since I get asked about him a few times a month and even have a section for the question in my Racing FAQ’s [#27]….the lastest. He’s been to more Victory Lanes than Richard Petty, David Pearson, Dale Earnhardt and Jeff Gordon combined. Officially, Bill “The Hat Man” Brodrick was in charge of public relations for Unocal’s racing division. He’s remembered, however, as the burly guy with a lion’s mane of coiffed hair and beard to match who was in charge of Victory Lane. His celebrations were orchestrated with the finely tuned precision of a symphony conductor. Brodrick was almost always the first person to a winner’s car once it got to racing’s version of the Promised Land, and as a result, he was almost always on television for at least a few seconds. Unocal was bought out in 1997. Although he’d been with the company just a few weeks shy of 29 years, at the end of the season, Brodrick was shown the door. Afterward, he refused to be a “hanger on,” who begs for passes. He operated Tavern at the Bridge in Algonquin, Ill., for four years and then turned it over to his son. “My son talked me into it, and my wife, of course, was on my son’s side,” Brodrick said of his decision to buy the bar. “This place was available, and my son knew it real well. To make a long story short, I bought that saloon and had to go to work. My son runs the business now and it’s doing quite well. It was work. I’d never worked that hard in all my life.” He still handles a few things here and there with the tavern, and he’s also a contract driver for a courier company. Brodrick stays as busy as he wants to be. Read full story on NASCAR.com.(3-29-2007)
