Former 1960's Dodge driver, James Hylton, dies in auto wreck.

[odcics2]

TALLADEGA, Ala. — James Hylton, the 1966 Cup rookie of the year, and his son were killed in an auto accident in Georgia, NASCAR confirmed Saturday afternoon.

Hylton was 83. His son James Harvey Hylton Jr. also was killed in the accident on I-85 in Franklin County, Georgia. No other details were available. Georgia State Patrol declined to provide details to NBC Sports about the incident, stating a report would be available Monday.

The Roanoke Times reported that Hylton and his son and crew chief Terry Strange were traveling back to South Carolina after Friday's ARCA race at Talladega Superspeedway when the accident happened around 6 a.m. Saturday, according to Hylton's ex-wife Evelyn Hylton.

She told The Roanoke Times that a police officer came to her door Saturday morning and informed her what happened.
"[The officer] said Terry ... told them that he thought James was having a heart attack and he looked over at him and lost control of the truck and went across the median and then across the other lane of traffic and hit an embankment," Evelyn Hylton said in a phone interview with The Roanoke Times.

"The truck, towing a big trailer with a race car on it, thousands of pounds, you have to be really careful."

Hylton was born on his family's Virginia farm in 1934 and learned to drive on his father's Ford Model T. During his motorsports career, he worked as a mechanic for NASCAR Hall of Famer Rex White and as a crew chief for Hall of Famer Ned Jarrett before becoming a driver.

Hylton, an independent driver, won two Cup races in 602 career starts. He won at Richmond in 1970 and at Talladega in 1972. He last drove in a Cup race in 1993 at Darlington Raceway. Hylton finished second in points in 1966, '67 and '71.

He made his NASCAR Premier Series debut in the 1964 Old Dominion 400 at Old Dominion Speedway in Manassas, Virginia. Hylton finished 19th in a 20-car field. Jarrett won that race and was among four NASCAR Hall of Famers in that race (David Pearson was second, Richard Petty was eighth and Wendell Scott was 18th).

Hylton made his first start in ARCA in 1986 and climbed out of the car for the final time in that series in 2013 after running the entire schedule. He competed 175 ARCA races but never recorded a top-10 finish. Hylton was a car owner in ARCA. Brad Smith finished 31st in Friday's ARCA race at Talladega Superspeedway.

[Lennard]

Sad story

[69rtse4spd]

Sorry to hear this. .

[F8-4life]

live in a car, die in a car.
Better then dying in a bed in some ways I suppose.

[alfaitalia]

I hope die peacefully in my sleep like my Grandad.......not screaming and crying like the passengers on his bus!

[Aero426]

live in a car, die in a car.
Better then dying in a bed in some ways I suppose.

It sounds like it was horrible and violent.    Off the road, airborne into an embankment, with another 10,000 pounds of trailer behind.