February 1969 was to be a special year for Pete Hamilton, Don MacTavish and race fans from New England. In years past many New England greats ran on the high banks of Daytona in the Permatex 300 and other races. Bill Slater, Bugs Stevens and Rene Charland are a few of the drivers that blazed the trail for others to follow.

This was the year of Hamilton and MacTavish. Mac (as his friends called him) had a good car and was looking for a solid run in the Permatex 300. The Daytona 500 had Hamilton starting in row 17 in the #1 Grand National (known as Nextel Cup today) car, a new 1969 Dodge Charger.

Rumors floated around the garage that MacTavish had a Grand National car lined for the rest of the season after the Daytona 500. It was a factory sponsored deal as the story goes.

PHOTO 2 - MacTavish is ready to start the Permatex 300. He was driving the Gene White sponsored Late Model Sportsman Mercury Comet. The car had run fairly well in practice, timing in the low to mid 180MPH range.

This was 1969. Unlike today's stock cars, much of the Comet was stock factory manufactured and heavily altered for racing.

Storm clouds began to move in as race time neared and the race was to begin 8 minutes ahead of schedule. There was a chill to the air. The 26 year old MacTavish took to the track and ran the two warmup laps as NASCAR sorted out the last few details. The green flag waved and the race was on.

NEWSPAPER: It took 2 laps for the field to get up to speed. MacTavish was on the move. It was lap 8 and MacTavish was coming out of the east turn when his car suddenly turned hard right and head on into the wall. The nose of the car punched partly through gate # 7, an opening in the otherwise solid concrete wall protected by a piece of metal guard rail.

The car was torn in half by the impact, fatally injuring MacTavish instantly. Mac's car spun into the path of the # 27 car of Sam Sommers and was hit head on. There was little left of the Gene White Comet. The safety workers removed Mac from the car.

No one knows what caused the crash. We only know we lost a friend and home town hero.

Although Mac was the 6th driver to die at Daytona Speedway, he was the first to die in stock car racing competition at that track.