Photos by SCOTT HOFFMAN

Greensboro (N.C.) News-Record Buz McKim has the responsibility of accumulating the artifacts and memorabilia that will be on display when the NASCAR Hall of Fame opens in 2010.

SCOTT HOFFMAN

Greensboro (N.C.) News-Record Lloyd Moore received this collage from his family after he retired from NASCAR racing.

SOMEWHERE IN CHARLOTTE, N.C. -- Buz McKim pilots his SUV on a winding path away from the city's skyscrapers to a non-descript brick building.

Road construction alters his route, not fear of being followed. Yet, the building's location remains secret because of its valuable stash.

Once there, McKim unlocks a door to enter the building and faces a second door.

"Look at this," he says, as he unlocks and opens the second door.

Here, in a windowless space the size of a conference room, NASCAR history resides.

McKim is its caretaker. The historian for the NASCAR Hall of Fame searches for racing artifacts and stores some here until the Hall is constructed.

Consider McKim the Indiana Jones of NASCAR history minus the chases and fedora.

Like the movie character Harrison Ford made famous, McKim uses ingenuity and gusto to find historic objects. Like Jones, McKim has an enemy, but McKim's foe is time. Although the Hall won't open until spring 2010, the interior design team needs to know within six months what McKim has, so displays can be built for those objects.

The Hall, which will be near the heart of Charlotte, will have about 40,000 square feet of exhibit space and showcase about two dozen cars. It's the smaller items, though, that McKim searches for, making phone calls and trekking across the Southeast.

This is a job the 56-year-old has waited his whole life for, notes his mom on a Web site friends made for McKim. He's never been far from racing. His father was a track announcer. McKim raced briefly and later designed the paint schemes for the Daytona 500-winning cars of David Pearson and Benny Parsons.

But it was days at the Museum of Speed, located a short drive from Daytona International Speedway, that had the most impact on McKim. He was a museum volunteer at age 13. McKim studied the vehicles, relished their history and admired their drivers, fueling his passion.

Those feelings remain. As he recently showed items that could be displayed in NASCAR's Hall of Fame, McKim introduced many items by saying, "I love this" and then explained their significance. This treasure trove features items NASCAR fans can appreciate.

There's a Bobby Allison racing uniform under plastic and hanging on a wall. Nearby is pair of dirt-stained white pants Fireball Roberts wore when he raced. There's Marvin Panch's 1956 contract with Ford that called for him to receive 60 percent of his race winnings as a driver and $500 per month as a mechanic. Today's top drivers make about $7 million per season before figuring in a percentage of race winnings and merchandise sales.

Among the items McKim brings to the building is a red helmet that Bill Elliott wore earlier this decade. McKim places it near a collection of racing seats. One seat was made for Alan Kulwicki, who was to have picked it up the day after he returned from the Bristol spring race in 1993. Kulwicki died in a plane crash heading to that track. That seat is near a box that includes a pair of wingtip shoes Dave Marcis wore when he raced.

Newer items such as Elliott's helmet aren't hard to find. Many drivers don't part with as many belongings as competitors from earlier generations did, selling their items for needed money. Fire destroyed other collections.

The older items intrigue McKim. He seeks objects from many competitors, including Curtis Turner and Joe Weatherly, and also looks for items from long deceased tracks such as those in the North Carolina cities of North Wilkesboro and Greensboro.

McKim wants personal items, things that drivers or car owners touched or were a part of cars, pieces with a special story to tell.

Such as Ray Fox's watches. Fox was a car owner from 1962-74 and had seven of NASCAR's 50 greatest drivers race for him: Junior Johnson, David Pearson, Buck Baker, Buddy Baker, Fred Lorenzen, LeeRoy Yarborough and Cale Yarborough.

Fox had watches made for his team in 1963 when Johnson drove. The silver watch was shaped like a steering wheel. Its face had a No. 3 in the middle -- the car number -- and a cartoon Fox on it. Only problem was that the watches were stolen before the team received them.

McKim found one with the help of a collector, marking an item off his wish list to find. That list remains long. McKim's "Holy Grail" is a gold-plated NASCAR membership card -- card No. 1. That's the one Bill France Sr., gave Red Vogt, a co-founder of NASCAR.

"I'd love to find that," McKim says. "It's disappeared."

McKim has spent eight years searching for it, but like Indiana Jones, not all paths lead where one expects. McKim recalls a time when he was told NASCAR had a truckload of confiscated parts that he could have for the Hall.

"We went up there salivating ... opened the door and there were like four pieces left," he says. "Someone had hauled everything off.

"People can say, 'I got this' and 'I got that' but until we can actually see it, touch it or at least get a picture we can't take anything for granted."

So, McKim keeps searching, collecting and dropping items off at this building. As McKim leaves, he locks both doors, heads back in his SUV and slips through traffic back toward the city where rising from a dirt floor soon will be NASCAR's Hall and its treasures.