THE MINNEAPOLIS 500 by Noel Allard
Special thanks to Noel Allard
of Park Rapids, Minnesota, for
allowing me to display his historical work on the Minneapolis 500 here
on gotomn. It is a privilege to have so many people share their photos
and written work here on the gotomn.com history page.
Scroll to the bottom of this page for a photo gallery with captions and
Noel's email address. You will find a gallery of photos from the
Minnesota State Fair Speedway from Noel's collection as well. Stan
Meissner
THE MINNEAPOLIS 500 by Noel Allard
Bibliography:
The History of America’s Speedways, Past & Present, Allan E. Brown, Allan Brown 1984
Wheels for the World, Douglas Brinkley, Viking/Penguin 2003
Thunder in the North, Gale Frost, Branston House, Inc. 1980
Minneapolis Park System 1883-1944, Theodore Wirth. Minneapolis Park Board 1945
Ill fated TC Auto Speedway, Noel Allard, Hennepin County History Magazine, Spring 1976
Minnesota Aviation History 1857-1945, Noel Allard, MAHB Publishing 1993
The Oily Grail, Jack Albinson, T.S. Denison, Minneapolis 1974
500 Souvenir Book, Carl Hungness Publishing 1983
Barney Oldfield, William F. Nolan, G.P. Putnam’s Sons, New York 1961
Minneapolis Journal Newspaper
Minneapolis Tribune Newspaper
What Became of the old Twin City Speedway, Lake Area Newspaper, May 1982, David Wood
Forword:
What follows is basically a story about a
single automobile race, the 1915 Minneapolis 500. But there is much more
to the story than just the few race descriptions that exist. The story
encompasses a time when the country, yes, the whole world, had become
romantically aware of the automobile. It was a time of far away war that
most Americans would rather not have concerned themselves with; a time
of incredible opportunity in the industrial age; a time of huge
inventions and even larger personalities. The United States was dragging
itself out of the Depression. And yet it was a most opportune period,
when fortunes could be made - and lost – in the virtual blink of an eye.
The race – the 1915 Minneapolis 500 – was
held on the sprawling site of the present day Minneapolis-St. Paul
International Airport. This site is perched on the bluffs above the
Minnesota River, near its confluence with the great Mississippi. It sits
on a corner of one of the great fortresses of the American frontier,
Fort Snelling, where US troops embarked to fight the last of the Indian
Wars, and, later, would ship out to battles in the Civil War. Later,
still, they would depart from there for World Wars I and II. But it is a
piece of racetrack romance that once, in this historic place, there
existed an unbelieveably modern automobile racetrack, unbelieveable
because in its day, it nearly matched the qualities of the modern
racetracks of NASCAR.
Here then is the story of the Twin City
Motor Speedway and the one great Minneapolis 500 mile race that, most
unfortunately, entered the racing stat book as a one-time event.
Chapter One: The Beginnings
The latter part of the nineteenth century
was a time full of excitement and frantic industry. New-fangled
machinery was becoming available that would make man’s life easier. New
utilities and conveniences were rapidly invented, developed and made
available to the common man. Eli Whitney, for example, would invent a
device to make processing cotton more practical; Robert Fulton’s
steamboat revolutionized water-borne commerce and recreation; Cyrus
McCormick’s reaper and John Deere’s steel plow gave hope for a simpler
future for the farmer; Samuel F.B. Morse’s telegraph had shortened man’s
chain of communication, as had Alexander Graham Bell’s telephone;
Edison had brightened the daily lives of millions with the first
practical light bulb. The linotype accounted for the rapid publication
of new ideas. The tinkerers were changing the way of life of everyone on
the planet.
During that time, the bicycle had also
undergone a revolution, from the old high wheel “boneshaker” with its
awkward and dangerous high perch, to a low-slung, pneumatic-tired device
that could deliver the youth of America to work, to the market, and
even to the racetrack. Many inventors such Henry Ford and later, Glen
Curtiss and the Wright Brothers were bicycle buffs and racers. And like
them, Ford was also interested in gasoline engines.
The idea of racing motor vehicles was not
new by 1915, the moment in time of our story. In fact, its start had
begun in Europe before the turn of the century. A German, N.A. Otto was
the first to invent a gasoline powered internal combustion engine.
Another German, Karl Benz, using an engine built by Gottlieb Daimler
assembled a strange three-wheeled buggy, the first roadable motor
vehicle, in the late 1880s.
In the US, Charles & Frank Duryea drove
their first engine-driven “horseless carriage” around the streets of
Detroit in 1893. And as soon as there were two such motorized vehicles
on the road, the natural impulse of any sportsman was to compete with
the other, and in this case it meant trying to “dust off” a rival on the
muddy and dusty country path or city street. America’s first auto race
occurred in Chicago on November 28, 1895. Duryea with a one cylinder, 4
horsepower, water-cooled car bested some eleven other entries, roaring
to victory in a race that covered 52.4 miles. It took him ten hours to
cover the distance; his average speed, 5.1 mph!
In 1893, Henry Ford, a modest young man
working for Detroit Edison, the local electric company, produced an
internal combustion gasoline motor of his own design. By 1894, he had
made the decision to mount it in a rolling chassis; and by1896, citizens
of Detroit began to complain about the smelly, noisy vehicle which Ford
called the “quadricycle” nipping at their heels and scaring their
horses as he tooled around the city’s rudimentary streets. The vehicle
used a two-cylinder engine that Ford had constructed and set in a crude
chassis which weighed in at 500 pounds. By 1898, Ford had an improved
vehicle on the street, but he wasn’t alone. Already others were
constructing motorized buggies, including Charles King, Ransom Olds, and
Francis and Freelan Stanley among others. The Stanleys thought to
utilize steam for propulsion. Steam power was much quieter, but also
requiring more logistics – ie: fiddling with kerosene and water, waiting
for steam pressure to build, etc.
Europe already was holding motorcar races
and the news had spread to this country. Ford had his eye on the future,
however. His thinking was that virtually every man on the street was a
potential buyer of a motorcar. The motorcar would free a person to
conduct a wide-ranging business, to distribute products, to travel to
lands unknown, or to take the family for regular outings. The
opportunities were numerous and, indeed, in 1900, Ford had built his
first truck. But, in 1901, he needed a way to put his motorcar in the
spotlight. He decided to challenge the reigning speed king, Alexander
Winton, to a race!
Winton, whose expertise was in building
cars, had also been competing, and was well-known to be on the top of
the art. His “Bullet,” as his racing machine was nicknamed, held the
current speed record, not quite a mile a minute. For the state of the
art, the status of tire technology, the adequacy of the dirt and cinder
horse tracks of the day, and the knowledge of fine-tuning…that was fast.
Ford sent a news release to the Detroit newspapers that he would
challenge Winton and anyone else interested to a 25-mile race – in a
Ford motorcar that was not especially built for competition. He was in
over his head. Ford knew nothing about either the theory or practice of
sliding turns and wheel-to-wheel maneuvering.
Five contestants, including Ford, signed up
for the event. But soon one competitor, Henri Fournier, pulled out in
order to try for a land speed record in New York where, apparently,
there was more prize money involved. William K. Vanderbilt, a wealthy
racing buff encountered mechanical problems with his car and withdrew;
and then racer W.N. Murray found a leak in the water jacket of his
engine and scratched as well… leaving Alexander Winton and his Bullet to
vie with Ford in the big race. Though not a racer, Ford was the
penultimate tinkerer, and never put anything on public display until he
was certain all the bugs had been worked out. Full of confidence, he
asked one of his mechanics, Spider Huff, to ride with him, standing on a
running board as ballast. Ford had positioned handles on various points
on the open car frame so that Huff could lean far out and balance the
car on the turns. Ford’s own position was seated unbelted on a bench
seat holding onto a tiller bar to steer the vehicle.
Officials, seeing the lack of competition,
downgraded the race to 10 miles instead of the planned 25. Winton
smiled. He was confident he’d cross the finish line before Ford. Ford
took two practice laps on the half mile dirt track and was as ready as
he ever would be. From the start, Winton quickly pulled away, but by the
fourth lap, the seven thousand paying spectators noticed that Ford had
settled down and was slowly gaining ground on Winton. Ford averaged 45
mph for the ten miles, enough to beat the vaunted Winton. When it was
over, Ford wiped his face and said to the local press, “I was scared to
death and I’ll never do that again. That board fence was right there in
front of my face the whole time.” Then, graciously, he added, “Put
Winton in one of my cars and he can beat anything in this country.”
Sitting in the audience that day was a person who was to go on to
greater fame in a racing car than either Ford or Winton, one Berna Eli
“Barney” Oldfield.
In 1902, Ford still saw racing as a
potential marketing tool and his shop had built up two powerful 70
horsepower open-chassis race cars, one painted yellow and the other,
red. Ford and a partner investor, Tom Cooper planned to enter the two
cars in a race called the Manufacturers Challenge Cup at Grosse Point
Township, Michigan, not far from Detroit. Twelve days prior to the race,
the two had hauled the cars to the track to do some testing. Needing an
extra mechanic, Cooper had called a friend, a mechanic named Barney
Oldfield, to come and help. Oldfield was a hell-bent-for-leather young
man who naturally migrated to a sport with the most danger and thrills.
Up to this time he had been a bicycle racer, having paid his dues in
slivvers and broken bones on the short board bicycle racing tracks of
the times.
Neither Oldfield nor Spider Huff could start
either racing car. Ford, in frustration, could see his reputation going
downhill if his name was on the unwilling cars, so he told Cooper that
he would sell him his share too. Thus at race time, Tom Cooper came to
own the two cars. In practice, attempts were made to break the one
minute mile (60 mph), but Cooper and Huff were unsuccessful, although
they had finally gotten both cars to run after some clever jury-rigging
of the carburetors by mechanic Oldfield. Finally, in frustration,
Oldfield begged for the chance to try to break the mark, though he had
never driven a competition automobile. He convinced Cooper to let him
drive based on his reputation as a winning bicyclist.
The cars were by now given the names “Arrow”
for the yellow car and just “999” for the red car after a high-speed
train of its day. In his first race in “999,” on the dirt horse track,
Oldfield was to compete against the “Geneva Steamer” driven by Bucknam;
Shanks in a Winton “Pup”; White in a “White Steamer,” and several
others. At the start, Oldfield jumped into the lead and held it till the
end, lapping the fourth-place car of Bucknam. Only four cars finished.
Oldfield’s long career had been launched.
Chapter Two: The competitors
It would be appropriate at this point to
thumbnail some of the most influential and popular auto racing figures
in the country from 1908 through 1919, figures who would be competitors
in the 1915 Minneapolis 500.
The year 1904 was a year of much social
energy. The Panama Canal was underway and President Teddy Roosevelt was
the major newsmaker. The Wright Brothers had just completed tests at
Kitty Hawk that proved man could fly; their unknown rival, Alberto
Santos-Dumont, had proved the same to the people of Brazil;;and the New
York subway was completed. The Edison studios turned out the first
moving picture to hit commercial theatres, The Great Train Robbery. In
addition, there were literally hundreds of American car companies
producing automobiles, and, in fact, industry publications list over
3000 car companies that began life between 1895 and 1905! The Model T
Ford came out after 1904 and by 1915, Ford would produce 1,440 cars a
day with a 24 hour shift, or 300,000 Tin Lizzies a year! Cars were
indeed the most important new product in the hands of the average
American.
After his introduction to racing via 999,
Barney Oldfield had signed on with the Peerless Automobile Company and
raced a special car, created just for racing, called the “Green Dragon.”
In 1904 he used this car to win the Gordon Bennett Cup, winning over
the Pope “Tornado,” a respectable racer of its day. At Grosse Pointe,
Michigan, he triumphed over the two Winton Specials. In the Louisiana
Purchase Trophy Race at St. Louis, Oldfield raced again in the Green
Dragon, and in trying to avoid a spectator who had run onto the track,
crashed, killing two persons and severely injuring himself. Out of the
hospital in October, he jumped into the repaired Green Dragon and won
the American Championship for the year at Cleveland. Competing for the
World Championship at the end of October, 1904, he raced against a
European contingent, vying with French champion, Maurice Bernin in a 90
hp Renault; Italian ace Paul Satori in a 90 hp. Fiat; and Frenchman Leon
Thery, who had won the 1903 Gordon Bennett Cup in his 80 hp.
Richard-Brassier. Oldfield was out for the money! He signed a press
agent, William H. Pickens (who co-incidentally was also the agent for
the great woman aviator of the times, Katherine Stinson) to promote and
enter him into contests and appearances. He had taken to clamping an
unlit cigar in the corner of his mouth to keep his teeth from grinding
together on bumpy racetracks, completing his colorful persona.
In 1908, Barney sold both of the Peerless
automobiles he owned, the Green Dragon 3, and a companion, the Blue
Streak. He was offered a Stearns 90 hp car to drive in the Briarcliff
Road races at New York, but only came in 11th. Italian-born Ralph
DePalma had come on the scene. DePalma had been a bicycle racer, as had
Oldfield, having started in 1902. A rivalry was begun that would become
more serious as years went by and as wins were traded between the pair.
In 1909, Oldfield campaigned a National racecar and the same year,
acquired a German Benz. This $4,000 car, with its 120 hp. Motor, was the
same car that had won the 1906 French Grand Prix in Europe. The
Indianapolis Motor Speedway had just opened under the ownership of Carl
Fisher and other investors.
The Indianapolis track was configured as a
two and a half mile modified oval of tar and crushed stone surface. A
three-day speed fest was held in 1909, with Oldfield racing to 5, 10,
15, 20 and 25 mile speed records. His top speed of 83-84 mph laps also
brought him the kilometer mark as well. Unfortunately, tire and track
technology of the day were unknowns and the rough, loose surface played
the major role in a crash by Charles Merz, in which a tire blew and the
car went out of control, killing three people. When the speed fest was
over, Fisher immediately had the track re-surfaced with 3,200,000
bricksm, earning it the nickname which was to go down in history, “The
Brickyard.”
The American Automobile Association (AAA)
became the major sanctioning body during this time, and because Oldfield
had reneged on a contract to appear in Atlanta, driving at another
track instead (where the purse was greater), was suspended from AAA
competition. There were other venues and records calling Oldfield. In
1906, a Stanley Steamer had driven to an American speed record of 128
mph on the smooth endless sand of Daytona, Florida’s beach. Oldfield
traded his Benz for a newer, bigger car named the “Lightning Benz,”
perhaps the car most associated with his name over the years. This auto
was a 200 hp monster with a 21.5 litre (1312 cubic inch) overhead valve
engine and 4-speed transmission. In this car, on March 16, 1909 he raced
on the sand to a new record of 131.7 mph, and knew the car could go
much faster.
Oldfield then shipped the car to California,
where he drove a match race against DePalma and others on the board
track at Playa Del Rey. When DePalma’s Fiat had engine trouble, as did
Oldfield’s Benz, a Fiat driven by Caleb Bragg beat Oldfield by a nose in
two out of three heats. In September, 1909, Oldfield beat DePalma by
1/5th of a second at the Minnesota State Fairgrounds’ mile dirt track.
Oldfield quipped that he could have beaten even that time except “for
the dead weight of my cheroot” (cigar). During his suspension by the
AAA, Oldfield opened and ran a saloon in Los Angeles and also took on a
tire dealership from a close friend, Harvey Firestone. For him,
Firestone developed a special performance tire, branded the Oldfield
model, which was used for many years on the top racing cars of its day.
By 1912, due to public pressure, Oldfield
was assimilated again into the AAA. But he was stilled banned from
competing at Indianapolis in the second 500 mile race to be held there.
Carl Fisher had decided that no matter what the AAA did, he was still at
odds with Oldfield. In 1911, the first year of the 500 mile race, Ray
Harroun, an engineer and fine race driver, won the event in a Marmon,
and the US AAA champion was Ralph Mulford, another excellent driver of
the day. The top drivers during this period would be DePalma, David
Bruce-Brown, “Terrible Teddy” Tetzlaff, “Wild” Bob Burman and Earl
Cooper, a 120 lb. Californian with “the calculating mind of a
mathematician.” The 1912 Indy was won by Joe Dawson, cruising past the
Benz of DePalma, its engine dead and DePalma and his riding mechanic
pushing it over the line for second place.
The Titanic tragedy occurred in May, 1912.
Despite the terrible disaster which dominated headlines for months, the
racing world continued at its normal pace. Oldfield had purchased J.
Walter Christie’s red 300 hp. Christie front drive in 1909 to preserve
it. It had been given the sobriquet of “Killer Christie” because it was
overpowered and hard to handle. Oldfield had future plans for the car.
By 1913, Oldfield was again driving for the
Mercer team. In the event at Tacoma, he ran against the Stutz team cars
and lost out to Earl Cooper.
Cooper and Oldfield would run head-to-head
at the Santa Monica Road Race, held on an eight-mile macadam course near
the ocean. Oldfield blasted away from the starter’s flag and held a
sizeable lead, but Cooper passed Tetzlaff for second and began running
Oldfield down. With a 4-minute lead over Oldfield, one of Cooper’s tires
blew out and he had to coast into the pits. As his riding mechanic
struggled to get the wheel off, Oldfield roared past. Cooper jumped out
of the driver’s seat and wrenched the wheel off, the tire was changed
and the car back on the track to begin running down Oldfield once more.
In his exuberance to stay ahead, this time Oldfield blew a tire and
bumped into the pits as Cooper whisked past and on to the checkered flag
as the winner.
On September 9, 1913, Cooper and Oldfield
again met head-to-head on a 3-mile paved track that circled the town of
Corona, California. Cooper, after experiencing the tire problem at Santa
Monica, had cannily practiced on the course to find what maximum speed
he could drive in order to not make any tire stops at all. He determined
that if he drove 75 mph. for the entire race, he could do just that.
Oldfield, hell-bent-for-leather, predicted that the race average would
go to 90 mph. Oldfield set the pace from the start, over Cooper,
Tetzlaff, DePalma and Spencer Wishart. He clocked an awesome 98 mph on
one lap, but the track had started to break up from the pounding it was
taking from the heavy cars. Oldfield burst a tire and Cooper inherited
the lead. Oldfield was back on the track and again at speed when again, a
young spectator ran onto the track in front of him. Oldfield swerved to
avoid the lad and crashed heavily, injuring several people and himself.
Cooper won again and would go on to take his first AAA National
Championship.
With war breaking out in Europe, the country
was abuzz. Moviemaker, D.W. Griffin’s talking picture “Birth of a
Nation” hit the silver screen and George Herman “Babe” Ruth became a
batting wizard. Oldfield had found a niche for the summer, racing
against daredevil flyer, Lincoln Beachey in a Curtiss biplane. Both
daredevils raced one-another at fairgrounds around the country, one
winning one time and the other the next. Crowds loved the spectacle for
it was generally the first time the majority of them had even seen an
airplane. Oldfield and his PR man, Will Pickens, pocketed $250,000 that
summer. Beachey would die later in the year, diving into the ocean off
California during a stunting exhibition.
The 1914 Vanderbilt Cup saw a fifteen car
field set for the start. Driving for Mercer were Ralph DePalma, Spencer
Wishart and Eddie Pullen. Stutzes were driven by Earl Cooper and Gil
Anderson. A newcomer was on the grid, “Baron von Rickenbacher.” The
Baron was Eddie Rickenbacher, and the title was meant to draw a response
from the crowd, well aware that the war against Germany was on though
the US was yet to be involved. (After the war, Rickenbacher’s name
changed to Rickenbacker.) The Mercer team fielded two cars of 450 cubic
inches and a third of 300 cubes. DePalma had won the 1912 Vanderbilt and
this year he had qualified at 117 mph. Thinking they would insure their
dominance, the Mercer team also hired Oldfield at the last minute.
DePalma immediately resigned! The feud between the two intensified. As
Oldfield was congratulating himself, DePalma purchased the old Grey
Ghost Mercedes and had it rebuilt.
This year, the race was held on the Santa
Monica 8.4 mile course. Oldfield drove with his faithful riding
mechanic, George Hill. Anderson assumed the lead shortly after the
start, but was out by lap 19 and DePalma was leading. Oldfield pulled up
alongside DePalma and they raced the last ten laps side-by-side,
sliding the turns together. At the wire it was DePalma by a nose. Earl
Cooper arrived at the line in fourth position.
In 1914, Carl Fisher finally relented and
allowed Oldfield to drive in the Indy 500. Oldfield would race in a
Stutz along with Earl Cooper and Gil Anderson. Bragg and Wishart would
drive for Mercer, Tetzlaff and Carlson for Maxwell, Joe Dawson, the 1912
winner in a National, and Rickenbacker and Haupt for Duesenberg. Others
entered were Burman, DePalma, Mulford, and Grant, along with eight
foreign drivers, including Rene Thomas and Albert Guyot in a Delage, Art
Duray driving a “Baby” Peugeot and Joseph Christiaens in an Excelsior.
Of the top seeds, DePalma withdrew early in the race with a heavily
vibrating chassis. Thomas won in the Delage, Rickenbacher was 10th.
The same year, at the new 2-mile dirt oval
at Sioux City, IA, Rickenbacker won on July 4th. Gil Anderson was fourth
in his Stutz. At the Elgin Road Races in Illinois, DePalma came in
first in his trusty Mercedes, Anderson took second and Oldfield was
fourth. The next event was the Cactus Derby, a road race from Los
Angeles to Phoenix for the title of Master Driver of the World. Oldfield
was entered in his Stutz, a racetrack car entered among the stock cars
in this very punishing mixed terrain event. To everyone’s surprise
except his, Barney Oldfield won the title. Despite not finishing the
Indy 500, however, DePalma ended the season with enough points to be
crowned the 1914 AAA champion.
1915 at Indianapolis would find DePalma
winning, with Italian-born newcomer Dario Resta taking second. Oldfield
was too hung-over to even get into the race car. He drove his big
“Killer Christie” at Tacoma on the 4th of July and survived…although he
didn’t win. At Chicago, Oldfield raced hard in a Delage against Resta,
Burman and Cooper. Resta won the event. At the Elgin Road Races in
August, Anderson and Cooper were 1 and 2 in Stutzes. The next race would
bring them all to Minnesota.
Backtracking for a moment - at Indianapolis
Motor Speedway, a series of smaller races that occurred in 1910 had been
dismissed to conduct one 500 mile endurance race in 1911. The long
“500” was won by Ray Harroun in his Marmon Wasp car. Harroun was an
automotive engineer and had helped design and build the Wasp. The Wasp
was a single-seater, competing against 39 two-man teams. Harroun was one
of the very few to be racing at the time without a co-driver/riding
mechanic. His design also incorporated the first rear-view mirror known.
He had started 28th in the field and worked his way to the lead by the
end of the race. Ralph Mulford finished 2nd and Eddie Rickebacher
finished 11th as co-driver with Lee Frayer. In 1912, only 24 cars
started the 500, and 1913 and 1914 saw a foreign invasion, with French
drivers winning both years. In 1914, Oldfield, the first American to
finish, came in 5th in a Stutz, and Rickenbacher finished 10th.
In 1915, Rickenbacher moved at first to the
Peugeot team, then switched to Maxwell (whose cars were designed by Ray
Harroun.) He would co-drive with Barney Oldfield in the Minneapolis 500
on Labor Day. Finishers at Indianapolis on Memorial Day would mirror
the competitors at the Minneapolis 500 on Labor Day. Top Indy finishers
were: 1. Ralph DePalma, 2. Dario Resta, 3. Gil Anderson, 4. Earl Cooper,
5. Eddie O’Donnell, 6. Bob Burman, 7. Howdy Wilcox
Chapter Three: The Racetracks
From the turn of the century, racetracks
abounded. Every large town had its own dirt racetrack, mostly half mile
and mile dirt or cinder tracks. Every county fair was centered on its
horse racing track, where spectators gathered in huge crowds on special
weekends during the summer to cheer for their favorite horses. It was
totally logical that entrepreneurs seized this venue for promoting the
next fad, motor racing, and the next step would be the superspeedway.
The definition of a superspeedway generally
refers to a large oval, high-banked track of ¾ mile or longer.
Brooklands, in England, was the first high-banked specialized racetrack.
It opened in 1907. It was, interestingly enough, built of concrete. The
first oval auto track in America was built in 1896, a one mile dirt
track near Narragansett Park in Cranston, RI. It was later paved with
concrete and lasted until 1923. The first superspeedway of any
prominence was the Los Angeles Motordrome, at Playa Del Rey which opened
in 1910. It was a board track constructed by Jack Prince, who would go
on to design many similar tracks across the country. Bankings were 20
degrees on the turns. It was an exactly circular track. Once cranked
into a turn, a racecar could be driven all day at one power setting with
little effort. The board track was not new, except to motor racing. For
many years short board tracks of 1/7th to 1/5th mile had been used for
professional bicycle racing and called “Velodromes.” They were
inevitably built with high banking. When the Los Angeles Motordrome
opened, it was the first board track built to a length that would
accommodate high speed racing cars, and built to strength standards to
absorb the pounding of such heavy machines. Before the Motordrome closed
in 1931, it had seen race speeds over 140 mph. Bankings were extreme,
in the case of the Miami-Fulford track, an incredible 50 degrees.
(Talladega, the highest-banked NASCAR track today, is a mere 33
degrees.) Cars racing at Miami had to run a speed of at least 110 mph
just to stay up on the banking. Because of these high speeds, and the
ability of spectators and competitors to race unheeding the usual clouds
of dirt and stones raised by cars on dirt tracks, board tracks became
popular and are considered the first superspeedways.
The next board track to open was the Chicago
Speedway. It opened on June 26, 1915 and races were held there until it
closed during 1918 to become the site of an Army hospital. It featured
the first oval, circular ends with short straight-aways between. The
Tacoma-Pacific Speedway in Tacoma, WA came next, opening July 4th of
that year, replacing a 2 mile dirt track. It would last until 1922. The
Omaha Speedway board track of 1.25 miles also opened in July of 1915,
but only three races were held there before it closed, also as a result
of the war’s distraction. The Des Moines Speedway opened in July, 1915
as well. It too, lasted only a single year. A track at Sheepshead Bay in
New York was constructed and another one was begun at Philadelphia, but
the reigning sanctioning body, the American Automobile Association
(AAA), would not accept it, and it was closed before it opened.
The years 1910 – 1931 were the period of the
board tracks. There were 24 outstanding board tracks in operation
during these years in the U.S. One was even constructed on the site of
what was the Montgomery Ward Department Store on University Avenue in
the Midway of St. Paul. Board tracks helped advance engine development,
tire and fuel technology, metal alloys and supercharging. Unfortunately,
fires, hurricanes and rot all worked against their permanence. There
was no such thing as treated lumber in those days. Only one or two
tracks were rebuilt after the wood rotted.
The board tracks, due to their high speeds
and clean atmospheres, were obviously where the action was in the early
WWI time period. Board tracks were built on pilings driven into the
ground, to which cross stays forming the banks and levels of the racing
surface were bolted. 2x4, 2x6, or 2x8 boards of various lengths were
then nailed together, on edge, to form a solid surface. The boards of
one of the tracks, the Pacific Coast Speedway at Tacoma, WA, was to be
paved over with asphalt, so the boards were laid flat and spaced
three-eighths of an inch apart. It was never paved over, due in part to
the fact that asphalt of the day was rather runny and not as we know it
today.
Since 1903 there had been racing at the
short dirt track at the Indianapolis Fairgrounds. The most famous
superspeedway in the history of American motor racing would also be
constructed near that city, the Indianapolis Motor Speedway. Carl
Fisher, chairman of the Prest-O-Lite Company, and his partners; Arthur
C. Newby, owner of the National Automobile Company; P.C. Avery, inventor
of the carbide headlamp for automobiles; James A. Allison; and Frank
Wheeler, partner in the Wheeler-Schebler Carburetor Company, created the
2.5 mile oval with corners banked nine degrees. A planned road-racing
track in the infield never materialized. Work started in 1908, using
crushed stone and the oily asphalt of the day. When the track opened on
June 5, 1909, racing became a nightmare due to the unstable track
surface, resulting in the death of one of the drivers and his riding
mechanic. Fisher quickly moved to repave the track with bricks for the
1910 season. Workmen laid 3.2 million bricks in a record 63 days. The
“Brickyard” became the only brick track in the US. (When Eddie
Rickenbacker took over ownership of the track in 1927, he had most of
the track repaved with asphalt, except for the main stretch in front of
the grandstand. That, too, was later repaved in asphalt with the
exception of a three-foot stripe at the start-finish line, which remains
today as a reminder of the surface that gave it its nickname.)
As mentioned earlier, besides the board
track on University Avenue in the Midway between Minneapolis and St.
Paul, the Minnesota State Fairgrounds was the site of a very fine
one-mile dirt track, used for horse racing from 1904. It was here that
the great Dan Patch paced his record mile at 1 minute, 55 seconds on
September 8, 1906. The one mile horse track also had a half-mile dirt
track inside of it, sharing a portion of the grandstand straightaway. In
1940, the mile track was plowed under and in the late 1950s the
half-mile track was paved with asphalt. The flying dirt had vexed the
spectators and the surrounding vendors (who thought that the dirt
floating onto their wares was polluted with the manure of horses over
the years).
Chapter 4: The Minneapolis 500
In 1914, plans for a huge two-mile oval
speedway near Fort Snelling Military Reservation, between the cities of
Minneapolis and St. Paul, were put on the table. The location would be
south of the city limits of Minneapolis and across the Mississippi River
from St. Paul. Streets bounding the area chosen were 60th Street to the
North and 66th Street to the South, 34th Avenue on the West and 46th
Avenue on the East. The Twin City Motor Speedway Company filed for
incorporation as a Minnesota corporation of the City of St. Paul,
Minnesota, of Ramsey County on April 8, 1915. The incorporators were
Charles W. Van Orsdol, Henry E. Habighorst, and James F. Sperry, all of
St. Paul. The purpose was to construct, operate and maintain a speedway
in the vicinity of St. Paul and Minneapolis and to furnish speedway
entertainment and amusements. Capital stock was set at one million
dollars, divided into 10,000 shares of $100 each. Habighorst was
designated President; Van Orsdol, Vice President; and Sperry as
Secretary. It is no surprise that the major investor and general advisor
to the Twin City Motor Speedway Company was Frank H. Wheeler, the same
investor who had backed the Indianapolis track and was President of the
Wheeler-Schebler Carburetor Company. In their first board meeting,
election of officers made Wheeler the President, with Habighorst as VP;
Dr. C.E. Dutton of Minneapolis, Secretary; and C.W. Van Orsdol, J.F.
Sperry and Oren Kellogg, Directors.
The property, consisting of 342 acres, was purchased for $41,000 from local farmers.
The speedway was designed by Walter D.
MacLeith, an architect and engineer practicing in St. Paul. Ground was
broken on May 20, 1915 and the construction work began July 8th. The
work was rushed. Timing was such that a national championship AAA
sponsored race could be held there on Labor Day, September 4, 1915, less
than two months away! Though it hadn’t been done in the US., it was
decided to surface the track with concrete, including banked turns of 20
degrees (considerably steeper than the Indianapolis track.)* The track
would be 60 feet wide on the straight-aways and over 80 feet wide on the
banked curves. Over 300,000 cubic yards of dirt would be moved as the
field was graded. Some 18,000 barrels of Chicago AA cement were used,
along with 10,000 cubic yards of crushed stone and 6,000 cubic yards of
sand in making the 76,000 square yards of concrete required. Cement was
poured over the course of the next few weeks to a depth of six inches at
the rate of 2,000 square yards a day. The operation required 200 to 250
workers on each of two shifts, day and night. Concrete technology was
brand-new. No reinforcing rods were laid to strengthen the concrete; the
method was virtually unknown and, as yet, not a standard. In fact, the
track surface had not even been smoothed properly. These unknowns would
lead to the demise of a great racetrack.
Covered grandstands were erected 40 feet
back from the track on the West side to accommodate some 75,000
spectators. Open bleachers were built to hold another 25,000. Three
tunnels were excavated under the track to allow for another 125,000
spectators to fill the infield. A two-story timing box was constructed
at the start-finish line. Altogether, a total of 3,500,000 board feet of
lumber purchased from the Ingvoldstad Lumber Company of St. Paul was
used for the structures. 2,500 squares of galvanized steel were used for
roofing. A row of open pits was arranged on the infield side of the
track opposite the grandstands. Though the pit area was open –
continuous to the racing surface itself - a concrete wall separated the
grandstands from the track. A total of 1500 men had been put to work
building the facility during a period of less than two months. Even
then, work continued on the grandstands even after the Labor Day race
had begun! In fact, streetcar tracks from downtown Minneapolis to the
Northern edge of the speedway grounds were hurriedly laid and finished
just three days before the race!
*The figure of 20 degrees is estimated from
scaling photographs. Nowhere does the actual degree of banking appear in
written records of the time.
The working crew of persons involved in the
operation of the event included representatives of the AAA contest
board: R. Kennerdell of New York, C.F. Ireland of Peoria, C. A. Kneedler
of Sioux City. Referee would be H.J. Clark of Minneapolis, starter Fred
J. Wagner of the Chicago Athletic Association, a technical committee of
five persons, a director of scoring plus ten assistants, a contest
director and his assistant, a chief umpire, surgeons, publicity
directors, press committee, scoreboard supervisor, paddock supervisor,
program sales manager, ushers and myriad others whose jobs were to make
the event happen smoothly.
The well-known drivers of the day entered
the event. Much publicity was made of the fact that Ralph DePalma (the
winner of the 1915 Indianapolis race only four months earlier); Dario
Resta, Barney Oldfield and Earl Cooper were among the entrants. The
Minneapolis Journal of September 2, 1915 reported the track as a
“tremendous shrine to king speed on which in elimination trials, the
rubber-tired projectiles have hurtled through space at a rate exceeding
100 mph … a triumph in construction and engineering skill.” The prize
money was to be paid in gold! Mayors from 53 regional cities were signed
to attend. Dayton’s Department Store, ever ready with its outstanding
marketing department, advertised “Kar Coats for the Motor Speedway
Races.” Donaldson’s Department Store advertised “motor apparel needs
from bonnet to boot, including all the latest fads and fancies affected
by the socially exclusive cliques of the east and beyond.” Minneapolis
and St. Paul were said to have gone “car-Crazy.” Hotels were filled, the
streets were crowded with visitors, youngsters clattered around in
push-mobiles. What could be more exciting?
A disappointing total, however, of only
fourteen cars were entered. Dario Resta in his Mercedes earned the pole
position with a qualifying speed of 102.8 mph. Gil Anderson in a white
Stutz sat in the front row with a 100.5 mph speed. Eddie Rickenbacker,
working as co-driver for Ralph DePalma, circled the track in practice in
their Delage at a surprising 114 mph, which would be the fastest speed
ever recorded at the track.
Labor Day, September 4, 1915, dawned sunny
and hot! The cars were inspected at 10:00 am and the race was to start
at 12:00 noon. The cars took one slow lap (there was no pace car) around
the track and starter Fred Wagner of the AAA dropped the green flag for
the rolling start as the cars swept past to start the race. Resta
immediately shot into the lead in his Peugeot, followed closely by the
two white Stutzes of Earl Cooper and Gil Anderson, then Ralph DePalma in
the Mercedes. Bob Burman, in his Peugeot, having started in the second
row, caught and passed the Stutzes at the end of the second lap and
drafted along behind Resta. Burman soon passed Resta and forged a lead
of almost 30 seconds over Resta. It was then DePalma and Cooper closed
on the leaders. At the end of ten laps, DePalma steamed into the pits
for some minor adjustments, returning to the track well in arrears of
the other cars.
Gil Anderson, resuming his season-long
battle with Stutz teammate Earl Cooper, pushed past Resta, coming up
behind Burman, who was averaging over 93 mph on the rough track. On the
16th lap, Burman clunked into the pits, opened the car’s hood, shook his
head when he learned that a connecting rod in the engine had broken,
and announced his retirement for the day. He would later relate that he
had planned to install new rods in the engine before the race, but they
hadn’t arrived in time. His retirement left Cooper leading, Resta in
second and Anderson third. At 56 miles, Resta powered by Cooper. Mulford
was fourth, Tom Alley fifth, O’Donell sixth and DePalma seventh. Billy
Chandler, Henning, Haupt, Brown and Oldfield brought up the rear. Now
Anderson, who had been holding back, stepped hard on his gas, passing
the charging Resta. At the 100 mile mark, it was Anderson, Cooper and
Resta. Anderson was still averaging over 90 mph. Now the track began to
take its toll. Cooper stopped for oil. Anderson blew a tire, which
wrapped itself around the drive shaft and slowed him coming into the
pits. All this was just fine for DePalma, who was coming from behind in a
masterful show of driving, picking off one car after another.
Passing Resta and pulling up on the rear of
Cooper, DePalma, at the 110 mile mark, had things going his way. Resta
slowed and coasted into the pits with a broken oil pump. A cap from the
back of the pump case had jolted off, causing a loss of oil. Next it was
the Duesenberg of Ralph Mulford that encountered trouble. With its hood
flapping, it was white-flagged (today it would be black-flagged)
because of the danger of its coming off during the race and causing
injury. There was no quick fix for it and Mulford was done! Now Otto
Henning’s Mercer lost power and stopped on the track. Henning steered it
out of the path of onrushing cars and he, too, had to watch the rest of
the race as a spectator. At 120 miles, it was Cooper in the lead,
averaging over 88 mph, then DePalma, and Anderson. DePalma’s car began
losing speed, and the two Stutzes closed up in the lead. But DePalma
wasn’t done. The car picked up again and DePalma pushed it hard,
reclaiming second place.
During pit stops, Johnny Aitkin took over as
relief driver for Cooper and Rickenbacker took over Oldfield’s car. At
200 miles, the leaders were Anderson, Cooper and DePalma. When DePalma’s
car finally gave out entirely, the two Stutzes of Cooper and Anderson
were left far up front with Ed O’Donnell a distant third in his
Duesenberg. When Anderson gave way to a relief driver, the crowd was
left with nothing much to cheer about. The race was now a battle of cars
against the track. When the leaders slowed perceptively to avoid
punishing their cars for the rest of the race, the crowd began to drift
away. It was a hot day; the star drivers were retired or their relief
was driving. Huge gaps between cars left the spectators with nothing to
watch but the occasional pit stop. The handling of the pitwork was
superb, however short. Harry Stutz, the builder of the racers, managed
the Stutz team cars himself. As little as it was, however, it left the
crowd bored and restless. For the bleachers, they had paid $2.00 a seat,
and for the grandstand seats from $6.00 to $10.00 besides a general
admission fee of $2.00, and for so little entertainment.
The finish was exciting though. Cooper
crossed the finish line 30 feet ahead of Anderson after a five mile,
neck-and-neck, see-sawing battle for the lead. O’Donnell in the
Duesenberg was third, finishing over 30 minutes later! He had driven the
first 376 miles without a pit stop, quite unlike the other competitors.
Alley in the Ogren car, was fourth; Haibe, in a Sebring fifth; Bill
Haupt, in his Duesenberg, sixth. Haupt finished his 500 miles nearly 50
minutes after the leaders and as the grandstands had by now emptied,
starter Fred Wagner finally stepped onto the track and waved the green
flag (there was no checkered flag used in racing yet), stopping the
remaining cars, including Billy Chandler and Barney Oldfield. It was
customary at that time to pay prize money only to the cars that
completed the full number of laps designated for the race. This was an
exception.
The race had plenty of disappointments. To
the spectators, few cars started and fewer finished; and even then, so
far apart that only the battle for the lead held any interest. The
spectators could be excused for becoming a bit restless because of the
few cars circulating - the race had gone on for almost six hours!
(Oldfield’s Delage made twenty tire and spark plug stops, consuming 72
minutes in the pits. Cooper, in winning, made only five stops for a
total of three and a half minutes, and Anderson, five stops, for four
and a half minutes.) One must realize that the spectators were more used
to seeing sprint cars sliding sideways on the dirt mile track at the
Minnesota Fairgrounds. There the speeds seemed higher because cars were
more bunched up on the smaller track. Here, there were not even clouds
of dirt to take home as souvenirs. Historian David Wood concedes that
“even the most avid fans could remain excited for only so many hours.”
There was also disappointment for the
track’s owners in that the track’s condition resulted in speeds well
below those of Indianapolis, and even the board track at Chicago. An
average speed of over 100 mph had been expected. Furthermore, the huge
crowd anticipated at over 100,000… was finally counted at around 30,000.
This was going to be a costly experiment!
There was disappointment for the drivers who
finished out of the money and the car owners who faced expensive
repairs and replacements. It was the rough concrete that broke the cars.
Eddie O’Donnell’s riding mechanic, Jack Henderson, was forced to hold
up a broken radius arm with his bare hand for the last 100 miles of the
race after the chassis structure had broken from the bouncing. He nearly
collapsed when the car’s wheels stopped rolling. The drivers expressed
feelings that vibration from the track was almost beyond belief, and the
track owners promised that the track would be ground with carborundum
before the next race.
Technically, the track design was correct.
The straight-aways had been wide enough for side-by-side racing and the
corners engineered well enough that the cars stuck to them like glue.
The cars could barrel down the straight and dive into the corners
without letting up on the gas.
A sidelight is that Dario Resta offered to
race Cooper in a match race the following week at the track, winner take
all of $5,000 of his own money. The match race was never held.
Statistics:
Earl Cooper Stutz 5:47:29 86.35 mph $20,000 John Aitkin
Gil Anderson Stutz 5:47:29:31 86.35 $10,000 Tom Rooney
Ed O’Donnell Duesenberg 6:20:25 78.86 $ 4,500
Tom Alley Ogren 6:24:44 77.91 $ 3,500
Haibe Sebring 6:38:17 73.33 $ 2,700
Bill Haupt Duesenberg 6:45:18 73.97 $ 2,000
Billy Chandler Cooling flagged $ 1,750
Barney Oldfield Delage flagged $ 1,500 Rickenbacker
Bob Burman Peugeot 16 laps
Dario Resta Peugeot
Ralph DePalma Mercedes 100 laps
Ralph Mulford Duesenberg
Henning Mercer
Brown Du Chaneau
Pete Henderson Duesenberg
Chapter 5: The Demise
Immediately after the 1915 race, the owners
knew they were in trouble. The track had been built at a cost of over
$730,000 in 1915 dollars. Income from the race at $2.00 and $2.50 a head
amounted to a drop in the bucket. The prospects for next year were not
bright. In fact, the track was unusable in its current condition and
would require additional expense to smooth it. No sooner had the race
noises ceased when scores of laborers arrived at the office of General
Manager Sperry in St. Paul demanding their paychecks. They were stalled
off. Contractors and representatives of firms that had supplied
materials met Wheeler and Sperry and demanded their money. More than one
garnishment suit was filed, including one by a driver, Tom Alley, who
apparently couldn’t pickup his prize money! Wheeler begged for time.
Walter Ingvoldson, who had sold the corporation the lumber, claimed his
payment. For others, checks had bounced. Before the following week was
out, some 500 laborers and creditors had stormed the general office, all
demanding their due. Still, partial payments were handed out to the
laborers and creditors. Maybe the situation could be salvaged after all.
Wheeler took a train to Indianapolis to meet
with Indianapolis Speedway officials, hoping for backing to float a
bond issue. No backing was found. Then, W.F. Martin of the Twin City
Carpenter’s Union filed a blanket mechanics lien for $16,000 and the
whole mess was now assigned to the courts. Races held in 1917 brought in
a meager $6,500 from which taxes and expenses could barely be paid. By
the end of 1917, the stockholders still owned the track, but were in
bankruptcy, and the track’s future undecided.
In the first fall and winter, the track was
further plagued by frost heaving. The lack of re-rod had made itself
felt. In 1916, the owners had no option but to begin dismantling the
grandstands and selling the enormous amount of lumber and tin to begin
paying off bills. The infield land was leased out to local farmers, from
whence it acquired the nickname “the 342 acre farm enclosed in
concrete.”
By March, 1917, the speedway had been sold
at sheriff’s auction for a mere $250,000 to the Minneapolis Trust
Company. Still, creditors held some $375,000 worth of bills. For all
practical purposes, the speedway was defunct and the land had to be put
to a different use. The grand experiment was over. After the abandonment
of the track as a racing venue, the high banks still remained for many
years. Young men, eager to test themselves against the racing heroes of
the day, often challenged the track with their Model A’s in the late
1920s. In 1925, Lyman Brown relates that he took his Model A, nicknamed
his “Collegiate Car,” to the track on a number of occasions, and, only
able to drive it at 25 mph, he had to stay low on the banking because
with its skinny tires, it would slip and slide down the banking. “It was
rough as the dickens with holes and cracks and broken concrete chunks.”
He told this author. Even so, he and his friends thought they were
rally racing! My father, Raymond Allard, told me that, once in a while,
one of his buddies would try to run around the high side and the car
would tip over. “Tiny” Larson, early Northwest Airlines mechanic,
claimed that once he and some friends borrowed one of their father’s
cars, and while trying to tame the track, the car tipped over. The boys
righted the vehicle and returned it to the owner without mentioning the
fact.
The auto racing buffs had slipped away, but
in their place arrived a new breed of sportsmen – the aviators. The
fairly flat field enclosed within the racetrack beckoned early flyers
with its clear white circle, a landmark easily seen from the air from
many miles away.
In 1917, with America engaged in the
European war, the Aero Club of Minneapolis had been formed for the
purpose of assisting the military with training aviators for overseas
flying needs. At the same time, Dunwoody Institute of Minneapolis became
the location of a Naval aviation ground training facility. It, and its
school in the Midway area between Minneapolis and St. Paul, included a
plan to train a few aviators. They would be given their first lessons
near The Parade, as a patch of ground near Dunwoody Institute was named.
By October, 1917, there were 85 men holding pilot’s licenses in the
local area.
In February, 1918, Sheriff Earle Brown, one
of the Aero Club directors, put his large land holdings northwest of the
Twin Cities at the disposal of the club. With the Armistice, the Brown
farm came into civilian use by the Ashley Aeroplane Company under Enos
Ashley and Walter Bullock. It became the first real northwest flying
field, but was soon followed by others: a field in Fridley used by the
Federated Fliers, Inc., under the ownership of C.W. Hinck; a field near
the Minnesota State Fairgrounds in St. Paul run by William A. Kidder
called the Curtiss Northwest Airplane Company. Brothers Wilber and
Weldon Larrabee also created the Security Aircraft Company and built a
hangar to house their operation on the site of the Twin City Motor
Speedway. It was constructed using part of the main straight-away as its
concrete floor.
With flying distributed at sites around the
cities, and frankly needing regulation and a single permanent site, the
Minneapolis Aero Club had been very active in seeking the proper place
for a large permanent landing field. By November, 1919 State regulations
had been imposed on the area’s flyers which prevented stunting over the
cities and officially licensing of aircraft and pilots. At the same
time, the State Adjutant General, W.F. Rhinow had requested the State to
establish an air squadron within the Army National Guard. They also
needed a home. The area that both groups had in mind was the grounds of
the former Twin City Motor Speedway near Fort Snelling and midway
between Minneapolis and St. Paul, for the same reasons as the promoters
of the racetrack had favored. When the property had gone on the
sheriff’s sale block in March of 1917, it was purchased by Mr. Gus
Hohag, (one of the original farmers who had sold it to the Speedway
corporation.) He, in turn, sold it for $56,000 to Guy A. Thomas. Thomas
turned it over for $100,000 to the Snelling Field Corporation (name
changed soon to Snelling Field, Incorporated) with Thomas as an officer
of the corporation. With the Security Aircraft Company and other
operators established on the field, by 1920 it had become the center of
all Twin City flying, and in fact, most of Minnesota’s flying. The
Minneapolis Aero Club gave way to the Twin City Aero Corporation which
leased the grounds of the old speedway and began removal of the concrete
and making improvements to the field. An airmail hangar was built and
the Twin Cities welcomed the first government airmail flight in 1920. In
1921, the State provided funds for construction of three hangars for
the newly chartered 109th Observation Squadron, the first Air Guard
aerial squadron approved by the US War Department. The airfield was
called Speedway Field until it was dedicated in 1923 to two local flyers
killed in aerial combat in the Great War, Ernest Groves Wold and Cyrus
Foss Chamberlain (Wold-Chamberlain Field).
In 1915, a law had been passed by the State
Legislature authorizing the Minneapolis Park Board to be created. A levy
allowed the Park Board to acquire property for parks and playgrounds.
In 1926 the Park Board officially acquired Wold-Chamberlain Field from
the Twin City Aero Corporation and thus began the airport’s climb to
becoming Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport. During the Works
Progress Administration (WPA) of 1935 – 1939 (named the Work Projects
Administration from 1939 to 1942,) the remainder of the concrete
speedway was removed, the field improved and paved runways laid. The
Park Board gave way to the Metropolitan Airports Commission in 1943 in
whose hands it is administered still today.
(Much more of the history of Minneapolis-St.
Paul International Airport can be found in the book, Minnesota Aviation
History, 1857-1945 by this same author, published in 1993).
It is noteworthy that Candler Field near
Atlanta, GA was another “superspeedway” racetrack, built for auto racing
in 1909 and closing in 1923. It also became the site of a major
airport, today the William B. Hartsfield Atlanta International Airport.
When Wold-Chamberlain Field was improved
during the 1930s, the remaining concrete portions of the track were
bulldozed to fill-in low spots in the central portions of the field. So,
it is today that somewhere under the two mile long, twenty inch thick
runways at Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport, the remains of a
once great, but doomed speedway lie forever entombed.
In 1916, the Twin City Motor Speedway would
hold additional races, but not a lengthy enduro. Races occurred on
Memorial Day, the same day as the Indy 500. Of six races on the card,
the longest one featured a 25 lap race for sprint style cars. A novelty
was a 5 lap race for what was called the Twin City Trophy, reserved for
cars that had been owned by Twin Citians for at least 30 days. A 5 lap
motorcycle race ended the holiday activities. Dario Resta won a 150 mile
event at the track later in the Fall.
For 1917. Ira Vail would win the last race
at the Twin City Motor Speedway, a 100 mile tussle with the rough track
held on July 14, 1917, a race sponsored by the Red Cross, called the
American Red Cross Auto Derby. In a preliminary event, Reeves Dutton had
won a 25 lap sprint in a Stutz.
Miscellaneous:
National Champions:
Barney Oldfield
1911 Ray Harroun
Ralph DePalma (AAA)
Earl Cooper
Ralph DePalma
Earl Cooper
Dario Resta
Earl Cooper
Thumbnails of the competitors:
Alley, Thomas. Raced five times in the Indy 500. Best finish 5th in 1919. Drove for Duesenberg in 1915.
Chandler, Billy. Raced from 1912 through 1916. One championship win in 1913. Drove a Cooling in the 1915 Minneapolis 500.
Oldfield, Berna Eli “Barney.” Born January
29, 1878 in Fulton City, Ohio (another source claims Wauseon, OH). Died
October 4, 1946. Married three times. In 1910, drove a car to a record
131.25 mph. First driver to break a 100 mph lap at Indianapolis in 1916.
In the 1930s he road-tested cars for Hudson, was the 1931 starter for
the Indy 500, drove Allis-Chalmers tractors in high-speed fairgrounds
exhibitions, owned a Country Club near LA., and was a movie star and
Broadway actor.
Cooper, Earl. Born in Nebraska in 1886. Died
October 22, 1965. Second at Indy 500 in 1924. Three-time National
Champion (1913, 1915, 1917) Began racing in 1908. Joined Stutz in 1912.
In 1913 he won seven of eight races entered and finished 2nd in the
eighth race. Missed the 1914 season and part of 1915 due to injury.
Drove for Stutz.
Mulford, Ralph. Born 1884. Died October 23,
1973. Ended his career as a hill-climb expert, setting records at Mount
Washington and Pikes Peak. Raced at Indy ten times. Involved in
controversy as to who won the first Indy 500, he or Ray Harroun.
Anderson, Gil. Raced Stutz cars in five of six Indy 500s. Best finish was 3rd in 1915.
Resta, Dario. Born August 17, 1884 in Milan,
Italy. Died Sept. 2, 1924. Won US Grand Prix in San Francisco in 1915
and the Vanderbilt Cup and was 2nd at the Indianapolis 500. He won the
inaugural board track race at Chicago Speedway in 1915. Drove a Peugeot
car in 1915. Winner of 1916 Indy 500, the Chicago 300 and Omaha 150 as
well as the Minneapolis 150. Finished his career driving in Europe.
Killed at Brooklands trying for a new land speed record.
Burman, Robert. Born Imlay City, MI April
23, 1884. Died April 8, 1916. Raced from 1909 to 1915. Raced at Indy
five times. Best finish 6th in 1915 in a Peugeot. Had six championship
race wins. Killed at Corona, CA in 1916 in the Peugeot.
Rickenbacker, Edward “Eddie” Born 1890 in
Columbus, OH. Began his career in 1906 as a pit-boy, then became a
member of the Lee Frayer/Miller team. His first race was in Red Oak, IA
where he crashed, but later in Omaha, he won nine out of nine races he
entered in a Miller car. In 1917 he went into the US Air Service,
becoming the leading US Ace with 26 enemy aircraft shot down. After the
war, he manufactured his own line of automobiles, and in 1927 bought the
Indianapolis Motor Speedway. In 1940 he spent several days adrift in
the Atlantic Ocean in a rubber raft before he was rescued. He became
President of Eastern Airlines in 1948.
DePalma, Ralph. Born February 23, 1884,
died March 31, 1956. Italian-American. Winner of the first Milwaukee
Mile championship race in 1911. Led the Indy 500 in his Mercedes in 1912
until 2 laps from the finish when a cracked piston sidelined him. He
and his riding mechanic pushed the car over the finish line for 2nd
place. Won 1912 and 1914 Elgin National Trophy and the 1914 Vanderbilt
Cup. Won the 1915 Indy 500. Set a measured mile speed record in 1919,
driving a Packard to a record 149.875 mph at Daytona Beach. Competed in
12 Indy 500s. Drove a Mercedes in 1915 AAA races.
