Sam BordenDec 24, 2025, 07:00 AM ET
Shut
Sam Borden is a senior author for ESPN.com.
ON NOV. 12, the USA Treasury Division shut down its 232-year run of manufacturing pennies. This wasn’t an enormous deal to me (and I’m nearly sure wasn’t to you). Most individuals don’t take into consideration pennies that always and use them even much less, which is exactly why the federal government stopped making the cash within the first place.
The gripes about pennies are acquainted: There’s no such factor as penny sweet any extra. Many shops gained’t even take them. They price 4 cents to make however solely have one cent of worth. They’re annoying.
Primarily, pennies are value nothing.
However earlier than you neglect about them completely, think about this:
What in the event that they’re value the whole lot?
DALE EARNHARDT SR. was burdened. It was Saturday, Feb. 14, 1998, the ultimate day of apply earlier than the Daytona 500, and Earnhardt’s automobile was having issues. An engine difficulty. His workforce was debating whether or not to swap in one of many backups, however with lower than 24 hours till the race, there was no consensus. Solely anxiousness.
This was normal for Earnhardt at Daytona. Regardless of being the most important star in NASCAR and an all-time legend, Earnhardt had by no means gained his sport’s most well-known prize. Are you able to think about if Tiger Woods achieved the whole lot he did besides he by no means gained a single Masters? That was Earnhardt. It wasn’t only a obvious gap in his legacy; it was the one gap.
It didn’t assist that he had misplaced the five hundred in what appeared like each manner potential. He had completed second 4 instances. He wrecked. He had gear fail. In 1986, he was charging towards the entrance and ran out of fuel with three laps to go. In 1990, he ran over a bit of particles on the ultimate lap and blew a tire to lose the lead on the wire. In 1991, he hit a seagull, and no, that’s not some type of NASCAR euphemism; Earnhardt actually collided with a low-flying chook, muddying his automobile’s aerodynamics, earlier than later crashing. Nineteen earlier begins within the Daytona 500, 19 heartbreaks. The engine bother on that Saturday in 1998 felt like the start of No. 20.
When Wessa Miller was just a little woman, she would generally play with a toy automobile and say, “I’m Dale Earnhardt!” ESPN Illustration
So, yeah, Earnhardt was just a little edgy as he left the storage’s most important space and walked towards a small convention room. His longtime adviser, JR Rhodes, was alongside; everybody else on the workforce stored engaged on the automobile.
A handful of kids greeted him within the convention room. They have been Make-A-Want children. Earnhardt placed on his greatest face and was gracious. He squatted all the way down to be on the identical eye degree as the youngsters as he talked to them, then popped again as much as shake palms with the mother and father. He gave them his consideration along with his time.
Close to the top, he got here to just a little woman. Her title was Wessa Miller. She was from Kentucky. She was 6 years previous and had been born with spina bifida, a situation the place the again doesn’t kind appropriately, leaving the spinal twine and surrounding nerves uncovered as an alternative of lined. Within the hospital, medical doctors advised Wessa’s mother, Juanita, it was the worst case of spina bifida they’d ever seen and it wasn’t possible Wessa would survive lengthy sufficient to go dwelling. Six years later, Juanita and her husband, Booker, have been treating every day with Wessa as a present. Wessa was paralyzed from the waist down, had a shunt in her head to scale back fluid and was in a wheelchair. Earnhardt kneeled subsequent to her.
Wessa cherished Earnhardt. Juanita had grown up rooting for Darrell Waltrip, however Booker was born the very same day as Earnhardt — April 29, 1951 — and adopted him intently. Wessa would generally say, “I’m Dale Earnhardt!” as she performed with a toy automobile. She was dutiful about watching his races.
Wessa and Earnhardt talked for almost quarter-hour. They giggled. Then Wessa mentioned, in her gradual, syrupy speech, that she had one thing to present Earnhardt. She pushed her tiny hand into his. He seemed down. It was a penny. A fortunate penny, she mentioned.
“What’s this for?” Earnhardt requested. Individuals would generally give him playing cards or photos to autograph, however nobody had ever given him a coin. He was confused. “What’s this for?” he mentioned once more.
“That’s for you,” Wessa advised him, “to win the Daytona 500.”
Wessa Miller met Dale Earnhardt the day earlier than the 1998 Daytona 500 and gave him a penny. Earnhardt, who wasn’t significantly superstitious, instantly glued it to his dashboard. Courtesy Miller Household & Davie Hinshaw/Charlotte Observer through Getty Photographs
IT SHOULD BE SAID: Earnhardt was not a deeply superstitious man. He had a few hoodoos like most drivers — peanuts anyplace close to a race automobile have been verboten, and Earnhardt steadfastly prevented $50 payments as a result of, it was mentioned, an old-time driver died in a crash with two of them in his pocket.
However past these, Rhodes advised me, there wasn’t a lot. That was why it was so shocking to Rhodes that Earnhardt, after leaving Wessa and strolling out of the convention room, seemed so decided.
If a fan handed Earnhardt a present — no matter it was — he’d often simply go it to Rhodes. This time, although, Earnhardt squeezed Wessa’s penny in his fist and headed instantly for the storage.
Jerry Hailey, who labored on Earnhardt’s crew, figured Earnhardt was hurrying again to rejoin the dialog about what to do with the engine. However Earnhardt blew previous everybody and began rifling the cabinets. “I remember he was like, ‘I need glue,’” Hailey mentioned.
Ron Otto, one other crew member, grabbed a little bit of epoxy and commenced mixing it for Earnhardt, however Earnhardt didn’t wish to wait. He snatched a tube of yellow Gorilla Glue, took it over to the automobile and tried to stay the penny to the dashboard.
“And this stuff is stringy and it’s everywhere,” Hailey mentioned. “It’s all over his hands, all over his gloves. When he pulled his hand back, the penny came off. So he’s like, ‘Give me some more glue,’ and he puts it back on there.”
Hailey laughed. “You can still see his fingerprint on it,” he mentioned.
JUANITA SAYS THAT, initially, Wessa was going to be named both Lynetta Jo or Joetta Lynn. She and Booker simply weren’t certain. However Booker had an uncle everybody known as Uncle Wess and, shortly earlier than Juanita gave delivery, Uncle Wess died from a coronary heart assault. Juanita knew how a lot Uncle Wess was wanting ahead to having a brand new grandniece, she mentioned, “so I just came up with Wessa after he passed. Truthfully, it’s a made-up name.”
Wessa was born at Pikeville Medical Middle, however instantly after supply, medical doctors advised Juanita they weren’t geared up to attempt to save a baby with this degree of spina bifida. She was transferred to the College of Kentucky hospital in Lexington, nearly 150 miles away. Juanita had by no means heard of spina bifida; she simply knew one thing was very fallacious together with her child.
“They told us when she was born she’d never be nothing but a vegetable,” Booker mentioned. “I said, ‘OK, this is how I feel about it: You tell me she’s not going to live, I’ll take her home and bury her if she dies. And if she does live, I’ll take her home and take care of her. But we’re going to try.”
Wessa Miller was born with spina bifida, a situation that required her to lie solely on her abdomen for months, and medical doctors didn’t suppose she had a lot time. Right this moment, she’s 34 and helps maintain her household on high of the most recent information. Courtesy Miller Household, Jessi Dodge/ESPN
At UK, there have been assessments, so many assessments. Not like most infants, Wessa couldn’t lie on her again, so she was all the time on her abdomen. Nobody may maintain her. Each time surgeons tried to shut her backbone, mind fluid would drain and the overlaying would burst open once more. Juanita and Booker have been advised to name family members and have them come to the hospital greater than as soon as as a result of medical doctors anticipated that Wessa was about to die. Juanita took pictures of the whole lot, irrespective of how jarring and graphic Wessa’s wounds have been, as a result of, she mentioned, “I knew it was all I would have.”
Even after Wessa survived 5 surgical procedures and was discharged from the hospital after three months, nobody anticipated a day would possibly come when Wessa can be 6 years previous and attend the Daytona 500. Specialists advised Juanita and Booker that Wessa would dwell a 12 months, perhaps two. After they linked up with Make-A-Want for the journey to Daytona in 1998, Juanita and Booker advised one another how fortunate they have been to have even made it this far with their daughter. As they talked with Wessa earlier than making the 750-mile drive from Kentucky, Juanita clearly remembers asking Wessa whether or not she had something she needed to carry to her favourite driver in order that he would possibly all the time bear in mind her.
“She kept saying, ‘I want to give him a penny,’” Juanita mentioned. “I don’t know why. She just kept saying that’s what she wanted.”
Booker and Juanita handed over a penny. However over the course of the drive by means of Virginia and Tennessee and the Carolinas and Georgia, Wessa — as little women usually do — dropped it within the automobile and misplaced it. Booker and Juanita gave her one other one and, nicely, she misplaced that one too.
So, they gave her a 3rd. (This was again when change was in everybody’s cup holder.) Wessa managed to carry on to that one till Saturday afternoon within the convention room, and Juanita has all the time cherished that it ended up that manner. She likes the symbolism, likes that the coin Wessa gave Earnhardt was really her third fortunate penny.
Why? Due to Earnhardt’s automobile quantity.
The No. 3.
The day after receiving Wessa’s fortunate penny, Earnhardt gained his first and solely Daytona 500 whereas she watched from the stands. “I think they both got their wish,” Juanita Miller says. “She got hers and Dale got his.” Courtesy Getty Photographs, Miller Household
EARNHARDT CRIED WHEN he gained the subsequent day. His nickname was “The Intimidator,” however even he admitted that, as he circled the observe on the final lap, “My eyes watered up.” Sitting together with her mother and father on the backstretch of the oval, Wessa’s feelings have been overflowing, too.
“I think they both got their wish,” Juanita mentioned. “She got hers and Dale got his.”
In that second, the Millers had no concept Earnhardt had glued the penny to his dashboard. They solely knew what they’d seen: Earnhardt main for 107 laps together with the final 61. Earnhardt zooming his automobile inside and out of doors, squeezing into tiny gaps like they have been freeways. Earnhardt one way or the other avoiding all of the unhealthy breaks and unfortunate moments that had dogged him for 20 years as 185,000 followers went delirious with pleasure.
Juanita and Booker cherished it. Their little woman had been capable of go to a race and see her favourite driver lastly win the trophy that meant extra to him than some other. They screamed as Earnhardt did a doughnut on the infield in celebration. They shouted as dozens of males on the opposite groups’ pit crews climbed over the retaining wall to clap for Earnhardt and congratulate him.
Then, as Earnhardt headed inside to speak to the media and rejoice some extra, they headed towards the observe exits. There was extra to do. They needed to take full benefit of their journey, uncertain what number of extra there can be.
“We drove to Disney World,” Juanita mentioned. “Wessa wanted to meet Mickey, too.”
Wessa Miller and her mother and father, Juanita and Booker, framed Wessa’s first picture with Dale Earnhardt and have a signed copy displayed of their dwelling in Phyllis, Kentucky. Their former normal retailer was named “Wessa’s: Home of the Lucky Penny.” Jessi Dodge/ESPN
ONE CHILLY MORNING final month, Juanita made ham biscuits. She wrapped the biscuits in paper towels and handed them out as she chattered to me and Booker about Thanksgiving and the development on the highway that winds previous their slender, one-story home in Phyllis, a sliver of a group tucked into the Cumberland Mountains of japanese Kentucky.
Then Juanita turned to her daughter.
“Wessa,” she mentioned. “Do you need anything?”
Wessa smiled and shook her head. “No, Mama.”
Wessa is 34 years previous now. Thirty-four. The medical doctors nonetheless inform Juanita they will’t consider it. Wessa has had 22 extra surgical procedures over time, and her well being is, as Juanita put it, “up and down.” When Wessa was 10, she started having seizures and was identified with epilepsy. At 12, she was identified with a Chiari malformation, a situation the place mind tissue extends into the spinal canal — a situation that Juanita mentioned affected Wessa bodily but additionally cognitively, impacting her reminiscence and attentiveness.
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Now, Wessa swallows a dozen capsules and watches as Juanita adjustments her catheter 4 instances per day. She averages one or two epileptic seizures every week, episodes which are generally horrifying, her physique locking up as she suggestions again in her chair. In a latest process, she had most of her enamel eliminated due to points together with her mouth and gums. These days, her shoulder has been bothering her. “Mama,” she whispered as Juanita cleaned up the biscuits. “It hurts.” Juanita acquired her an Advil and rubbed her arm.
Juanita and Booker nonetheless take the identical method with Wessa as they all the time have: They do issues proper up till the second she will’t anymore, they usually enjoy all of it. Juanita’s picture books overflow: Wessa going to grade faculty and highschool and sitting in her chair with a sash and a tiara as a result of she was voted homecoming queen one 12 months. Wessa at her cousin’s soccer recreation. Wessa mendacity on a dolly subsequent to Booker as he works on a automobile. “She’d get up there and help me change the oil,” Booker advised me. He was proud.
Wessa’s speech might be gradual and halting at instances, however her thoughts is sharp. She remembers names and dates and faces higher than most. Juanita is usually nonetheless shocked within the mornings when she comes into Wessa’s purposely darkened bed room to assist her away from bed and Wessa will already know whether or not it’s a pleasant time out. “She tells by how much light comes in under the crack in her door,” Juanita advised me.
Wessa’s snicker is contagious, too. Years in the past, on their first airplane flight to go to Juanita’s household in Florida, Wessa was surprised by how excessive within the air they have been and turned to her grandmother because the aircraft rose above the clouds. “I said, ‘Grandma, where’s Jesus at?’” she mentioned by means of a smile. “She told me, ‘Honey, you have to go far beyond to see him!’” Booker and Juanita roared.
From her bed room, with pictures and posters, to the overall retailer, with a counter stuffed with pennies, Dale Earnhardt stays a presence in Wessa Miller’s life. Jessi Dodge/ESPN
Wessa’s room is crammed with posters and photos and playing cards and knickknacks. Most should do together with her household, Earnhardt and different NASCAR drivers, or the Bible (her bedspread has the verse from John 3:16 on it), in addition to — after all — pennies.
Earnhardt talked about Wessa’s fortunate penny being glued to his sprint in his postrace feedback in 1998, and it was the start of a real connection between Wessa and Earnhardt. He invited the household to a race at Bristol Motor Speedway a month later, then advised them he needed to satisfy them at one in all his automobile dealerships, the place he gave them a brand new van to assist them take Wessa to all her physician’s appointments. Wessa picked a blue one. “My favorite color,” she says.
Even after Earnhardt died in a crash in 2001 (Wessa went to the funeral), the story of her penny stored rising in NASCAR lore. Followers despatched her Earnhardt shirts or hats or photos as items, to not point out handfuls of pennies. Strangers dropped by the home and left No. 3 jackets or sweatshirts. David Poole, a longtime reporter for The Charlotte Observer who wrote about Wessa and have become a household buddy, began a charity, Pennies for Wessa, that raised sufficient cash to interchange the Earnhardt van as soon as it conked out after almost 200,000 miles. When Poole died in 2009, Wessa went to his funeral too.
In 2018, Juanita and Booker took over a traditional nation retailer positioned proper subsequent to their home in Phyllis. They known as it Wessa’s, and the signal out entrance proclaimed it, “Home of the Lucky Penny.” There was an “Intimidator” burger on the deli menu — three half-pound patties plus Swiss, bacon and barbecue sauce — in addition to “Wessa fries,” which got here with cheese, bacon bits and ranch.
Generally, as a joke, Juanita put a large cardboard standup of Earnhardt within the restroom to shock clients (“Wessa would laugh,” she mentioned), and as she confirmed me the shop and we walked previous the ice cream freezer, Juanita stopped on the money register close to the entrance door. The register was on high of a counter, and you would see an image beneath the glass of Wessa and Earnhardt from that first assembly within the convention room. Pennies surrounded the picture, a whole lot of them that clients had left, making a type of lovely, copper-colored mural that stretched the complete size of the cupboard.
“We have a different outlook on pennies,” Juanita advised me. “It was always, heads up, pick it up, tails up, leave it down. But then I seen a thing that said, ‘Pennies was a blessing from heaven,’ and I thought, boy, that is true. So even if it’s tails up, I still pick it up.”
The Millers don’t anticipate reopening the overall retailer, however they’re contemplating utilizing it as a spot to showcase the memorabilia they’ve collected — and been given — since Wessa gave Dale Earnhardt a fortunate penny again in 1998. Jessi Dodge/ESPN
JUST A FEW months in the past, Juanita and Wessa loaded the van and drove to the Richard Childress Racing Museum in Welcome, North Carolina. Earnhardt’s automobile from 1998 is on show there, and Juanita lifted Wessa out of her chair so she may peer inside. She noticed the harness and the switches and, additionally the pennies that guests flip by means of the window onto the driving force’s seat as a type of 425-horsepower wishing nicely. She noticed her penny, nonetheless caught to the dashboard, just under the steering wheel.
“I thought it would have already fallen off,” Wessa exclaimed, and Juanita shook her head and held her nearer. Some glue is powerful.
The Millers don’t take as many journeys as they as soon as did. Along with Wessa’s well being calls for, Booker retired from working within the coal mines after 47 years and is enduring fixed lung points, whereas Juanita got here by means of her personal thyroid most cancers and now spends most of her days taking good care of everybody else. She closed the shop two years in the past so she may assist her mom, who has dementia.
Dale is gone. David Poole is gone. The penny is sort of gone.
Wessa remains to be right here.
She isn’t mad about what all of us take into consideration the penny. She will get it. She simply sees it otherwise. Once I advised her I had a present for her and supplied her a penny that I had introduced from dwelling, her face lit up. She reached into her pocket.
“Pennies,” Wessa whispered to me, “are the best thing ever,” as she pushed one in all her personal into the palm of my hand.
