Roads and Rides brings us this terrific retrospective short, this time interviewing Ed Justice, Jr. to find out just how integral his family was to the sport of stock car racing, and vice versa. As a descendant of one of the earliest names in NASCAR, the man understands and has a keen appreciation for what his dad and two uncles–Ed, Zeke and Gus–were able to do to cultivate and grow this American sport.

Justice gives the audience the quick recap behind stock car racing that we all know by now: moonshiners and bootleggers out of Southern hill country, who modified their stock Fords and Chevys to outrun the law. “These guys wanted to know, ‘Was your car faster than my car? Well, let’s go out to this farm and we’ll make a circle and we’ll run a race.’ That’s the roots of stock car racing,” explains Justice.

Segueing into Ed Junior’s garage, we set eyes upon a gloss black ’39 Ford Standard coupe, which Ed describes as the first-ever NASCAR champion car, “driven by Red Byron.” Prepped by renowned mechanic and fabricator (as well as the man who came up with the organization’s name) Red Vogt, the V8-powered coupe took the win at Daytona back at the first championship race in 1948.

Red Byron poses for his picture after winning the 1948 NASCAR Championship.

“My dad and my uncles were the sponsors of this car, in fact they [were] the first sponsors ever for NASCAR, [so] this is very much a root of our family,” says Justice. “So I replicated this car to surprise my dad…and you could see [the joy] on his face.” A picture that Ed Jr. took of his dad sitting in the car shows just how much the gesture meant to him.

In a sense, it’s one of the best ways the son could have shown his appreciation for all that his father and uncles had done for motorsports. To revive the nostalgia and bring back the thrills and memories of the good life. And it doesn’t hurt that the car can still run like the champion it’s modeled after, as we see in following clips of Justice driving around Los Angeles.

Find more videos like these on the Road and Rides’ YouTube channel, and find them on Facebook for more cool pictures and videos of killer cars.