Remembering Naomi Grimes
Ray & Naomi Grimes
Tuesday, February 21, 2017
by Bob Wilson & Eric Arnold - Track Historians
All of us at Knoxville Raceway are saddened to learn of the passing of Naomi Grimes.
Naomi along with her husband Ray Grimes, promoted Knoxville Raceway from 1974-1979. Together they rescued Knoxville Raceway from its financial problems and kept racing alive at the Marion County Fairgrounds. They decided to expand the Knoxville Nationals to a four-day event and invented the Nationals scoring system. Naomi, and their daughters Linda and Teri sat down at the kitchen table and used prior year’s Nationals results to form different scenarios before coming up with the Nationals scoring and point system that is still used today.
Her basic schedule on Saturday nights was to work at the pit shack sign-in window as well as to score the races during the evening from the old infield judges' stand. Additionally, she figured weekly points for the track. During Nationals, her additional duties were to figure points and to develop the lineups. Finally, it was Naomi's concern which led to the courtesy car. This is the car used for driving family members to the hospital from the track after an accident. She often housed those family members if the hospital stay was lengthy.
Since their retirement from working here at Knoxville Raceway Ray and Naomi could often be found sitting in their reserved seats in Section C. They enjoyed racing and never took a payment for their work over those years. They especially enjoyed watching their grandson Dustin Selvage race.
Ray passed away in November of 2016.
Naomi was inducted into the Knoxville Raceway in 2004, one of only eight women to be enshrined.
Funeral information can be found at this link.
http://www.overtonfunerals.com/memsol.cgi?user_id=1925648
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