Most people get news like this and go quiet. Rick Houston got it on a Thursday and wrote a statement by the end of the day. The NASCAR journalist and historian announced he has been diagnosed with pancreatic cancer that appears to have spread to his liver.
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He posted it himself, through The Scene Vault Podcast on X, the same place he has spent years making sure other people’s stories do not get forgotten. Now it was his turn.
“I am not scared. I don’t know what tomorrow holds, but I know Who holds tomorrow.”
He said he is not in any pain. His main worry was his family and what they were about to go through. The podcast, though, was not stopping.
“Producing the podcast has been one of the true joys of my professional life. I don’t plan on going anywhere any time soon.” He ended the whole thing with three words.
“Bring it on.”
Houston was originally heading toward ministry before he found racing in 1991. He started small as sports editor at The Alleghany News in Sparta, North Carolina, covering local short-track racers.
By 1994, Winston Cup Scene came calling. Back then, Scene was the weekly newspaper that perhaps everyone in the NASCAR garage read. Houston worked his way up to Busch Series Editor, spending years on the road and earning the trust of drivers who were still finding their footing.
Along the way, he wrote nine books. Three became standard references for anyone serious about NASCAR history. Second to None was the first real written history of the Busch Series. NASCAR’s Greatest Race told the story of the 1992 Hooters 500, where Richard Petty made his final start, Jeff Gordon made his Cup debut, and Alan Kulwicki won a championship nobody saw coming. Dale vs. Daytona went deep on Earnhardt’s two-decade obsession with the one race that kept slipping away.
He also tracked down and digitized what is believed to be the only complete 32-year physical collection of NASCAR Scene in existence. Every issue, preserved.
Outside of NASCAR and racing, he wrote a book about NASA’s Apollo-era mission controllers, consulted on a documentary, and ended up as an on-screen extra in the Oscar-winning film First Man. At home in North Carolina, he has been married to Jeanie, a District Court Judge, since 1996. He’s also a deacon at his local church, a thread connecting back to where he started before journalism found him.
The timing of this announcement is sadder because of what happened recently. Houston co-founded The Scene Vault Podcast in 2018 with Steve Waid, his old boss and eventually one of his closest friends.
Waid had spent 28 years at NASCAR Scene, rising to Editor-in-Chief, and mentored writers including Bob Pockrass and Jeff Gluck. He won the Squier-Hall Award for NASCAR Media Excellence in 2018.
Waid died on June 15, 2026. He was 77. Houston was in the room. Just before the end, he told Waid they had come a long way from 1990, the year Waid had turned him away at the front door of the Scene offices without letting him inside.
Houston announced the death in three words. “It is finished.”
Weeks later, he got his own diagnosis. And said, bring it on.