From Digney's link to the June 30, 1926 Vancouver Sun... http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_oRAnNWtVV...4UzNvA/s1600-h/vancouver+sun+june+30+1926.JPG It states, "The following cars have been officially entered to date: 1. Deusenberg Special. Elmer Spatz. From the LA Times article I quoted above, I had assumed the #1 (Fronty) car shown here was the "Brockman Special". Do you think the promotor of the 'California Dirt Track Kings" would have called Elmer's T the "Deusenberg Special" for promotions sake...? While on this PNW tour, seems as though Elmer and Bod Parsons had a little dispute, which brought the tour some more press... "The Deadly Dirt Track Duel" (one of my favorite clippings) This article went with this previosly posted pic... And here are the results, seems as though Elmer lost a piston... Ok, here's a few more newspaper clippings. Monday April 4, 1927. Looks like the day before, Elmer lost a wheel while driving "Pop" Evan's Glendale Special at Ascot... And another misc racecar pic with no details... There's more where these came from... Neal
(email from the owner) Hello. Here is a bit more about the Elgin, I am sorting the pictures out at the moment and will get you them to you tomorrow. The Car is a board track racer recreation with a very big 1914 Grand prix Peugeot influence. Elgins are an American make coming from Chicago who did do some early board track racing but there looks where nothing special hence the more styled body. The Car is all Elgin apart from the radiator which is of period; the engine is a Falls six cylinder OHV which all Elgins used. The gearbox unit is connected to the engine and the clutch is an original period borg & beck. The back axle has a new crown wheel and pinion with new half shaft to fit to the rudge whitworths. With the new CW&P I have estimated the car had a speed of about 75 to 80 mph but as I have not driven her i cannot say it for definite. The Car runs and starts first time the only things that need doing are the rev-counter drive, fan belt... and filling with water. It hasn’t got an MOT or registered with the DVLA but the VSCC has sent a letter to the DVLA confirming it as a 1917 Elgin. This should be straight forward as soon as the MOT is done. I have a spare engine and gearbox minus cylinder head that go with the car. My hopes where to get it on the road and seen at a few VSCC events but with my new house moving quicker that I thought it needs to go. Best Regards Ian Seymour-Smith the last of them. It is sad that this guy never drove this car, it almost done. (if someone really wanted to do it up, drop an early aero engine in it and really go)
GREAT STUFF Neal! Please keep posting it, I really enjoy all this early stuff, need to find my Ascot book and look for some related photos & info. Many cars were listed as "Duesenberg" in programs and newspaper reports but wwere based on engines and sometimes just the chassis. They may not look anything like a factory built car. That odd two man car you have in your first post may in fact be the "Duesenberg", it looks like it could be a straight eight. Any closeup photos of the engine would help confirm that.
I am currently looking for a couple of these early racers to put in our prestigious "History of the Race Car" building during the Grand National Roadster Show - January 29-31 2010. If anyone here owns one or knows anyone that does please get in touch with me. Thanks, Axle
A few more race car pics... This car looks like the same chassis and engine as the #1 car, but a different body? And maybe the tow car? Elmer looking a little dirty. I am not sure whose car this is? Neal
Neal, thanks for the additional photos! The unique thing on that car is the front hubs. The car has a Model T Ford front axle and chassis and runs Dayton wire wheels, looks like it has front brakes, but they aren't.
Few or any dirt cars in this time frame had front brakes. Just looked at all the photos of this car and see what looks like a Model A Ford brack crossshaft behind that right front tite, but the hand brake lever only activated the rear brakes, a standard feature of the time. Attaching front backing plates to a t front spindle is a tought ting to d. Neat car!
That would be an Essex. It was more common to cut down Essex rails and drop a T motor into it, than build an Essex. Many 3 springer sprint cars of the time (2 parrallel up front and a transverse in the rear) are built this way.
Jim, Great photos from the Ormond Beach races. Thanks. Although i suspect some animosity towards the French. W.K.Vanderbilt- Merc. Arthur McDonald-Napier. E.R.Thomas- Merc. William.K.Vanderbilt-Mercedes 90hp. The 'Flying Dutchman'
Kurtis, nice pics as well. I have more somewhere of the same event including the wreck of Crocker. I do not have any built in animosity of the French nor do I think any of the guys did on this side of the pond. I admire what they did with their racers and engines tremendously and most of the early racers did as well. It did not take a genius to see how well their cars performed. What I dislike is that a "select" few had the audacity to think that they could direct what records we were setting on our soil under our own rules as to whether they would be acceptable to them and the international community. We had some guys set records one way and some two way. We did not live and die by their supreme rules. We had our own rules and if they did not like them then so be it but to say "all of these foreign records we set are 'official and proper' and your records set are worthless is absurd. For years those clowns had questioned DePalma's 1919 land speed record for various reasons but mostly due to a lack of a two way run. If those idiots could find their way out of bed in the morning without directional signals it would surprise me. Did they ever do their homework or did it not fit their script? No. It finally took Gary Doyle in his book on DePalma to set the record straight, but that worthless sanctionlng body could have cared less anyways. He was not on their approved list apparently. There were other issues too lengthy to go into regarding our own lack of a truly big time body on this side to stand up to them. But look thru the records today and you see all of their inane little asterisks. I am a huge Peugeot and Delage fan etc and has nothing to do where they were born, it only has to do with some of the snobs that elevate themselves to heights where they have no business being in the first place-Jim
Great idea, keeping this thread to the first half-century! I can spend hours (who can't?) reeading & re-reading this discussion! Great thread!
Jimi, It's far too early to start a new topic covering post WWII auto racing. I may be ambitious when i say this, but, this one has the potential to go to at least 20,000 posts although i doubt it if that will happen. Stick around. There is much to be discussed and thousands more photos to be shared. I'm just getting started. Cheers, Kurtis.
Alright gentlemen,tell me all you can about this photo I picked up for $2.50 today at the Stan Lobitz Racing movie party. Looks like the 1914 Mercer to me. Corona? Elgin? What is the car #3 beside it? I also got a photo of what appears to Be Waldo Stein at Elgin in 1919 in the Oldfield #28. It is on heavy stock and will not scan correctly enough to post,but looks fine in real life. It is probably a copy of an original photo,but for that price,what the heck.
Those are some amazing pictures you guys have there. I cant really tell but it looks as though there is no safety harness or seat belts. It crazy how people back then had such disreguard to racing safe haha.
Those early cars did not have belts and the drivers and riding mechanics rode on,not in them. The driver had the wheel to grip and the mechanic might hold on with one hand and have a foot peg. In the event of an accident they were usually thrown from the car.
Buildy a great pic. The car beside it is the 1914 Tahis (I'm pretty sure-without checking the actual records- the Tahis carried a tank like that in a number of races). The car still vintage races in original condition and is owned by Randy Reed. I spoke to him years ago (maybe 1985ish) when he raced it in a vintage race at the San Diego stadium parking lot. Carries a Wisconsin 4 cylinder but since it displaced more than 300 cubic inches, it was limited to only select events, mainly on the West Coast I believe. A somewhat funny story is that I was standing along a fence by myself watching the Tahis and some others go by and this guy walks up next to me and he also is by himself and seems pretty interested in the old cars. I made a little small talk with him and I am thinking this guy is familiar but couldn't put 2 and 2 together and then it hit me. I asked him "aren't you Rodger Ward" and he said "Yes I am". Well we went on talking and he was as nice a guy as you could meet. Well I asked him to sign my program but I did not have a pen and neither did he. So I ask this girl nearby with a purse for a pen to get an autograph and she gives me one. I had him sign it and so I go to give the girl her pen back and there are a number of people asking me who he is. I say Rodger Ward and guys are rubber necking saying "WHO". So I tell them he is a two time Indy winner and then all sorts of people started to gather around him. I said sorry about that and smiled and he shrugged and started signing autographs. Good guy and really down to earth. I believe the pic is Corona 1916 in one of the very last contests for the big Type 45 Mercers. As to your other pic with the #28 car that would be a great pic to see. That would be the Golden Sub with new bodywork. Car was no longer real successful at that juncture but it is and was a great car. Too bad it did not survive (burned in a fire in Joliet in the thirties).-Jim
Hello Jim, Thanks! Great story on Ward. Kind of parallels my experience with another multi Indy winner Rick Mears. Super nice guy,unlike some of the other "Big Boys" in racing I`ve been around-LOL. Who would be driving the Mercer if that is a 1916 race?Pullen? Is that #3 an offshoot of Stutz somehow? Driver of that car? On the Waldo Stein Oldfield Miller-I`ll try to take a photo of the photo with my camera and see if I can get it on here in better shape that way.
Tahis... Randy's email basis the Tahis: TAHIS SPECIAL Tahis is a Greek word for Speedy The Tahis Special has a lengthy history in American speedway and road racing. Frederick Robinson of Chicago, Illinois constructed the car. The first races for the Tahis Special were the Chicago Automobile Club Trophy and the Elgin National Trophy held in Elgin, Illinois in August 1914 and driven by Mort Roberts, a well-known driver of the day. In 1915 Mr. Robinson brought the car to the West Coast for the San Diego Exposition Road Race held at Point Loma in January. The Tahis Special was the first car entered in this race and was featured in a lot of the press articles because of a supposed search for a driver. In February they went to San Francisco for the U. S. Grand Prix and the Vanderbilt Cup races. In the Grand Prix, a tire was thrown from a wheel at speed and ran over a U.S. Marine guard who attempted to stop it while doing spectator control duty. During early 1915 Jack Gable drove the Tahis Special. Gable was a riding mechanic for "Wild Bob" Burman in the Indianapolis 500 in 1915 and possibly earlier. Burman, who had driven the Blitzen Benz to the, unrecognised, Land Speed Record of 141+ mph in 1911, may have been instrumental in aquiring the Wisconson racing engine that is used in the Tahis Special because of his close association with the firm and other racing cars that used this model engine. This engine is a 4 cylinder, Type JR of 449 cu. in. and 110 h.p. Burman finished eleventh at Indy in 1913 driving the Keeton with an engine of this same type. In 1914 the two Burman Specials used a push rod, hemi-head version of this same engine built especially for him by the Wisconson factory. In October 1915 the Tahis Special was at the center of a very controversial disqualification at the California Raisin Classic held in Fresno, California. After having been driven from Los Angeles to Fresno through the Mojave Desert because of a last minute race invitation by the A.A.A., the clutch needed attention. The repairs could not be completed before the closing of the qualification session. The other entrants were allowed to vote on allowing the Tahis Special to run in the race. These were professional racers in these days with very little sponsorship and everybody needed the prize money. The car was voted out of the race. March 1916 found the Tahis Special at Ascot Park in Los Angeles for a 100-mile race on the 1.0 mile oiled dirt oval driven by Clarence Shockley. In April, the car participated in the Corona Road Race at Corona, California driven by Jack Teel. This must have been a traumatic event for the Robinson team because of the death of Bob Burman, his riding mechanic and a track guard, when a wheel collapsed on Burman's Grand Prix Peugeot causing a horrible crash. Five spectators were also injured. Also, in April the car went back to Ascot Park for a 150-mile race driven, again by Jack Teel, to a 5th place finish. There is photographic evidence that the car competed from 1916 to 1919 in what were, probably, minor races in the Southern California area, but locations are unknown. Ascot Park operated through 1919. The car was registered for road use in California in 1919. Fitted with a battery, lights and a starter, it was used on the streets by Mr Robinson. During this next period, from 1919 to 1949, the last major mechanical work would have been accomplished as none has been done since. The engine, transmission and rear end have been maintained over the years, but no rebuilds or overhauls have been done to these components since, most likely, the 1930s. Harry Johnson, then of San Pedro, California, aquired the car from the estate of Mr. Robinson in 1949 due to the prodding of Herb Royston, a well kown car collector of his day. Herb Prentice of Downey, California, then owner of the ONO racecar, passed on the car because he thought it to be unsafe in the event of an overturn on the track. It then passed to Hugh Darby of Fresno (not a town with fond memories for the Tahis Special). In 1952, Lonnie Reed of San Diego, traded a 1914 Cadillac converted to a truck, for the car and a 1918 Harley Davidson motorcycle. The Tahis Special has been a member of the Reed family ever since. During the 1950s, Joe Thomas, who finished second at Corona in 1916 for the factory Mercer team, commented on the car. He stated that while the performance with the powerful engine was good, a problem for the car was its weight. This had caused many problems with the tires then available, particularly in the longer races. There is evidence that Mr. Robinson tried to correct this during the car's evolving race history. During 1958, 1959 and 1960 the Tahis Special participated in a series of match races with a modified Fiat S61/Pope Hartford at Alpha Speedway in San Diego. In 1988, the car began competing in various vintage racing events that became popular in the early 1970's. There have been no tire problems. The Tahis Special has been to the Monterey Historics three times, the San Diego Historic Grand Prix three times and the Visalia Vintage Motorsports Festival twice. It is believed that this car is the oldest, unrestored racing car still competing in the United States.
Buildy, after checking my records it may be 1915, at either San Diego or San Francisco. I am not sure the Tahis ran at Corona in 1916 and I am not sure they had that bodywork on the car in 1916. My records seem to agree that the #3 Robinson/Wisconsin /Tahis ran and the #4 car was a Mercer Special. Ruckstell was in the #4 car at San Diego and Pullen in 4 at San Fran. I might do better to quit guessing while I am still ahead (or am I). Like touching a hot stove to see if it is really hot- I will guess Pullen. The driver of the Tahis is Jack Gable. The engine was allegedly similar to Burman's Keeton Wisconsin. I gave up temporarily trying to figure out the Burman/Wisconsin saga. He had them build his Keeton engines and then had them build some overhead cam engines and that went south, so he then took his checkbook to Harry Miller and later sued Wisconsin when they later sold some OHC engines copied from his blueprints. Someday I hope to put 2 and 2 together and hopefully come up with a reasonably correct answer on that mess. Would appreciate a pic of the Sub. Thanks Jim
Fur Biscuit,thanks for the great story on the Tahis Spl ! Jim,here is a photo of a photo of a photo-LOL. I think it coveys the general idea,though. The picture I grabbed at the show for $2.50 will display nicely in my collection. Pretty sure this is Elgin 1919.
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