From Bob Baker
Knoxville, IA — (March 14, 2013) — The National Sprint Car Museum in Knoxville comes to life in April, May and early June as the fifteenth annual International Reel Wheel Film Festival on April 5-7 and the twenty-fourth annual National Sprint Car Hall of Fame (NSCHoF) Induction Banquet on May 31-June 1 take center stage.
This year’s featured films at the world’s longest-running festival celebrating the automobile and motorsports in film are Sean Buckley’s “Follow the Corn 3: (Jesse) Hockett Memorial Weekend,” Michael Hamm’s & Kerrie Long’s “The Greatest Auto Race on Earth,” John Greene’s and Jennifer Jordan’s “Boys of Bonneville: Racing on a Ribbon of Salt,” and Mike Thompson’s “Faded Thunder: The Clarence ‘Mutt’ Anderson Story” and “Faded Thunder: The Amazing Mr. (Jim) Welty.” All five are racing-oriented documentaries.
Saturday, April 13, is also the traditional Practice Night for all three weekly divisions of winged sprint cars at Knoxville Raceway. The rest of April and May brings weekly winged sprint car racing to the half-mile Knoxville dirt track, plus special events for four International Motor Contest Association (IMCA-type) classes on April 28 and the always-popular World of Outlaws (WoO) sprint cars on May 11.
The climax of the spring 2013 museum season takes place on May 31-June 1 as the twenty-fourth annual National Sprint Car Hall of Fame (NSCHoF) induction weekend takes place on the Marion County Fairgrounds. This year’s honorees at the Saturday afternoon banquet include Charles “Dutch” Baumann, Art Bisch (Sr.), Andy Linden, Brad Noffsinger, Lou Blaney, Jeff Bloom, C.W. Van Ranst, Harold “Red” Lempelius, Richard Hoffman, E.A. “Ernie” Moross, Edd Sheppard and Jean Lynch. Plus, Friday night will include a fun and informal special reception for past inductees on the museum’s second floor.
The cost for each day of the International Reel Wheel Film Festival is just the price of a museum admission (i.e. – four dollars per adult), while Practice Night at Knoxville Raceway features free admission in the grandstands. Those individuals interested in the fifteenth annual International Reel Wheel Film Festival are encouraged to visit the museum’s web site at www.sprintcarhof.com. The non-profit museum, which is open seven days a week, year-round, can also be reached at 1-800-874-4488.