Bruton Smith

Ollen Bruton Smith (born March 3, 1927 in Oakboro, North Carolina) is a promoter and owner/CEO of NASCAR track owner Speedway Motorsports, Inc. Inducted into NASCAR Hall of Fame January 23, 2016. He was ranked #207 on the Forbes 400 list with an estimated worth of $1.5 billion in 2005, and fell to #278 (worth an estimated $1.4 billion) in 2006. He is divorced with four children. He was inducted in the International Motorsports Hall of Fame in 2007.

In 2012, Smith was classified by CNN Money as the oldest CEO of the Fortune 500.

Background

Bruton Smith watched his first race as an eight-year-old. He bought his first race car at 17. He began promoting stock car events as an 18-year-old at Midland, North Carolina. He claims that he beat NASCAR legends Buck Baker and Joe Weatherly. He quit racing because his mother wanted him to quit.

Business Involvement

NSCRA

In 1949, Smith took over the National Stock Car Racing Association (NSCRA), one of several fledgling stock-car sanctioning bodies and a direct competitor to the recently founded NASCAR, and announced that the series, which sanctioned races across Tennessee, Georgia and North Carolina, would establish a "Strictly Stock" division that year; some believe this caused Bill France, Sr., NASCAR's founder, to accelerate his plans for his own Strictly Stock division, which would later become the Winston, then Sprint Cup Series; it also touched off a rivalry between Smith and the France family that continues to this day. France and Smith discussed merging their sanctions in 1950, and came to a tentative agreement on the issue, however Smith was drafted into the United States Army to fight in the Korean War in January 1951, becoming a paratrooper; two years later, when Smith returned to civilian life, he found that mismanagement in his absence had caused NSCRA to dissolve.

Bruton

Coordinates: 51°06′48″N 2°27′10″W / 51.113411°N 2.452801°W / 51.113411; -2.452801

Bruton is a small town, electoral ward, and civil parish in Somerset, England, situated on the River Brue along the A359 between Frome and Yeovil. It is seven miles south-east of Shepton Mallet, just south of Snakelake Hill and Coombe Hill, ten miles north-west of Gillingham and twelve miles south-west of Frome in the South Somerset district. The town and electoral ward have a population of 2,907. The parish includes the hamlets of Wyke Champflower and Redlynch.

Bruton has a museum dedicated to the display of items from Bruton's past from the Jurassic geology right up to the present day. The museum houses a table used by the author John Steinbeck to write on during his six-month stay in Bruton.

The River Brue has a long history of flooding in Bruton. In 1768 the river rose very rapidly and destroyed a stone bridge. On the 28 June 1917, 242.8 mm of rain fell in 24 hours at Bruton, leaving a water mark on one pub twenty feet above the normal level of the river. In 1984 a protective dam was built 1 km upstream from the town.

Bruton (surname)

Bruton is a surname. Notable people with the surname include:

Hundred of Bruton

The Hundred of Bruton is one of the 40 historical Hundreds in the ceremonial county of Somerset, England, dating from before the Norman conquest during the Anglo-Saxon era although exact dates are unknown. Each hundred had a 'fyrd', which acted as the local defence force and a court which was responsible for the maintenance of the frankpledge system. They also formed a unit for the collection of taxes. The role of the hundred court was described in the Dooms (laws) of King Edgar. The name of the hundred was normally that of its meeting-place.

The hundred of Bruton was a relatively small hundred, covering approximately 14,250 acres (5,770 ha), that contained the parishes of Brewham, Bruton, Honeywick, Knowle, Milton, Pitcombe, Redlynch, Upton, Wyke and Yarlington.

The importance of the hundred courts declined from the seventeenth century. By the 19th century several different single-purpose subdivisions of counties, such as poor law unions, sanitary districts, and highway districts sprang up, filling the administrative role previously played by parishes and hundreds. Although the Hundreds have never been formally abolished, their functions ended with the establishment of county courts in 1867 and the introduction of districts by the Local Government Act 1894.