Beloved North Carolina NASCAR Museum Set To Reopen

For many years in sports, the greatest of trophies had names that were synonymous with their sports.  For example, everyone knows The Lombardi Trophy is handed out to The Super Bowl winner.  The Stanley Cup is awarded to the winner of hockey's championship.  And for decades, if you won the season long points series in NASCAR, you won The Winston Cup.  Beginning in 1971 and ending in 2003, the RJ Reynold's Tobacco Company was the title sponsor for the sport.

Since then, there have been many names and sponsors and to be honest, I'm not sure I could tell you who the latest is.  That thirty plus year period was a golden era in auto racing in our country and specifically, the south.  It has been immortalized with The Winston Cup Museum in downtown Winston-Salem.  The museum opened in 2005 and houses many race cars as well as other cherished memorabilia and artifacts from that beloved Winston Cup era of NASCAR.  However, lawyers got involved with fans' joy.

The company that purchased the Winston brand, ITG Brands LLC, wants the assets of the museum saying they belong to them.  Oh, boy.  The Winston Cup Museum was forced to close on July 3 due to a temporary injunction that required the museum to close.  The lawsuit continues, but the museum will now reopen on September 1, and resume operations during its normal business hours.  Also, there will be NEW merch and features for fans to see and enjoy.

It's become a legal case of "he said/she said" between the two parties.  No common ground has been reached.  Another mediation hearing between the Winston Cup Museum's lawyers and ITG is slated for next month.  Ugh.  Can someone please tell lawyers to stay out of the joy fans get from their favorite sports.  I think I speak for all sports fans when I say we're not fans of lawyers.

In getting ready for today's show, I came across a blurb about The Spam Museum.  That's right, you didn't misread that.  There is indeed a museum dedicated to spreadable pork shoulder and ham.  I would have assumed it was in Hawaii (where Spam is like a crazy delicacy), but no, it's in Minnesota?  There's a good reason for that, but more on that later.  This got me to thinking though...what other "strange" museums do we have in this country?  Hang on for this tour!

Why don't we begin our tour out west in Blackfoot, Idaho (the potato capital of the world), and The Potato Museum.  All things potato past, present and future are covered here.

Let's stay out west and go to Las Vegas for The Neon Boneyard.  This is a neon sign homage to Vegas' past.  I would think this would be really cool to tour at night.

Plano, Texas (just outside Dallas) is where you'll find The Cockroach Hall of Fame.  Not only will you see living exhibits of cockroaches hissing at each other, but ones where roaches are made up like celebrities.  Wow.

Close to home, you can pile in the car and head to Beaufort, SC and the Kazoobie Kazoo Factory and Museum.  Learn about all things kazoo (including the proper way to play) and you may even get to make your own!

Middleton, Wisconsin is the place to go if you wanna deep dive into the world of mustard.  There you will find The National Mustard Museum.  Feel free to browse the largest collection of mustard and historical mustard artifacts. Admission is free and you can sample any and every of the nearly 500 mustards on sale at any given time.

I don't know if this is as much a museum as a bizarre answer to the question, "What happens to lost luggage that never gets returned?"  The Unclaimed Baggage center is 40K square feet of strange in Scottsboro, Alabama where you can buy-at discount-items from unclaimed luggage that the airlines have been unable to reunite with its owners (after 90 days).

Joshua Tree, California is where you run into the biggest WTH stop on our tour (IMO).  The Crochet Museum appears to be an abandoned PhotoMat kiosk/store that is just populated head-to-toe with products that have been crocheted.  Crazy.

Right on the world-famous Route 66 in San Bernadino, California, is where you'll find the museum dedicated to the most popular fast-food franchise of all-time:  McDonald's.  Even though the original building/store is no longer there, the museum on its site has tons of pieces of McDonald's history and it is a fun place to explore

In California's Bay Area (Alameida) is where you'll find The Pacific Pinball Museum.  Relive your childhood, playing pinball games.  There are more than 90 working machines on site.

And last, but not least the one that got our curiosity piqued to start this journey, The Spam Museum.  Located in Austin, Minnesota (home of parent company, Hormel Foods), this joint features a mock assembly line where you can practice packing Spam into cans and a gift shop with Spam cookbooks and all the merch you can handle.