[Congressional Record Volume 164, Number 30 (Thursday, February 15, 2018)]
[Senate]
[Pages S1158-S1159]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                         TRIBUTE TO KEN SQUIER

  Mr. LEAHY. Mr. President, it is my honor and privilege to recognize 
the achievements of a great Vermont broadcaster and friend, Ken Squier.
  Ken recently became the first journalist ever to be enshrined in the 
NASCAR Hall of Fame. While his roots are at WDEV Radio in Waterbury, 
VT, Ken is known nationally as the country's most recognizable voice of 
auto racing. Without question, Ken's voice and calls of the most 
memorable auto races were key to the rise in prominence of the sport.
  Still, with all of the national recognition, Ken has always made 
Vermont his home. His radio station, WDEV, is strongly committed to 
community service and serves the people of his hometown and the greater 
Vermont community with distinction. Ken Squier is, without question, a 
Vermont treasure.
  In honor of Ken's induction into the NASCAR Hall of Fame and his 
continued outstanding service to Vermont, I ask unanimous consent that 
the article by Jasper Goodman, from the January 24, 2018 edition of the 
Barre Montpelier Times Argus, ``Profile: Squier a living legend,'' be 
printed in the Record.
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

                 [From the Times Argus, Jan. 24, 2018]

                    Profile: Squier a Living Legend

                          (By Jasper Goodman)

       ``Guys like Neil Bonnett and Tiny Lund and so many of those 
     guys who were so good--they all died doing what they wanted 
     to do, which is not the same as any other sport. If you are 
     dedicated to racing, it can cost you your life. I just felt 
     they needed to be represented far more than announcers or 
     promoters or sponsors''--Ken Squier.
       Seldom is Ken Squier wrong in his prognostications about 
     the motorsports industry. But when he told me five years ago 
     that he would never be officially inducted into the NASCAR 
     Hall of Fame, I had my doubts.
       Squier had just returned home from a trip to Charlotte, 
     North Carolina, where he and Barney Hall were presented with 
     the first annual Squier-Hall Award for NASCAR Media 
     Excellence, an honor for which they were co-namesakes. He 
     felt at the time that he had reached the pinnacle of his 
     career.
       NASCAR had just unveiled an exhibit in its Hall of Fame 
     museum that featured audio from his famous broadcast of the 
     1979 Daytona 500. Each year since then, a media member has 
     been honored with an award named after him.
       Last weekend, Ken Squier returned to the Hall of Fame in 
     Charlotte--this time to accept an even more prestigious 
     honor: being the first journalist ever inducted into the 
     NASCAR Hall of Fame itself.
       ``Because the panel is made up of a majority of drivers and 
     media guys, there were two or three who said, 'You just have 
     to be there.' So there I went,'' Squier said.
       Around Vermont, as the former owner of WDEV Radio and 
     Thunder Road, Squier has been a prominent public figure. But 
     at NASCAR events, fans worship the ground he walks on. Why?
       It's simple: NASCAR wouldn't be the sport it is today 
     without him.
       As auto racing rose in prominence during the 1960s and 
     early '70s, the sport began appearing on television. But it 
     was never given the treatment that baseball, basketball, 
     football or hockey got: live, start-to-finish coverage.
       In 1979, Squier changed that.
       At the direction of NASCAR co-founder Bill France Sr., 
     Squier convinced skeptical CBS-TV executives to air flag-to-
     flag coverage of the Daytona 500.
       It was a smashing success--literally. The race ended in 
     thrilling fashion, with Cale Yarborough and Donnie Allison 
     spinning out and getting in a fistfight on the infield. Ken 
     and color commentator David Hobbs vividly captured the 
     excitement and delivered a live broadcast to 15.1 million 
     viewers, many of whom were snowed into their homes after a 
     blizzard buried the Northeast.
       That date--Feb. 18, 1979--was when racing went from being a 
     Southern fringe-sport to a nationwide phenomenon.
       Squier served as the lap-by-lap commentator for the next 20 
     Daytona 500s. He famously nicknamed the event ``The Great 
     American Race.''
       ``The beaches of Daytona, in Ormond--that's the history of 
     American motorsports,'' Squier said. ``They were racing there 
     over 100 years ago. . . . This wasn't just another race--this 
     was Daytona.''
       Squier expresses hesitation about being in the same Hall of 
     Fame as the racing legends who he covered.
       ``There was still that catch in my throat,'' he said. 
     ``Guys like Neil Bonnett and Tiny Lund and so many of those 
     guys who were so good--they all died doing what they wanted 
     to do, which is not the same as any other sport. If you are 
     dedicated to racing, it can cost you your life. I just felt 
     they needed to be represented far more than announcers or 
     promoters or sponsors.''
       Squier's hesitation is unsurprising. Unlike many modern-day 
     broadcasters who enjoy directing the spotlight at themselves, 
     Squier has never been one to place himself at the center of 
     attention. Vermont Governor and three-time Thunder Road track 
     champion Phil Scott noted last Friday that in the first draft 
     of Squier's acceptance speech, there was ``not one single 
     mention of himself.''
       ``He's been telling us the great American story his whole 
     life,'' Scott said in his introduction of Squier at the Hall 
     of Fame induction ceremony. ``But we never hear his story.''

[[Page S1159]]

       The line about Squier not wanting to talk about himself was 
     repeated over and over again last weekend. And in a 90-minute 
     interview for this story, it proved to be largely true. 
     Squier managed to eloquently brush off questions about his 
     career accomplishments. Instead, he chronicled the history of 
     motorsports--as he so often does in conversation.
       But make no mistake: The fact that Squier rarely speaks of 
     himself isn't a character flaw. It's what makes him the best 
     at what he does.
       He is a storyteller--not of his own life, but of others'. 
     And without his innate ability to deliver those stories, 
     NASCAR would have never enjoyed the national prominence that 
     it does today.
       Squier grew up in Waterbury and worked throughout his 
     adolescence at WDEV, which his father, Lloyd, founded in 
     1931.
       ``I was lucky,'' Squier said. ``(WDEV) was always full of 
     kids--young, young guys. And Rusty (Parker) ran it fluidly. 
     It gave me an opportunity that a lot of people wouldn't have 
     had to go out and do something that I really desired, which 
     was the racing. It was big and it was growing and every year 
     it got bigger and bigger. But I could always come home.''
       Even as he rose to national prominence, Squier always 
     called Vermont home.
       ``I loved Verniont and everything it stood for,'' he said.
       Squier once described NASCAR drivers as ``ordinary people 
     doing extraordinary things.''
       The same can be said of Squier, an ordinary, down-to-earth 
     Vermonter who changed a sport in extraordinary ways.
       Squier has given much of his life to NASCAR. Last weekend, 
     the sport gave back to him.

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