The Illinois Stock Car Hall of Fame, based in Roscoe, has officially inducted its Class of 2025 following a ceremony and festival at the Historic Auto Attractions Museum near Rockford.

The 12th annual celebration honored four new inductees and stock car visionaries, including Larry Schuler, Bob Pierce, Bill Venturini, and the late Elmer Musgrave.

Schuler, still an active pavement racer at 72, scored his first late model feature win in 1973 at the former Illiana Motor Speedway, a now-closed race track located in Schererville, Indiana. More recently, he scored his 79th career win at Grundy County Speedway during a 40-lap NASCAR Advance Auto Parts Weekly Series main event this summer.

Pierce is a dirt late-model champion throughout the nation, especially in the Midwest. His career began in the early 1970s, frequenting tracks like Fairbury, Farmer City, Macon and Danville. In 1983, Pierce reportedly secured 38 feature race wins, plus two UMP Summer Nationals titles in 1992 and 1995, for a total of 14 career Summer Nationals victories. In 1990, Pierce was the UMP national champion. Following his racing career, he founded Bob Pierce Race Cars, a dirt-track modified and late-model chassis builder and parts supplier in Oakwood, Illinois.

Following in his father Tony's racing footsteps, Venturini started his racing career in the 1970s, winning his first late model feature in the Roadrunner division at Rockford Speedway in 1976. Bill began competing in the United States Auto Club (USAC) stock cars in 1978, in addition to the American Speed Association, ARTGO late models, and the International Racing Association. For a time, Venturini became known for his all-female pit crews, led by his wife, Cathy. With starts in the NASCAR Cup, Busch, and Craftsman Truck Series, he later rounded out his driving career with his first ARCA stock car championship in 1987, repeating the effort in 1991. He began fielding cars for his son, Billy, to race in ARCA competition before establishing roots in Concord, North Carolina, for Venturini Motorsports. The team, known as one of the winningest car owners in ARCA history, was officially sold to Nitro Motorsports earlier this year.

The late Musgrave began his racing career just before 1950, before rising to be known as a formidable force on short tracks throughout Chicago and the Midwest region. For years, Musgrave was a staple late-model competitor at O'Hare Stadium in Schiller Park, Illinois, in the modified class, and also competed in national races with USAC and the Midwest Association for Race Cars, now known as ARCA. He secured two wins with USAC, one in 1959 and another in 1963, plus five MARC/ARCA races. As is typical in the industry, Musgrave passed the racing gene to his sons. Tom Musgrave is a two-time late model champion at Grundy County Speedway, while the younger Ted Musgrave was competing at Waukegan in 1974. Ted even made starts in the NASCAR Cup Series and Craftsman Truck Series, winning the truck championship in 2005. Elmer Musgrave passed away in 2000 at the age of 72. His son Ted accepted the recent induction award.