Jason Rufkahr
Business Communications, ADMS-2563
Mrs. Darenda Kersey
April 6, 2013
Nascar racer Mark Martin was born on January 9, 1959 in Batesville Arkansas to Julian and Jackie Martin. He learned how to drive by an early age, with his father pressing the gas while Mark stood in the driver’s seat and steered them down back country dirt roads. By the fall of 1973 Mark had persuaded his father to build him a race car. On April 12, 1974 at the age 15 years old, Mark was driving a race car. He started out racing local quarter mile tracks where his first race was at a small dirt track in Locust Grove Missouri. He won only his third race and went on to win that year’s Arkansas State Championship. In 1977 he skipped his high school graduation to go racing in Springfield Missouri. Mark began racing that year in the American Speed Association, a stock car racing series based in the Midwestern United States, along with Rusty Wallace, Dick Trickle, and Alan Kulwicki.
Martin made his first attempt at the elite Nascar Winston Cup in 1981, with moderate success. He ran a full season in 1982 and attempted to win the Winston Cup Rookie of the Year. By 1983 his racing career had gone sour. Having exhausted most of his personal resources the previous year, and suffering through a failed sponsorship, Mark was forced to sell his race team. He spent most of the next years bouncing from team to team.
Mark Martin Ford was originally started out at 2605 Harrison Street in Batesville, but in 2006 it moved to a new location of 1601 Batesville Blvd because the business had out grown the old location. Mark Martin Ford is privately owned, and currently employees a staff of 47.
Mark Martin is co-owners in his dealership with Lance Landers, who also owns other dealerships. Mark and Lance took over ownership of Independence Ford, which is now Mark Martin Ford, on January 26 2004. Between the two of them, they have a 50/50 partnership in the dealership. Mark Martin