Martinsville hot dog stand stands the test of time

MARTINSVILLE, Va. — Tucked neatly behind pit road at Martinsville Speedway, squarely at the start/finish line, sits the Martinsville hot dog stand.

There is nothing flashy about the building, much like the famous hot dog itself. But the rectangular, single-story cinderblock stand is the original — there since the beginning, according to track president Clay Campbell, although it has seen its fair share of change over the decades.

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Its origins were laid as a two-story building — one part concession stand, one part NASCAR control tower.

“It actually was a control tower then a viewing level on top of that,” Campbell told NASCAR.com. “So it was a taller building. And then we removed the top part. And voila, you got the concession stand. … We actually dressed it up some years ago. It was a block building. We put the aluminum siding on it and dressed it up. And that was the concession stand.”

Track staff quickly realized nobody was referring to it as the concession stand, though.

“All the crew members say, ‘Let’s go to the hot dog stand and get some hot dogs,‘” Campbell said. “They’d never call it, ‘Let’s go the concession stand to get hot dogs.‘ It was always, ‘Let’s go to the hot dog stand.‘ So then we made that kind of retro old sign to go on top of it. And there you go. That’s the hot dog stand.”

The dog has become a rite of passage for any Martinsville goer. Built in 2001, the garage stalls along the backstretch quickly saw crewmen‘s etchings marked on support beams — clearly keeping a tally of something.

“I saw those hash marks. You got the four and then across; four and then across. Well, what is that? Surely they didn’t use that many tires or whatever,” Campbell said. “And then I come to find out it was how many hot dogs they had.”

Like the building from which they‘re sold, the Martinsville hot dog was never meant to be anything special. Campbell will tell you as much.

In reality, that is the beauty behind the concession-stand staple in southern Virginia. Dressed in chili, slaw, onions and mustard, the Martinsville hot dog was never meant to be a groundbreaker — just familiar to those who frequented the 0.526-mile short track.

Campbell, grandson of the oval‘s founder, H. Clay Earles, got his start at the speedway working in maintenance before moving to concessions. The growth of the legend behind the fans‘ food favorite grew organically over the years.

“The hot dog was just something my grandfather started way back during (the track‘s) infancy,” Campbell said. “And as time went on, it was just something he wanted. You know, you go to the most ballparks, you get a hot dog, nothing on it. You go to the condiment stand, put whatever you want on it. Here, it comes fully dressed with the works. You know, you can say, ‘I don’t want onions,‘ or whatever. But it’s the works.

“The bun is supposed to be soft and warm. So that’s the uniqueness of it. It’s much like what you would have it at your home or at a cookout or whatever. It’s not just a plain old hot dog.”

That hot dog, however, has its own lore, featuring two 21st-century talking points. The first came in 2004 when Martinsville Speedway was sold from the Earles family to International Speedway.

The sale was announced in May at Richmond Raceway, with Campbell joined on stage by then-ISC president Lesa France Kennedy as well as Jim France and John Saunders. The quartet fielded questions from the media — “nothing perplexing,” said Campbell.

Well, that was until former NASCAR chairman and CEO Bill France Jr. raised his hand from the back of the media center.

“Oh no, what does Mr. France want to know?” Campbell recalled thinking.

“Yes, sir, Mr. France.”

“You’re not going to screw up the hot dog, right?” France asked.

“No sir. It will not be screwed up,” Campbell laughed.

Fast forward to October 2004, when NASCAR returned to Martinsville for the first time since the sale. ISC, which later merged with NASCAR, then used its own caterers for concessions at each of its facilities.

“The very first race after the changeover, they had changed the hot dog,” Campbell said. “Changed the process that it was made. It always came in a wax paper. (Instead), it came in a Styrofoam cup. That didn’t go over too well. And you had to put everything on it yourself.

“I’ll tell you what, the year before that happened is when the third-turn concrete came up and went through Jeff Gordon’s radiator grill. I thought that was a bad day. That was nothing. This was a bad day. I mean, teams, drivers, car owners were going to the NASCAR hauler complaining,

“I got a call from the president of the caterer. And these were his words: ‘If Mr. France calls you, tell him we’ve got boots on the ground, and we’re correcting it.‘ It was a high alarm.”

The other uproar around the dog came after Martinsville opted for a different hot dog provider beginning in 2016. Jesse Jones‘ Southern Style red hot dog was the staple ingredient dating back to 1947, but the track opted for another company seven years ago.

That change was short-lived, and the partnership with Jesse Jones was rekindled in 2018.

RELATED: More on Jesse Jones’ return, constructing the dog

“We went through a process because we couldn’t find anything just like it,” Campbell said. “So we actually dyed them in the concession stands to match the color. Problem is one guy that worked for the company that lost the bid, he started going on social and ratting on us and that got everything up in an uproar. Nobody would have known it. It tasted the same. But now we’re back to the original. Everything is just like it was.”

From the grandfather clock awarded as the winner‘s trophy to its spot on the Cup circuit, Martinsville is surrounded by tradition. Snagging a hot dog from the stand is just part of the Martinsville experience.

“We’ve always thought it was really nice to have a signature product that you’re kind of known for on the food line,” Campbell said. “There are other places that have tried things. There are other places that have even tried the hot dog. But there’s one thing you can’t overcome and that’s history. You know, we’re 76 years old this year. I would say that hot dog is at least 60-something years old. You can’t surpass history in just a few years‘ time.”