Here’s one of the stranger-looking cars in early NASCAR history: Junior Johnson’s notorious ’66 Ford Galaxie, which quickly earned the name Yellow Banana.

The date was August 7, 1966, at Atlanta International Raceway, and the Ford Motor Company was having a rough season in NASCAR Grand National competition. The automaker was locked in a political squabble with NASCAR boss Bill France Sr. over engine rules, much like Chrysler the previous year. When Ford’s 427 SOHC engine (read about the mighty Cammer here) was dealt another crippling blow through a rules change in April, the home office in Dearborn asked its factory-backed teams to stay home.

But as things turned out, NASCAR needed the Ford teams just as much as the Ford teams needed NASCAR, because when the Fords stayed home, the Ford fans stayed home, too. So it was apparently made known to the Ford contingent, somehow, some way, that if  one of the top Ford entries would be willing to return, NASCAR officials might be willing to look the other way when the car rolled through technical inspection. At the request of John Holman of Holman Moody, team owner Junior Johnson took NASCAR up on the offer, and the result was the ’66 Galaxie that will be forever known as the Yellow Banana.

As the car magazines of the time (above) were happy to show, the yellow hardtop Johnson brought to Atlanta was remarkably different from a production ’66 Ford. The nose was drooped down, the deck was bent high in the air, and the entire body was squashed down over the chassis. The windshield was laid back and the roof was chopped down several inches. It was said that driver Fred Lorenzen, on loan from Holman Moody, could barely get in and out through the narrow left window opening. The banana-shaped Galaxie never should have gotten past the technical inspectors, but magically it did.

The aerodynamically enhanced Ford qualified third for the Dixie 400 in Atlanta. (Another car of dubious legality, Smokey Yunick’s Chevelle, was on the pole. Read about it here.) Lorenzen led for 24 laps but then smooshed the Banana into the wall on lap 139 due to a mechanical failure—according to some sources a tire blew, others say a hub failed. (Richard Petty picked up one of his 200 race victories that day.) And that was the end of the Banana in its one and only race appearance. NASCAR’s parting words to Johnson went something like this: Nice to see you, come back soon, but don’t bring the Yellow Banana with you.

Ford was lured back to the Grand National series with what proved to be an even better concession from NASCAR than the Banana had been. The Ford teams were permitted to run their intermediate-size Fairlanes and Comets with 427 wedge engines and Galaxie-style front suspension, a highly competitive setup that returned Ford to the top.

Today, the saga of the Yellow Banana is water under the bridge, just one more colorful episode in NASCAR lore. At the 2015 Hall of Fame induction ceremony in Charlotte, Hall of Fame members Johnson (right) and Lorenzen were reunited with the Banana (actually a recreation). Johnson passed away in 2019 at the age of 88, while Lorenzen is living comfortably in Illinois.  -Photo below courtesy of NASCAR on Twitter.