PBC Member Spotlight

Pit Board Charity Bio
 
My name is Kelly Vogel and I recently moved to Mooresville, North Carolina.  I know one would assume that racing is what brought me to Mooresville.  However, I actually stumbled upon it when I was doing research for a television pilot I was writing that takes place on Lake Norman.  I came down from Washington, DC, to do some research and, when I got off at exit 36, it reminded me of the town where I grew up in Colorado.  I fell in love with the area, the people, and the lake.  So after several visits, I purchased a house on the lake, packed up Bailey the Basset Hound, and headed south.
 
I still have my job as a lobbyist in Washington, DC.  I represent the health insurance industry, which requires me to travel up to DC a few days a week.  I have some really great opportunities; my favorite is Senator Ensign’s annual charity event in Las Vegas where we do the Richard Petty experience and race go-karts.  I also look forward to traveling to the conventions this summer.
 
People often ask me when I became of fan of NASCAR.  It has always been part of my life.  My brother raced late models while I was growing up and raced in the NASCAR Southwest circuit before switching to boat racing.  I do not even think I was old enough to go into the pits when he first started, but I never missed a race.  My job was to keep count of the laps for my very nervous mother.  I still love to go to local races and have so much respect for the amount of work those guys put in every week to chase their passion.
 
I write screenplays as a hobby and recently wrote a television show about a family who owned a large race team.  I did not set out to write a show about racing, but once you cross that line it takes on a life of its own.  Although it was set in present time, I thought it was important to have one character that represented what NASCAR was back in the 60’s and 70’s.  The men I studied for this character became some of my favorite drivers.  I read their stories and was amazed at the sacrifices they and their families made to race with no potential for fame and fortune on the other side like there is in the sport today.  With all of the safety precautions taken today, it is amazing to hear about how they would strap themselves in with nothing but rope or use old seat belts to hold the doors closed.  It was just crazy.  Having watched my brother struggle in the early years when an engine would blow or he had a bad wreck, I really was in awe of these guys.
 
I was honored when the Pit Board Charity asked to feature me in your monthly member spotlight.  I was introduced to the group when I came across the Junior’s Elves project while doing research for the script.  I thought it was a great opportunity to provide an evening of fun at Christmas time.  I work every day with lawmakers who are trying to change our country on a macro level, but sometimes I think you do more every week with the work that you have done over the years and I appreciate you all making me a part of it.  I hope to see you all here in December.

June - Jim Peterson

My name is Jim Peterson, I'm 44 years of age and live in south eastern < xml="true" ns="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags" prefix="st1" namespace="">Minnesota, I love having the four seasons of the year here, spring is my favorite. I have two sons ages 19 and 17, like any father I think the world of them. My hobbies are computers, website design, drawing, models, trains and RC cars.< xml="true" ns="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" prefix="o" namespace="">

I've been a race fan my entire life, at a very young age I went with my father and uncle to a race at a county fair, images of that race still run through my head. My best friend's (Tom) father Bill had a modified race car that he owned, Rick Houser was the driver of the 454hp. #19 Camaro. As young teens we went to many of the races, it was Tom and my job to change the gears in the quick change rear end, being thin and wiry we were cut out for the job of crawling under the car. The track atmosphere was carnival like, the smells, the racing, the brawls, all of it was exciting and intoxicating.  

Our other job was washing the race car, if Tom's folks were away we'd take the car out on the big lawn and do some doughnuts all while laughing, Tom driving and me on the passenger side gripping the roll bars. Later we'd take our motorcycles out and try to make it look like the bikes tore up the grass, I think Bill knew what we were doing, but maybe he let us have this little "treat" for helping out, I'd like to think so anyway.

 I watched the first live broadcast of the Daytona 500 in '79 with my friend Tom, we went wild at the end when Yarbrough and the Allisons had the famous wreck then fight. I haven't missed many televised races after that. In the mid 80's I became a hard core Earnhardt fan, for me it was just natural to be a Dale Earnhardt Jr. fan, once an Earnhardt fan always an Earnhardt fan.

 As a young adult I had a number of jobs, I traveled the USA repairing stained glass windows, I was a house painter for awhile. I grew up in construction, my father owns a concrete company so after I got the rolling stone fever out of my head I settled down to work for the family business, it was hard work but then there was a sense of satisfaction after completing a big job and doing it well.

 On July 7th, 1990 my life forever changed. I went camping with friends by a man made lake, it was late afternoon when I decided to take a swim, I ran down the beach into the water and dove in, something that I did the day before a number of times. The night before we had a strong thunderstorm, we stayed dry in our tents but it rained really hard, I think what went wrong was a bunch of the sand on the beach washed down into the water making the area shallower (the owner of the lake piled sand up to make a man made beach), I hit the bottom and broke my neck.

 I knew exactly what happened, the crunching sound (eeew) was obvious to me, my eyes were open, I remember seeing the sun rays through the water, I slowly floated up hoping that someone would  see me, I didn't want to drown on top of everything else. I kept a cool head, my friends spotted me face down, he came to my aid, I told my buddy, Jeff, that I broke my neck. I remember the chattering noise of the chopper that came to my  rescue, I spent 6 long months in the hospital. My diagnosis is a C-5 Quad incomplete, I regained a lot of movement on my right side and am very thankful for that. I can still type, one key at a time, yeah slow but determined (smile). I can put models together, draw and play video games with an arcade stick controller, I even built a 4 x 8 foot model railroad, something the kids loved to play with growing up, it's still fun. Oh and I can cook, it's also an enjoyable hobby of mine, yes I love the food channel.

 Around 1996 my father gave me a computer that crashed, I managed to get it working, I was intrigued by this "new toy". I connected to the Internet and became a PC user, I did the typical things, surfed, played games, etc. Then one of my personal care attendants showed me her website, it drew my interest so I taught myself HTML and graphic design, I needed a subject for a site, my obvious choice was Dale Earnhardt. I built a site with
content pertaining to him, it never took off, the other Earnhardt sites were more popular.

 Dale Jr started racing in '96, I was following him closely the next couple of years, the info and images of him were hard to find at the time. After Dale Jr's first win at Texas in the Busch Series that began to change, I took the opportunity to build the first Jr site on the 'net, it went live on July 3rd, 1998, at first it was simply called Jim's Dale Earnhardt Jr. Site, later after it became more popular I chose the domain name dalejrpitstop.com, it was now The Dale Earnhardt Jr. Pit Stop. This year is the 10th year anniversary!

 The most popular section of the site is "The Pit Board", a term phrased for the old chalk boards that racing crew members would use to communicate with their drivers on the track. One day a person posted as Dale Jr, I removed the message and e-mailed the individual to tell them I thought they were impersonating Jr and how wrong that was, oops... after a few embarrassing e-mail exchanges it was in fact Jr, thankfully I saved his message and re-posted it. After a few more posts by Jr people accused me of making this up, was I the impostor? Some thought so. The good man that Dale Jr is, he took some pictures of himself next to the computer screen with the site clearly visible, after posting these the accusations ceased. I was honored that Jr liked the site and posted to us fans, if you haven't done so please visit his official site at dalejr.com, it's a killer site, absolutely beautiful.

 Around 2002 a Pit Board member came to me with an idea, her name was Sonya Clay, a very nice charming
and caring woman. Her idea was to start a charity, I thought she had a great idea and agreed to let her use the Pit Board as a launching zone, Sonya chose the name The Pit Board Charity, she even used a graphic I designed on the Pit Board entry page as a logo, I was honored by that. I will say this over and over, the charity is one of the best if not the best thing that came out of the site and board. To date this caring group of fans has helped a great number of people, families, children, animals and other charitable causes. One of the first things the charity members / pit boarders did was pull together to get yours truly a brand new computer, a tool that I was in great need of, something that I'm both humbled by and very thankful for to this day, thank you all for that.

 This is an honor to be asked to write this short bio, well maybe a little longer than I wanted, but it gave me an almost therapeutic feeling sharing things from my past, thanks to the charity for offering me this opportunity. I know money can be tight, because of this I can't always donate, but this is something I'd like to work on, I know even a few dollars can be helpful. Even if you can't give monetarily please share The Pit Board Charity with others, just by word of mouth you can help bring a smile to someone's face, that in itself makes it worthwhile.