Racing’s SpokesQueen

Race car drivers have come and gone over the past 40 years. The one constant on the racing circuit since 1961 has been Linda Vaughn, whose introduction at the beginning of countless auto races became as anticipated as the singing of “The Star Spangled Banner.”

The undisputed queen of motor racing since her coronation as “Miss Hurst Golden Shifter” in 1966, Vaughn has seen both the sport and Hurst Automotive Products grow exponentially. Her many fans will tell you there’s a connection.

Born in Dalton, GA, before 1950 (that’s all you really need to know, and besides a gentleman never asks), Vaughn’s first major title was Miss Atlanta Raceway in 1961, followed by Miss Pontiac in 1962, Miss Firebird from 1963 to 1966, and her final title, Miss Hurst Golden Shifter in 1966.

She may have started as a beauty queen, but George Hurst, founder of Hurst Automotive Products, understood Vaughn could be much more. A practical promotion marketer, Hurst knew he needed a woman with a little something extra to draw attention to his stick shifts. He wanted a spokesperson who would provide instant brand recognition, a bigger-than-life personality that masses of people could identify with.

Vaughn fit the bill. Bill Simpson, a pioneer in racing safety, once remarked, “You know you’re at the most important event around when you see Linda Vaughn there.”

There had been beauty queens at car races for years before Linda Vaughn, and Lord knows there were any number after her. Vaughn, however, redefined the role. Traditionally the “Queen’s” job was to sit in the air-conditioned VIP suite with the bigshots, venturing out to plant a smooch on the winning driver at the end of the race. Queens didn’t rub shoulders with the hoi polloi attending the races, and they sure as heck didn’t volunteer to pose for photos and sign autographs for them.

Then came Linda.

“She never forgets a name, and goes out of her way to charm everybody, whether it’s a big corporate executive or the fan in the stand,” says Ron Watson, president of the Motorsports Hall of Fame of America.

“Linda has an incredible ability to make everyone feel like her best friend,” says Dennis Rogers, executive VP of The Mr. Gasket Performance Group, Hurst’s parent company.

No other queen worked as hard. Want somebody to stand for three hours straight in a 105-degree tent in August, in the Deep South, posing in a gold lamé body stocking and six-inch heels with every good ‘ole boy with a Kodak? Linda’ll do it! Need somebody to stand on a concrete floor in some drafty convention center in Detroit in December, while wearing white plastic go-go boots, a micro skirt and a push-‘em-up brassiere for five hours, answering questions from every visiting fireman, while you’re demonstrating Hurst’s Rescue Tool? Linda’ll do it! Can’t find anybody to strike a pose in a bathing suit, while hanging onto a giant, 12-foot Hurst shifter mounted on the rear deck of a ’68 Pontiac Pace Car, while it cruises down the front straightaway of an Alabama dirt track? Gimme a big ‘ol “Hell, yes,” ‘cause dadgummit, Linda’ll do it!

Vaughn averaged over 150 annual appearances for the first 30 years she worked for Hurst. In the process, she gets hit on more often than a batting practice pitcher in spring training. But this spokesperson par excellence leaves every would-be lothario swaggering on his merry way, telling his buddies “There’re just too many people around for her to show how much she really likes me. Shoot man, did you see the way she smiled at me?”

That’s the Vaughn magic: Men are irresistibly drawn to her, yet she always leaves them with their ego intact. And while 99.9% of Hurst’s sales are to men, Vaughn gets along with their women, too. Being beautiful, self-effacing and funny is a mighty potent combination.

In 1983, Hurst promoted Vaughn to her current position as VP-public relations. After 40 years as a marketing icon, Vaughn has received a number awards. In 1998 she was honored with a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Specialty Equipment Market Association. In 2005, she received the Heritage Award for Lifetime Achievement from the Motorsports Hall of Fame of America, in Detroit.

As Betty Carlan, librarian of the International Motorsports Hall of Fame in Talladega, put it, “Honey, she’s been there forever!”

Vaughn has no plans to retire. “I’ll always hit the big races like Daytona and Indy,” she claims, “but I’ll probably spend the summer going to the smaller events that have always been my favorites.”

An American original, long may she wave!

ALWAYS A LADY

I first saw Linda Vaughn in the 1970s while I was staying in a Marriott somewhere in the Midwest. I was sitting there quietly having a beer, when in walks this woman so jaw-dropping gorgeous that extraterrestrials in search of a female specimen would have passed her by, reasoning that she wasn’t of the same species as the rest of us.

For an hour, I watched more than 20 men try to get her to dance with them. There were athletic types, lounge lizards, macho men, yuppies, businessmen in suits, even guys in their mid-60s leaving their wives at their tables! (Imagine the conversation they had before that long walk to the bar? “Well Irene, you’ve been a wonderful wife for 47 years, and you’ve raised our six kids up just fine, but I may never be able to look myself in the mirror again if I don’t take a shot at that blonde lady at the bar.”)

Each was rebuffed with a smile and a pleasant “no, thank you.” I knew that the blonde had to be someone famous, but for the life of me I couldn’t say who she was.

The mystery was solved when I opened my May 23, 1983 issue of Sports Illustrated, which had a story titled, “From a Vamp to a Veep,” by Bob Ottum. The 10-page feature profiled Vaughn, beginning with a photo of her in tight jeans and a T-shirt, checking the oil on her bright red Ferrari. Understand, Mickey Mantle never got 10 pages in SI; Muhammed Ali may have gotten 10 pages — after he was voted “Athlete of the Century.” Who in the heck was Linda Vaughn and how did she rate 10 pages?

Ottum asserted in the story’s first paragraph that Vaughn was “the queen, in fact, of everything on wheels.” He spent the next eight pages proving his hypothesis — at least to my satisfaction.

That was a quarter of a century ago, and Linda Vaughn is still making everyone from pre-teens to octogenarians walk backwards every time she passes by. Real queens have that effect on folks, you know.