From Pisgah to Penske: Canton's Deb Williams races to Hall of Fame motorsports journalism career

Jul. 19—Deb Williams' passion for motorsports began when she was still in diapers.

"My parents were going to stock car races when my mother was pregnant with me," she said. "The only place they could get me to quit crying and sleep until I was a year old was in the infield under the loudspeaker at the Asheville-Weaverville track when it was a dirt."

What began as a motorsports mobile over the toddler's crib turned into a passion for the burgeoning racing fan from Canton.

"When I was four years old, I was sitting on the hood of the car parked above turns one and two, and this guy turned over on the track. He jumped out and ran across the track, and I thought that was so exciting," Williams said.

Williams was lucky enough to have a dad, Ray Williams, who was an auto racing junkie in the 1950s and '60s. Williams spent many days with her father at Frank Pressley's garage in Canton.

"I grew up around car garages and services stations," she said. "There were a couple of years where Frank Pressley fielded a car for Ralph Earnhardt, and his car was sitting out in front of Pressley's garage. I walked over to the passenger side, put my hands on the door and looked inside. I thought that was the coolest thing I'd ever seen."

Childhood fun turns into passion

As Williams got older, her interest in cars and racing continued to grow.

"We were always around races," she said. "When I was 13, Daddy decided I was old enough to take care of myself at the superspeedways. We went to Rockingham, Daytona, Charlotte, and we'd already been going to Bristol because it was close to home."

When Williams and her father visited Charlotte in October 1967, the deal was sealed.

"I promised myself that day that, one day, I would live in this area and work in stockcar racing," Williams said.

She became obsessed with motorsports, highlighted by her dedication to never miss a race and another opportunity to cover the sport she loves.

"When I was a senior at Pisgah, baccalaureate was required," she said. "But that happened to be the same day of the 'World 600' race, and one of our neighbors had given me tickets as a graduation gift."

So Williams went to her school principal and explained her situation, hoping he would let her miss the event.

"'Don't tell anybody I'm letting you do this,'" he said. "'Go to the race, and what we'll do is leave a vacant seat for you on the last row in the gym at Pisgah. If you get there after we've marched in, walk in and sit down.'"

With 42 laps to go at the "World 600," Williams and her father left and raced back home.

"Mother had my cap and gown ready, daddy got me to the high school and I went running in," Williams recalled. "I was so sunburned my face matched my red cap and gown. My best friend asked where I'd been, and I said, 'Charlotte.' She said, 'Charlotte?' I said, 'Yeah, the 600. I'll tell you about it later.'"

Williams writes 'Bear Country'

Although she always loved to write as a child, it wasn't until she started reading racing recaps in the local newspapers that she invested herself in the world of sports journalism.

"When I started following races closely in the Asheville Citizen, I was disgusted because I kept finding so many factual errors," she said.

A chance meeting with Clifton Metcalf, then-publisher of the Waynesville Mountaineer (which later became The Mountaineer), at a school career day turned into a job during her junior year.

"Next thing I knew, I was in his office, telling him about my aspirations," Williams said. "When I walked out of that office, I had my first assignment, to do a story on the water polo team at the YMCA in Canton."

The assignment turned into a weekly "Bear Country" column which provided updates on the goings-on at Pisgah High School, from band and chorus to new teachers and the student council.

Williams earned a spot covering Pisgah football and basketball games her senior year, which provided her an opportunity to showcase her work ethic and dedication.

"On the way to cover a junior varsity football game at Brevard, I did my English homework while mother drove. I wrote the game story that night, and the deadline was noon the next day. After my mother dropped me off at school the next morning, she drove my story up to the Mountaineer," Williams recalled.

And writing was no easy feat in the mid-1970s.

"When I started writing, I was writing on a Royal typewriter," Williams said. "I can't tell you how many of mine had paragraphs cut out and stuck together with Scotch tape."

A stellar high school career earned Williams a spot at East Tennessee State University, where she majored in journalism.

"I had the most fun those four years," Williams said. "I got to really learn who I was. I got to separate my parents from who I was. I wasn't just Ray and Crickett's daughter."

Despite a burgeoning ROTC career at ETSU, Williams stuck with journalism.

"With the way it was for women at that particular time, I needed to seize every moment and advantage that I possibly could," she said. "I needed to focus on journalism."

And focus she did. By the end of her freshman year, she was named assistant sports editor at the student newspaper, was sports editor her junior year and became a student assistant in the sports information department office her senior year.

All the while, she continued to press the keys on her typewriter at The Mountaineer during her summers.

"I would finish up the spring quarter, take a week off, work at The Mountaineer through the summer, take a week off, and then go back to ETSU and start working there," she said.

ETSU grad returns home

After graduation, Williams returned to The Mountaineer, where she became the crime reporter, a position commonly reserved for men in the late-1970s, and eventually landed the role of sports editor, too.

But racing had not left her DNA. She just had to convince her editor that there was a desire for motorsports journalism in the community.

"When I was at The Mountaineer, everything had to be connected to Haywood County. If there was no Haywood County connection, you couldn't write about it," Williams said.

Luckily for Williams, New Asheville Speedway on Amboy Road had a handful of Haywood County drivers racing every Friday night.

"I told Clifton I wanted to cover those races, but he didn't like racing. He went to UNC, so the only thing that mattered to him was UNC basketball," Williams said.

Eventually, a number of letters to the editor poured into The Mountaineer office, thanking the paper for covering the races.

"I walked into Clifton's office and said, 'Have I made my point?'" Williams recalled. Metcalf agreed, and motorsports coverage became an integral part of The Mountaineer sports section.

Williams catches her break

Williams' career took off in the late '70s, and a job opening in Charlotte, which has long been the Mecca of the auto racing world, piqued her interest.

She learned from a sports reporter at the Citizen-Times that the Charlotte Observer was looking to add women to its sports department.

"I told him 'I don't want a job because I'm a woman, but because they think I'm good at what I do,'" she recalled.

Williams instead joined United Press International in Raleigh in 1979, where she was the only woman employed in the state for over two years. Although Williams imagined she'd be traveling across the state covering breaking news, the reality was a wake-up call to the demanding journalism industry.

"You had to pay your dues working the 4 a.m. shift, and you're on call 24 hours a day, 365 days a year," she said. "I covered four stories in three cities in 48 hours, but it didn't do much for my health."

The opportunity provided a bevy of skill-building opportunities and introduced Williams to the adrenaline high of covering breaking news stories. Plus, she got to cover NASCAR.

"I was the first woman to cover NASCAR on a regular basis for an international wire service," she said.

Williams soon separated herself from the competition. She was promoted to UPI's Charlotte bureau manager in 1983, but the honeymoon didn't last long.

"I got a call from the state editor, who said, 'Deb, we're all having to take 25% pay cuts. We're all looking for another job, and I'd advise you to do the same," Williams said. "I was just devastated."

But what Williams initially saw as a loss turned into an opportunity. After a short stint with Sunbelt Video in Charlotte, Williams took a job as a reporter with NASCAR Winston Cup Scene, then called Grand National Scene, in 1986. She stayed 18 years with the weekly motorsports magazine, eventually rising the ranks to become a senior editor.

Williams accepted a position as director of media relations at Penske Racing in 2004. The position gave her an inside track to cover some of NASCAR's biggest names. And since 2008, Williams has worked independently as a freelance writer and consultant, getting to cover stories that matter to her and the motorsports world.

Her career has also included a number of book credits, including "Images of Modern America: Charlotte Motor Speedway" (2017); "Charlotte Motor Speedway History: From Granite to Gold" (2013); "The Evolution of NASCAR: A Historical Collection" (2010); "Ryan Newman: Engineering Speed" (2004); and "Ray Evernham: Racer, Innovator, Leader" (2001), among others.

Capstone on a decorated career

But on June 30, Williams' career took on a new meaning, one she never imagined.

"I was sitting at home in Charlotte, nursing a summer cold, and I got a call from the president of the National Motorsports Press Association," Williams said. "I said, 'What can I do for you?' She said, 'It's what I can do for you.'"

Kelly Crandall, the NMPA president, informed Williams that she had been named to the NMPA Hall of Fame. Williams is the third woman ever inducted into the NMPA Hall of Fame.

"It felt surreal. I start to cry," Williams recalled. "Here are the drivers I looked up to when I started covering the sport, and I can't imagine I'm going to be there, too."

Williams is set to be inducted alongside Don "Big Daddy" Garlits, a pioneer in the world of drag racing, Johnny Rutherford, a three-time winner of the Indianapolis 500 and Indy Car-racing ambassador, and Hurley Haywood, one of the most accomplished road racers ever.

Williams said a Hall of Fame honor was never on her radar, although the industry has long since noticed her unique contribution to the motorsports industry.

"Someone described me as 'the Loretta Lynn of stock car racing,'" Williams said. "I may not be a coal miner's daughter, but I am a mill worker's daughter."

Looking back on her career, which has been highlighted by interactions with Mario Andretti, Richard Petty and a multitude of other racing legends, Williams can't help but be thankful for the community that raised her.

"It's having a good family foundation, a good community foundation, an excellent school system, people who believe in you and encourage you when you're down," she said. "You always hear 'The word I is not in the word team.' The word I" is not in the word of success, either."

With an award-winning career and a Hall of Fame induction in her back pocket, Williams said she hopes she can inspire the next generation to follow their dreams.

"I am from the Appalachian mountains and a small town, but I can still dream big and I can do it," she said. "Maybe what I've done in my life can be an inspiration to somebody else."

And just this past month, Williams was reminded about why she fell in love with motorsports and journalism all those years ago. Williams spent the day covering Ryan Newman's daughter racing at a track in Salisbury.

"I pulled out my 35mm camera and spent five hours there taking pictures and doing interviews," she said. "Sometimes, you've got to go back to where you began to remember why you fell in love with it."