home a few years back. I'll never forget that. Roy lit up when he talked about those days and it even brought a tear or two to his eye. He was a great guy...

[HurstBros0]

I don`t know how to load a picture... I guess it`s in the attachment.

[DAD]

Originally Posted by HurstBros0 I don`t know how to load a picture... I guess it`s in the attachment.

Thanks

Wish I was more puter literate also. That is Roy all right. I can't get them arms and hands off of my mind. Roy could intimidate you just by shaking your hand. His hand just swallowed my hand and I got pretty big hands. I knew Roy since I was a very young kid and worked with him as a teenager. A kinder gentler nicer man you could never meet. That race car in the background is definitely a Modified. Back then you had USAC and modifieds of one shape or another. That isn't the Knoxville car is it?

I have a picture of him sitting in Fido somewhere around here but haven't found it yet.


Bill Jones

[SPRINTCAR]

Knoxville Legend Roy Robbins Dies

by NSSN Staff

Roy Robbins, the 1961 Knoxville Nationals winner. (NSSN Archives Photo)
Roy Robbins. (NSSN Archives Photo)

KNOXVILLE, Iowa – Roy Robbins, the winner of the first Knoxville Nationals at Knoxville Raceway in 1961, has died. He was 88 years old.

He was born Sept. 19, 1927 in southern Indiana near Little York. He moved to nearby Louisville, Ky., to make his living as an iron worker, but moved back to Indiana years later where he lived a quiet life.

Robbins and car owner O.J. Huffman were one of two cars to race with an ‘air-scoop’ in the 1961 Nationals, which was known as the Super Modified National Championship at the time, as they raced for the $1,000-to-win prize. The ‘air-scoop,’ or wings as we now call them, were banned after the 1961 season until the 1970’s. Air-scoops had been used locally in Indiana where Robbins raced, but the technology was unheard of at Knoxville at the time.

Robbins began racing in 1948 at the Jeffersonville Sportsdrome in Indiana and traveled to 15 states to compete at 80 different tracks across the country stretching from Indiana, Texas, Kansas, Minnesota, Florida and Pennsylvania. He won two track championships at Lawrenceburg Speedway in Indiana, but was known for his “outlaw” status of traveling throughout the 1950’s and 1960’s as a racer. He also tested a NASCAR stock car at Daytona in 1964. Robbins was inducted into the Knoxville Raceway Hall of Fame in 1983.

RIP Roy.