Dover Downs director dies

Melvin Joseph, 83, one of the original founders of Dover Downs, a prominent name in motor sports, and a longtime harness horse owner, died April 6 at his home in Georgetown, Del.



Joseph is best know in The First State and in racing as the man who brought motorsport racing to Delaware. The Melvin Joseph Construction Company built Dover Downs' one-mile speedway, which surrounds its five-eighths mile harness racetrack. In 1995, it was Joseph's company which rebuilt the then asphalt NASCAR track and made it a state-of-the-art, concrete surface with high banks at each end, which has become known in motorsports as "the Monster Mile." In 2002 Joseph was inducted into the Delaware Sports Museum Hall of Fame.



For several years in the 1960s, Joseph conducted a harness meet at a track he built and owned, Georgetown Raceway in Sussex county in southern Delaware. The track later became a harness horse training center.



During his career as a horse owner, Joseph owned, either separately or with partners and friends, a number of top harness horses. For several years in the 1980s, Joseph and armored car magnate Bill Brooks and the late chicken-processing king Frank Perdue owned several top pacers. Their partnership ended after Brandywine Raceway closed following the 1989 season.



Joseph raced horses under the nom de course of 49 Racing Stable. He was the co-owner of the fast pacing mare Crossfire N, the 2003-04 Horse of the Meet at Dover Downs, and Los Barvos, a top-class trotter. Joseph also had success with a pacer named Forty Nine, who raced at Brandywine and at Maryland tracks. In the 1990s, Joseph also stood Tyler's Point, who he owned with Brooks and Perdue.



The 49 Racing Stable took its name from car number 49, which Joseph owned, in the first Daytona 500. Joseph and his friend John Rollins were instrumental in bringing the motorsports to Dover Downs in its first year of operation, in 1968. Later, Joseph championed NASCAR races as one of the company's products. Since 1969, his was the voice that said "gentlemen start your engines" to start the two annual NASCAR Nextel races at the track.



Joseph served on the board of directors of Dover Motorsports, Inc. and as vice president of Dover International Speedway. He also served on the board of directors of Dover Downs Gaming and Entertainment, Inc., the parent company of Dover Downs Harness, Dover Downs Slots, and Dover Downs Hotel.

« Back