Sum of all parts is what put Johnson in inaugural class

CONCORD, N.C. -- Junior Johnson never won a championship as a driver in NASCAR. He won six titles as a car owner, but if that were the fundamental criterion for his election to the sport's nascent Hall of Fame, he'd have to line up beside or behind others like Rick Hendrick and Richard Childress. There is no singular achievement that earned Johnson, now a purveyor of moonshine and country ham, a place in the shrine's inaugural class. Much like the race cars he once built, his sum is greater than his individual parts.

The first class

Richard Petty, Dale Earnhardt, Bill France Jr., Junior Johnson and Bill France Sr. will be enshrined in May 2010.

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Each of the five men elected to NASCAR's first Hall of Fame class on Wednesday played a role in building the sport, some more obviously than others. Bill France cobbled together a loose confederation of racing organizations and unified them under one sanctioning body. Bill France Jr. transformed a regional tour defined by dirt tracks and small towns into a national series featuring major markets and glitzy speedways. Richard Petty shook every hand, obliged every autograph request, and won over as many hearts and minds outside the car as he did in it. Dale Earnhardt, gritty and relentless, gave those in the grandstands someone who reminded them of themselves.

And then there was Johnson, better known today by his statistics, those 50 career victories as a driver and six championships as an owner, three each with Cale Yarborough and Darrell Waltrip. He won races, he butted heads, he made enemies, he pushed the rules in his day further than Chad Knaus or Ray Evernham ever dared to.

He had a mysterious, larger-than-life back story that involved running moonshine and serving prison time. No wonder it was Junior Johnson that novelist and social critic Tom Wolfe decided to profile when the white-suited dandy took on the subject of stock-car racing, resulting in his The Last American Hero is Junior Johnson epic that appeared in the pages of Esquire magazine in 1965.

He has no specific accomplishment that matches up to those of his fellow inductees; Johnson did not win seven championships as a driver, or found a sport, or take it national. But the beauty of Junior Johnson is that his greatness defies classification -- he was a winning driver, a championship car owner, a master mechanic and engine builder, and through Wolfe a pioneer in shaping NASCAR's national appeal. Johnson wasn't the greatest ever to compete in NASCAR, but he was perhaps the most complete. (Continued)