LOUISE SMITH, SHIRLEY MULDOWNEY & JANET GUTHRIE Legacy Threatened by IMHOF Chaos

November 22, 2025

• While Alabama Governor Kay Ivey cleans house at the International Motorsports Hall of Fame after a damning audit revealed $236,000 in missing funds and stolen vehicles, we can’t help but think about the three women whose groundbreaking legacies are housed there. LOUISE SMITH, SHIRLEY MULDOWNEY, and JANET GUTHRIE represent the only female inductees among 145 Hall of Famers – a ratio that already tells us everything about how women’s contributions have been valued in motorsports history.
• LOUISE SMITH blazed the trail as the first woman inducted in 1999, nearly 30 years after the Hall’s founding – because apparently it took three decades to acknowledge that women had been racing competitively all along. MULDOWNEY and GUTHRIE, both drag racing legends, round out this embarrassingly small but incredibly significant group of honorees whose artifacts and memorabilia deserve better stewardship than what they’ve been getting.
• The scandal involving former employee Karen Lakey and commission members mishandling donated vehicles and funds puts the entire museum’s credibility at risk.

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