Richard Childress has dedicated his life to racing and winning championships, something that is common knowledge to NASCAR fans. What many don't know about is his dedication to conservation.
Conservation: "A careful preservation and protection of something. Especially: planned management of a natural resource to prevent exploitation, destruction, or neglect." - Merriam-Webster.
Childress's love of hunting and fishing is well-documented. He has done so in Africa, Russia, and many other countries around the world. He has hunted and fished with family members and race car drivers alike. He has also spent a considerable amount of money and time supporting organizations that protect wildlife and their habitats.
Back in the 1990s, he was part of the fundraising efforts to help reintroduce elk to North Carolina, a process that successfully took place in the early 2000s. He also converted some of his land in Montana into a conservation area where elk could roam on the way to Yellowstone. This prevented builders from encroaching on the area as more and more people became infatuated with the Western lifestyle.
"People that aren't hunters, they go out to enjoy the great outdoors, they don't understand that the hunters, a lot of time, provide that," Childress told AltDriver during a one-on-one sitdown. "The people that go up to see the elk in North Carolina -- which hadn't been there in a couple of hundred years -- the hunters raised the money.
"And to put those elk where people can carry their kids and see them, and people that are not even hunters can go up there and listen to an elk bugle, or see elk calves running around, that's the rewarding part."
A fateful letter
Childress grew up hunting and exploring the outdoors. He hunted squirrels and rabbits as a child. He learned from his stepfather's father that if you kill something, you eat it. You don't just hunt for fun.
As he aged, he hunted deer and turkey. He began starting to work with organizations that sought to preserve the outdoors. However, he didn't fully begin to understand conservation until the 1980s.
This is when he received a letter from an angry man.
"I remember back in the 80s, I had shot something and somehow they put a picture in the old 'Winston Cup Scene,'" Childress explained as he leaned back in his chair. "I don't know if you go back that far. It was an old magazine. And this guy writes GM Goodwrench, 'I'll never buy another car. Y'all killing, all this.' So I did my research then, really learned a whole lot about conservation.
"And the more I thought about it and the more I read about it, going back to 1937, the Pittman-Robertson Wildlife Restoration Act, 1950, the Dingell-Johnson Act. As you read these things, you understand if you buy a case of shells or whatever you buy, there's an excise tax that goes to Pittman-Robertson.
"If you buy fuel for your small engines or your fishing equipment, that money goes to Dingell-Johnson, and all that's for conservation. So your hunters are your biggest conservationists. And the more I dug into it and learned about it, I said, 'This is something I want to be involved in.'"
Photo credit: AltDriver
The Pittman-Robertson Wildlife Restoration Act and the Dingell-Johnson Act provide funding for wildlife restoration, conservation, and hunter education. Under the Pittman-Robertson Act, taxes on firearms, ammunition, and archery equipment are put into the Federal Aid to Wildlife Restoration Fund in the U.S. Treasury.
This funding then goes to individual states to help restore animal habitats and for further education of hunters and outdoor enthusiasts. Back in January, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service announced that more than $1.3 billion would be apportioned between all states in 2025 to support conservation and connect people with nature.
The Dingell-Johnson Act places taxes on fishing equipment and boating-related items. It uses these funds to provide grants to individual states to aid with sport fish restoration and management.
"The thing about most of these groups, people don't realize all the things that they do beyond protecting the wildlife," Childress said. "They preserve land. I mean, like the National Wild Turkey Federation, I'm on their board. And we're working a lot with the forestry to help the forestry out.
"So there's a lot more than just protecting an animal or moving an animal from one place to the other."
Childress still has this letter from the angry man. He doesn't remember everything in it after roughly 40 years, but certain things still stick out when he reflects on that pivotal moment in his life.
"When that guy wrote that letter -- it was '85 or '86 -- I did my research and I sent him back about how many turkeys had been -- they were about gone, and now there's a few million of them around," he said. "Just different things that the hunters have done for conservation.
"And my last sentence -- I can't remember his name, I got the letter still at my desk. If somebody sends me something, I send that letter and change the name on it. But the last sentence was, 'Now you tell me what you've done for conservation to protect our animals.'"
Bringing conservation to the race fans
A visit to the Richard Childress Racing Museum shows this side of Childress. Back in the early 2000s, the museum moved to its new building after outgrowing its previous home. Childress used this move to create a wildlife section highlighting his hunting and fishing trips, as well as the conservation-focused organizations he supports.
Photo credit: AltDriver
"I said, 'I need to put wildlife, put the history, let people see there's more to it,'" Childress said. "And we take a dollar from every ticket that is sold and put it back into conservation. And we've been doing that ever since probably 2001 or 2002, when we built it."
This area does not feature Cup Series cars or haulers; it has animals from all around the world and plaques detailing their origins. Childress hunted or caught the majority on display. His grandsons, Ty and Austin Dillon, also added to the display. The late Dale Earnhardt and many others also contributed while joining the Hall of Fame team owner in the great outdoors.
The wildlife section of the museum features displays for prominent organizations with which Childress is involved. Ducks Unlimited, Bass Pro Shops, Realtree, North Carolina Wildlife Habitat Foundation, National Wild Turkey Federation, and Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation are all prominently featured.
Photo credit: AltDriver
These organizations all share the common goal of supporting conservation efforts across North America. They also have no problem with Childress's passion for hunting. This is key considering that Bass Pro Shops and Realtree have both sponsored Richard Childress Racing cars. So has Winchester Ammunition, a newer addition to the team.
"Johnny Morris, to me, is the greatest modern-day conservationist," Childress said about the Bass Pro Shops founder, whom he met in the mid-1990s at a wildlife fundraising event. "I call him the modern-day Theodore Roosevelt. Theodore Roosevelt was one of my heroes for all the many, many things he'd done, preserving parks and putting a lot of that together."
Guiding the future generations
Austin Dillon at a Winchester event. Photo credit: Richard Childress Racing
Conservation has been a pivotal part of Childress's life, but he has not kept this to himself. He has worked to guide future generations by educating them with verbal lessons and physical application, starting with his family.
"He took us out and taught us how to hunt and fish from the time I can even remember walking," Ty Dillon told AltDriver. "And I just remember my first, probably the most memorable, was my first hunt trip with him. Out in the deer stand and took my first deer, and he didn't believe that I shot it.
"I was promising like, 'Pop Pop, I got him, I got him!' He's like, 'I don't know, buddy, I don't know.' And later that night, we got out of the stand to find it, and I definitely hit it. And it was just a fun celebration.
"It was one of our first hunting trips ever, but we've been able to travel to New Zealand together, Mexico, Canada, Africa on all kinds of hunting trips with him. We have stories and stories to tell of just the adventures we've been on together and memories that we'll never forget."
Photo credit: AltDriver
Childress has dozens of stories as well, some more embarrassing than others. As he tells each one, a big smile crosses his face. He occasionally has to stop and collect himself after laughing about particular memories
"I remember carrying Austin the first time up to a friend of mine's ranch over in Iowa, and it was a high-fenced area," Childress said. "And he shot his first deer, and he was 6, maybe 7. And he wasn't supposed to have radios, but it was on a fenced area.
"I heard a shot, and I said, 'Austin, was that you that shot it?' 'Yeah, Pop Pop. I think I pooped in my pants.'"
Having these memories of teaching his family is special enough, but Childress has experienced something that he views as equally rewarding.
He has seen Austin and Ty, in particular, carry on the tradition of supporting conservation efforts as they have grown and started families. He has had the opportunity to sit back and watch his former pupils educate others about safety, the importance of protecting animal habitats, and funding education across the country.
"This past fall, I took my son on his first hunting trip," Ty said. "He's four years old and just him and I got to sit in the stand together and experience that. And just having something that was passed to you from a grandfather and dad, hunting traditions and all the things you learn about being in the outdoors, and to be able to -- he's only 4 -- but pass that on to him means so much.
"And I hope it's one day something that he gets to pass to his kids. Learning about the outdoors and conservation is important to our family. And I'm just happy that my son had a good time doing it."