The 1958 Jim Mideon 500 (known officially as 1958-31) was a

NASCAR The National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing, LLC (NASCAR) is an American auto racing sanctioning and operating company that is best known for stock car racing. The privately owned company was founded by Bill France Sr. in 1948, and ...

Grand National Series The name NASCAR Grand National Series refers to former names of the following NASCAR series: *National-level stock car series: **NASCAR Cup Series (known as NASCAR Grand National Series between 1950 to 1970, then the NASCAR Winston Cup Grand Nation ...

event that was held on Saturday, July 18, 1958, at

Exhibition Stadium Canadian National Exhibition Stadium (commonly known as Exhibition Stadium or CNE Stadium) was a multi-purpose stadium that formerly stood on the Exhibition Place grounds, in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Originally built for Canadian National E ...

Toronto Toronto ( ; or ) is the capital city of the Canadian province of Ontario. With a recorded population of 2,794,356 in 2021, it is the most populous city in Canada and the fourth most populous city in North America. The city is the anch ...

Ontario Ontario ( ; ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada.Ontario is located in the geographic eastern half of Canada, but it has historically and politically been considered to be part of Central Canada. Located in Central C ...

Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by tot ...

. Children were entertained with a

jigsaw puzzle A jigsaw puzzle is a tiling puzzle that requires the assembly of often irregularly shaped interlocking and mosaiced pieces, each of which typically has a portion of a picture. When assembled, the puzzle pieces produce a complete picture. In t ...

of the Royal Family before the race began. Most of the cars in the race were either Chevrolet or

Ford Ford commonly refers to: * Ford Motor Company, an automobile manufacturer founded by Henry Ford * Ford (crossing), a shallow crossing on a river Ford may also refer to: Ford Motor Company * Henry Ford, founder of the Ford Motor Company * Ford F ...

. All of the 19 drivers on the racing grid were born in the

United States of America The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territo ...

. Admission to the race was $2.00 for adults ($ when adjusted for inflation) and $0.50 for children ($ when adjusted for inflation). The local bi-laws of the late 1950s allowed only team sports to be played professionally on Sunday. Since stock car racing wasn't included as one of the permitted "team sports," they had to operate the race on a Saturday night in compliance with city officials.

Race report

Prior to the race, invocation services were held along with the singing of ''

The Star-Spangled Banner "The Star-Spangled Banner" is the national anthem of the United States. The lyrics come from the "Defence of Fort M'Henry", a poem written on September 14, 1814, by 35-year-old lawyer and amateur poet Francis Scott Key after witnessing the b ...

'' and ''

God Save the Queen "God Save the King" is the national and/or royal anthem of the United Kingdom, most of the Commonwealth realms, their territories, and the British Crown Dependencies. The author of the tune is unknown and it may originate in plainchant, bu ...

'' (Canada's official national anthem in 1958). The first green flag of the race was waved at 8:00 P.M. Eastern Daylight Saving Time (EDT) and the checkered flag was waved at approximately 8:46 P.M. EDT. One hundred laps were resolved in forty-six minutes on a paved

oval track Oval track racing is a form of closed-circuit motorsport that is contested on an oval-shaped race track. An oval track differs from a road course in that the layout resembles an oval with turns in only one direction, and the direction of traff ...

spanning ; making it a shorter track than

Martinsville Speedway Martinsville Speedway is a NASCAR-owned stock car racing short track in Ridgeway, Virginia, just south of Martinsville. At in length, it is the shortest track in the NASCAR Cup Series. The track was also one of the first paved oval tracks in ...

. The track itself was reported as being nearly a carbon copy of

Bowman Gray Stadium Bowman Gray Stadium is a NASCAR sanctioned asphalt flat oval short track and longstanding football stadium located in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. It is one of stock car racing's most legendary venues, and is referred to as "NASCAR's longes ...

in Winston-Salem, North Carolina.

Lee Petty Lee Arnold Petty (March 14, 1914 – April 5, 2000) was an American stock car racing driver who competed during the 1950s and 1960s. He was one of the pioneers of NASCAR and one of its first superstars. He was NASCAR's first three-time Cup ch ...

(in his 1957 Oldsmobile 88) defeated

Cotton Owens Everett "Cotton" Owens (May 21, 1924 – June 7, 2012) was a NASCAR driver. For five straight years (1957–61), Owens captured at least one Grand National Series win. Owens was known as the "King of the Modifieds" for his successes in modified ...

(in his 1957

Pontiac Catalina The Pontiac Catalina is a full-size, junior series automobile produced by Pontiac from 1950 to 1981. Initially, the name was a trim line on hardtop body styles, first appearing in the 1950 Chieftain Eight and DeLuxe Eight lines. In 1959, it becam ...

) by racing at speeds up to .

Rex White Rex White (born August 17, 1929) is a retired auto racer and NASCAR champion. White was one of the drivers who competed for the original Chevrolet racing team. He began racing in 1956, grabbing fourteen top-ten finishes. After a part-time run in ...

earned the event's pole position by qualifying with a speed of . Dick Walters received a last-place finish in this race due to an incident with his car's rear end. This race is known for the debut of a young driver at 21 years, 16 days, Richard Petty, in car #142 (triple-digit numbers were legal in NASCAR until the 1970s). Even though NASCAR is usually associated with the

Southern United States The Southern United States (sometimes Dixie, also referred to as the Southern States, the American South, the Southland, or simply the South) is a geographic and cultural region of the United States of America. It is between the Atlantic Ocean ...

, Richard Petty's first Grand National Series race was officially on Canadian soil. He finished in 17th place; ten positions worse than he started. It was suggested that Lee Petty intentionally knocked his son out of the race due to racing issues. However, the truth of the matter was that Lee was trying to out-lap his son Richard (who was driving too slow) but used his "chrome horn" to take out the young Petty in his first race. More than 9,700 live spectators were on hand for this race even though heavy rainfall made the track somewhat slippery. The race car drivers still had to commute to the races using the same stock cars that competed in a typical weekend's race through a policy of homologation (and under their own power). This policy was in effect until roughly 1975. By 1980, NASCAR had completely stopped tracking the year model of all the vehicles and most teams did not take stock cars to the track under their own power anymore.

Qualifying

Post-race consequences

The purse of the race was $4,200 in American dollars ($ when adjusted for inflation). To this day, this is the only event in the modern-day Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series to take place in Canada as the track itself was later torn down to make way for newer development. Basically, the race track is now a soccer stadium and fairgrounds. NASCAR would eventually return to a more prepared

in the 21st century. However, it would be to

Montreal Montreal ( ; officially Montréal, ) is the second-most populous city in Canada and most populous city in the Canadian province of Quebec. Founded in 1642 as '' Ville-Marie'', or "City of Mary", it is named after Mount Royal, the triple ...

Circuit Gilles Villeneuve The Circuit Gilles Villeneuve, also spelled ''Circuit Gilles-Villeneuve'' (), is a motor racing circuit in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. It is the venue for the FIA Formula One Canadian Grand Prix. It has previously hosted the FIA World Sportscar ...

for the

Nationwide Series The NASCAR Xfinity Series (NXS) is a stock car racing series organized by NASCAR. It is promoted as NASCAR's second-tier circuit to the organization's top level Cup Series. NXS events are frequently held as a support race on the day prior to a ...

in addition to various small-town tracks for the "local"

NASCAR Canadian Tire Series The NASCAR Pinty's Series (french: Série NASCAR Pinty's), commonly abbreviated as NPS, is a national NASCAR racing series in Canada, and is a continuation of the old CASCAR Super Series which was founded in 1981. History In September 2006 NASC ...

Cayuga Speedway The Jukasa Motor Speedway (formerly known as Cayuga Speedway and the Cayuga 2000 Speedway) was an auto racing track located near Cayuga in Haldimand County, Ontario, Canada. Famous stock car drivers including Dale Earnhardt, Matt Kenseth, Bobby ...

(now Jukasa Motor Speedway) wanted to host the first-ever Nationwide Series race in Canada but was turned down by NASCAR at a later date.The Simcoe Reformer - June 8, 2006 Since then, the track has been on hiatus. In 2010,

Exhibition Place Exhibition Place is a publicly owned mixed-use district in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, located by the shoreline of Lake Ontario, just west of downtown. The site includes exhibit, trade, and banquet centres, theatre and music buildings, monuments ...

hosted its first NASCAR-sanctioned race, the Jumpstart 100, since this 1958 race, on a temporary street course spanning , for the Canadian Tire Series as part of

Honda Indy Toronto The Grand Prix of Toronto (known for sponsorship reasons as the Honda Indy Toronto) is an annual Indy Car race, held in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Originally known as the Molson Indy Toronto, it was part of the Champ Car World Series from 1986 t ...

weekend.

Finishing order

Timeline

Section reference: * Start of race: Rex White started the race with the pole position. * Lap 18: The rear end of Dick Walters' vehicle was problematic, forcing him to exit the event early. * Lap 72: Lee Petty takes over the lead from Rex White. * Lap 90: Lennie Page withdrew from the event due to problems with his ignition. * Lap 115: Richard Petty had a terminal crash; forcing him to withdraw from the race. * Finish: Lee Petty was officially declared the winner of the race.

References

{{authority control Jim Mideon 500 Jim Mideon 500 Jim Mideon 500 Former NASCAR races Jim Mideon 500 NASCAR races at Exhibition Stadium Sports competitions in Toronto