Editing Hillsborough, North Carolina (section)

====Historic Occoneechee Speedway Trail====
[[Occoneechee Speedway]], just outside Hillsborough, was one of the first two [[NASCAR]] tracks to open in 1949. The track was made up of dirt. It is one of two tracks remaining from that inaugural season, [[Martinsville Speedway]] being the other. Today, the site has been preserved as a trail.

The Historic Occoneechee Speedway Trail (HOST) is a {{convert|3|mi|km|abbr=on|adj=on}}-trail located on {{convert|44|acre|m2}} at the site of the former Speedway.  [[Bill France, Sr.|Bill France]] and the early founders of NASCAR bought land to build a {{convert|1|mi|km|abbr=on|adj=on}} oval track at Hillsborough, but opposition from local religious leaders prevented the track from being built in the town. Instead, NASCAR officials moved their project to Alabama, where they built the large [[Talladega Superspeedway]] in [[Talladega, Alabama|Talladega]].<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.historichillsborough.org/images/Speedway-Complete.pdf |title=Racing vs. Religion |access-date=July 16, 2007 |publisher=Historic Hillsborough |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071008210038/http://www.historichillsborough.org/images/Speedway-Complete.pdf |archive-date=October 8, 2007 |url-status=dead }}</ref>