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Weedsport, NY (March 3, 2026) – The Northeast Dirt Modified Hall of Fame sends sincere condolences to the family and friends of “Wild” Bill Rafter, a larger-than-life hero to Western New York race fans since the late 1940s, who died Monday at the age of 96.
Hailing from Clarence Center, NY, Rafter was inducted into the Northeast Dirt Modified Hall of Fame in the inaugural class of 1992.
Rafter began building his legendary career as a teenager, back at Buffalo’s Civic Stadium in 1948. Spotting talent, local car dealer John Moran hired the kid to drive his highly-modified ’37 Ford coupe and they proceeded to tear up the record books. When a drivers’ strike shut down the 1951 season, the team followed the racing fumes southward, to Daytona Beach, where Rafter took a credible stab at NASCAR’s newly-formed Grand National series.
Returning north after a military stint, “Wild Bill” picked up right where he left off, winning five extra-distance races in just three days in the fall of 1958—at Monroe County, the NYS Fairgrounds in Syracuse, Civic Stadium, Merrittville and Waterloo. It was the first of four victories he’d score at Syracuse.
Driving a blue and white No. 22 for his brother-in-law Gil Bruss, Rafter was close to unbeatable throughout the 1960s, on both dirt and asphalt.
He was as tough as they come, with no ”give-up” in him: During a 1964 championship event at Merrittville, a rock hit Rafter above his left eye; he continued to two-fist the car to the win, then was immediately transported to the hospital. He had fractured his skull.
Rafter even came back at the end of his career, after a spectacularly fiery engine explosion at Perry Speedway in 1970 landed him in a burn center for a month, where he pleaded with doctors to “let me out for the final race. I just need to run one lap and I’m champion!”
During his 24-year career, “Wild Bill” took titles on both clay and tar, at Civic Stadium, Merrittville, Lancaster, Holland and the NYS Fairgrounds. Rafter was NASCAR’s NYS Sportsman Champion in 1959.
