Never confuse "enthusiasm" with "interest." While dedication is obviously a factor in what the historian does, one quickly learns to keep one's enthusiasm in check given that it inevitably clouds one's observations and subsequent interpretations. Of course, historians tend to be very much "compartmentalized" in that their thoughts as historians are kept quite separate from their personal thoughts -- and enthusiasms. Although I had a long interest in the history of automobile racing, I did not move into the automotive historian camp until relatively late. This was prompted in great part by the realization that most of what was being presented as "automobile racing history" was largely either hogwash or so inept that it was worthless dribble. The few exceptions were truly that, exceptions. The advent of the internet forum held promise for a time, but that promise, alas, has largely been very much unfulfilled. Over time, I have pretty much abandoned any enthusiasm for the sport and drifted further and further into the historian's realm.

All that said, "The Last American Hero" was a better article by Tom Wolfe than a movie. I have come to the conclusion that few have actually read the article that appeared in Esquire many years ago (early 1965), or have forgotten just what it actually focused upon. The article was notable more for it being written by Wolfe for a New York-based magazine than for what was actually written, the style being somewhat different than the usual Southern sports prose.

Given that I was "hanging around" the GN scene at the time, not many were all that impressed by the writing, but rather that someone took the trouble to write about Junior without making him like as if he were a racing version of Pa Kettle or some redneck gomer from Tobacco Road. Junior was many things in those days, the biggest one being very sharp and smart.