The American Automobile Association, Part III

When the 1915 season dawned upon the American Automobile Association's (AAA) National Championship Trail, there was an unusually high sense of anticipation on the part of the Contest Board. The Chairman of the Contest Board, Richard Kennerdell, was basking in the satisfaction of not only a successful 1914 season, but a 1915 season which promised to be truly bigger. There were nearly 25 events on the schedule for the National Championship Trail. The National Pastime, baseball, was in turmoil as the Federal League was mixing it up with the American and National Leagues. The opportunity for motor racing to become "Big Time" was a thought that many were literally banking upon to come true.

There was also a sense of real change in the air. During the 1914 season, there were four venues which were road circuits - Santa Monica, Tacoma, Elgin, and Corona; the brick speedway at Indianapolis; four venues which were dirt tracks - Sioux City, Kalamazoo, Galesburg, and Minneapolis; plus the beach races at Galveston. For 1915, Kennerdell and the Contest Board felt that they were poised on the verge of seeing automobile racing becoming a major sport.

There was good reason for that optimism. Not only were there more events on the calendar for 1915, but more venues as well. The road circuits were San Diego, Glendale, San Francisco, Venice, Tucson, Oklahoma City, and Phoenix. The brick speedway at Indianapolis was back, of course, and along with concrete speedways at Minneapolis - the Twin Cities Speedway and Providence - the Narragansett Speedway. The dirt tracks were back as well - Ascot, Galesburg, Sioux City, Burlington, and Kalamazoo. There was yet another type of track which was making its Championship Trail debut during the 1915 season.

In April 1910, the Los Angeles Motordrome at Playa Del Rey - just outside Los Angeles, held its inaugural events. The track was unusual for two reasons. Firstly, the track was circular. Secondly, it was made out of wood. The board track was born.

The Playa Del Rey board track was constructed by John S. "Jack" Prince, a former cyclist. The Briton had cashed in on the velodrome building craze which swept America in the decade or so prior the construction of the Los Angeles Motordrome. Playa Del Rey, however, was the brainchild of another immigrant, Frederick E. Moscovics. It was Moscovics who had the idea of actually building the track out of wood planks.

Moscovics was a Swiss mechanical engineer who studied at the Polytechnic in Zurich and the Armour Institute in Chicago. He had also worked for Maybach, Daimler, and Allen-Kingston. After the latter folded, he had been hired by Delco Electric and sent to Los Angeles. It was while there that he came up with the idea for a racing track made from boards. Moscovics convinced a Southern California sportsman by the name of Frank Garbutt and the Los Angeles Pacific Railway Company to provide the financing necessary to build the track. He then contracted Prince to do the construction.

The one-mile track was 45 feet wide and banked at an angle of 20 degrees, this being measured at 25 feet from the bottom of the track. The entire track was encircled by a dual guard rail with a 30 foot freeboard composed of crushed stone lining the inside of the track. The former was to keep the cars from sailing off the track and the latter to slow them down if they spun onto the bottom of the track.

With construction beginning in early February, the track was ready in plenty of time for the opening events in April. The campaign to gather a good field - Barney Oldfield, Ralph De Palma, Ray Harroun, and others, including an amateur named Caleb Bragg - was successful, and the pre-race promotional effort was effective as tickets were selling better than expected. The initial program was a solid seven days of racing. Yes, seven days of races. There were a total of 27 races run over distances from five miles to 100 miles. Just for the record, the winner of the first event, a 10-miler on April 8th 1910, was William Endicott in a Cole, running in the "Stock 160-231 cubic inches" event at a speed of 66.267mph.

The first slate of races at Playa del Rey was sanctioned by the AAA Contest Board, with Board Chairman Samuel Butler making the trek westward to head the officiating team. The Contest Board also reserved additional dates for the track - or motordrome - but the track did not hold another event until November of 1910. Despite the hoopla, the initial races did not make the expected monies anticipated and so there was a need to make some revisions to the plans outlined earlier in the year.

Garbutt and Moscovics struggled through 1911 and gave up at the end of the year, having sustained significant losses trying to make the track successful. The Los Angeles Dealers Association (LADA) assumed the duties as the promoters for the track at the end of 1911, running only one race in 1912 before giving up after an attempt to use the sanction of the Western Automobile Association in the final event at the motordrome in early 1913. After this event, the track was used for a variety of purposes by the local dealers before finally burning to the ground.

Enthusiasm for the use of board tracks for automobile racing did not end with the failure of the Playa del Rey track. Jack Prince built another track from wood planking in California, this time in Oakland. The Oakland Motordrome was smaller - a half-mile in distance - and also used a circular design like the Los Angeles track. There were several reasons for the shorter distance being selected for the track, a major one being the plan to feature motorcycle racing as well as automobile racing on the track. The angle of the banking was much steeper than that of Playa del Rey as well: 40 degrees versus 20 degrees.

Although originally scheduled for a late-1910 opening, the Oakland staged its first meeting in April 1911. A year later, in April 1912, the track held its last automobile race. The track suffered from poor promotion and equally poor management. Only with the last event, too late to save the track, did the motordrome benefit from quality promotion, in this case from Ernie Moross - the former manager of Barney Oldfield and the owner of the Moross Racing Team. The team included at various times such "star drivers" as Bob Burman, Cyrus Patschke, Teddy Tetzlaff, and Hughie Hughes in addition to Oldfield.

In 1915, the board track was to return to the scene and with a vengeance. The beginning of the season saw the announcement of no less than eight of the board tracks to be built for the racing season, of which six were built: Chicago (Maywood), New York (Sheepshead Bay in Brooklyn), Cincinnati, Des Moines, Omaha, and Tacoma. Although the new tracks at Minneapolis and Providence were originally announced as being built as board tracks, both were eventually constructed as concrete speedways.

Despite the dislike of road races by Chairman Kennerdell, the first events on the calendar for the AAA Championship Trail were all road races bar one, and all were run in California. San Diego and Glendale both held road events and the dirt track at Ascot followed hard on the heels - four days - of the Glendale race. Ascot also saw the first of several fatalities that were to mar the 1915 season: Jack Callaghan died as the result of injuries sustained after crashing his Duesenberg while trying to pass the quick Canadian Wilbur D'Alene. Callaghan was pierced by a piece of the track railing and died a day later. The fate of his riding mechanician is not mentioned.

The 1915 editions of the American Grand Prize and the Vanderbilt Cup were run in San Francisco on a road course laid out around the Pan Pacific International Exposition. One fact of life about San Francisco in February is that it rains. Sometimes it rains a lot. On occasion it rains and it rains and it rains. Late February 1915 was one of those times. The rain fell steadily for several days prior to the Vanderbilt Cup race. What complicated matters was that the course was laid out not only over paved city streets, but over sections of unpaved (dirt) streets as well - with the finishing stretch being covered with wooden planks thrown in for good measure.

The original date of February 22nd - George Washington's Birthday - for the Cup race had to be abandoned and the race was rescheduled for March 6th, but not after some unpleasantness in the garage area, Barney Oldfield in particular being upset. Oldfield and Kennerdell had a heated discussion in which Oldfield campaigned hard for the running of the race as scheduled - one reason being the nearly 100,000 spectators who were lining the circuit expecting a race, and another being that his contract with the Maxwell team ran out on March 1st. Kennerdell prevailed, but not without some assistance from Eddie Rickenbacher, who wore not only a rain slicker and galoshes over his racing uniform but a grim look on his face during the exploratory lap that the drivers were asked to do before the race was officially postponed.

The Grand Prize race held as scheduled although the weather was threatening at the start. The sensation of the race was the Peugeot driven by Italo-Briton Dario Resta. Resta seized the lead from the start even though mud and water was flying everywhere as the cars roared over the still muddy, soaked streets. During his pit stop, Resta relinquished the lead. The rain, which had been holding off, finally hit and turned the already sloppy circuit into a worse mess. In spite of the appalling conditions, the crowd numbered about one hundred thousand hardy souls, who witnessed a masterful display of driving on the part of Resta.

Despite his solid victory in the Grand Prize race, Resta was given little chance in the Vanderbilt Cup, which was run in excellent conditions. The result was the same: Dario Resta, Peugeot. It took Resta a bit long to take the lead, 20 laps, but the outcome was never in doubt. The Peugeot finished seven minutes ahead of the car in second place, the Stutz of Howdy Wilcox. Resta had arrived on the scene like a bombshell. Resta would never be so lightly considered again when he appeared on the grid.

In 1915, Barney Oldfield did something that he had never done before, which is really saying something: he won an event on the National Championship Trail. It was yet another event in California - the Venice Road Race. In an irony which must have made it sweeter for Oldfield, the Contest Board ended up sanctioning an event promoted by the Western Automobile Association (WAA). This was a (possible) legacy of the peace brokered by former Contest Board Chairman William Schimpf when he made his trip out West two years previously, when the WAA and the AAA locked horns. Chairman Kennerdell ended up sending Fred Wagner to Venice to salvage a bad situation made worse when all the local AAA officials resigned rather than work the race.

The race was notable not just that it was Oldfield's first win on the Championship Trail, but how he earned it. On the final lap Oldfield was in fourth place right on the tail of Maxwell teammate William Carlson. Oldfield slipped past Carlson into third and was stunned to pass the wrecked Stutz of Dave Lewis which had crashed with the Case of Eddie Hearne as they battled for the lead. And then the flag dropped and Oldfield had finally won a Championship event.

Amazingly, Oldfield followed this victory with another three days later - this time in Tucson on another road course. This was one more stop as the Championship Trail ended its stay out West: The Southern Sweepstakes Road Race in Oklahoma City. However, before the race there was an announcement that was to have an effect on the Contest Board and its activities for decades.

The heavy hand with which the Contest Board ran racing in America was not necessarily appreciated by many promoters, teams, and drivers. The Contest Board was quick to hand out penalties to drivers and teams who ran in unsanctioned or "outlaw" events and even quicker to slap them on the promoters. For the promoters, a major complaint was the price tag attached to the sanctioning fees the Contest Board levied on the promoters. After a number of years of discontent and grousing, the irritation finally boiled over. The fairground promoters finally responded to the AAA by creating the International Motor Contest Association, IMCA. The IMCA was to have a long life and plenty of business as the AAA created another venue or participant every time it declared a track or driver to be an "outlaw."

The Oklahoma City race was delayed by rainy weather for four days. When it was finally run on the fifth day, the crowd had dwindled to only about 15,000, far less than anticipated even after the delays. However, they were treated to a good race with Bob Burman in his Peugeot winning from Dave Lewis (Stutz) and John Raimey (Case).

The International Sweepstakes was one of the top three events on the Championship Trail, perhaps first among equals with the Grand Prize and the Vanderbilt Cup races. It had become one of the few truly international events, the Grand Prix de l'Automobile Club de France being the other major event of the day. For 1915, however, the International Sweepstakes had no international rivals. Europe was now at war. The German and French cars had battled on the race track and now their countries were truly battling each other. The European War reduced the number of foreign drivers entered for the race as well as restricting supply of the European cars. This is also a good time to mention that the maximum displacement for Championship Cars - Class E - was now 300 cubic inches, reduced from the previous year's 450 cubic inches.

The entry list was still very large, if not necessarily healthy. Qualifying was over a single lap and the minimum qualifying speed was 80mph, a speed which 18 of the 41 entries did not meet. In 1915, Decoration Day - 30 May - fell on a Sunday and the International Sweepstakes was held on the Monday following, 31 May. The cars were not assigned race numbers until after qualifying. The numbers assigned were in order of their qualifying speeds, # 1 to the pole winner - Howdy Wilcox (with mechanician C.W. Scott) in a Stutz with a speed of 98.90mph, and so forth down to the final qualifier being given # 28, Willie Haupt (Harry Donaldson) in an Emden, 80.36mph. This mean that the cars qualified using one number and raced using another. Wilcox, as an example was assigned # 14 on the entry.

Complicating things was the Contest Board rule restricting only three cars from the same manufacturer in a race. This meant that Jack LeCain did not make the race since there were already three of the Peugeot cars ahead of him in the qualifying order. Therefore, although actually 28th in the qualifying order - and turning a lap speed fast enough to qualify, Haupt started 24th.

Race Monday saw rain falling just a few hours before the start of the race. There were showers as late as an hour prior to the start. Despite the threat of yet more rain, the race began on time and it quickly became apparent that the two cars to watch were the Mercedes of Ralph De Palma and the Peugeot of Dario Resta. The two drivers dominated the race with the chase being tipped in the favor of De Palma when Resta slid wide and touched the wall on the 129th lap. The contact damaged the right front hub of the Peugeot and allowed De Palma to begin putting some distance between himself and Resta. Two laps from the end, the engine in the Mercedes broke a connecting rod, having started to run very rough the previous lap as the rod was beginning to break. Despite two holes being punched in the block, De Palma managed to nurse the ailing Mercedes across the line first, no doubt with visions of the1912 race clearly in his mind.

The International Sweepstakes had provided a great show and further enhanced its status as perhaps the most significant motor racing event in America. The 500 mile race at Indianapolis, however, was soon to lose its unique position on the Championship Trail. Yet another group of promoters agreed to form an association, only this time operating within the AAA. Taking for itself the name of "Speedway Association," the new group was composed of those who had built a series of new board or concrete speedways, plus the brick speedway of Indianapolis. The board speedways at Chicago, Sheepshead Bay, Tacoma, Sioux City, and Omaha joined forces with the concrete speedway in Minneapolis to create a change in the direction of AAA racing which would dominate American racing for over a decade. The board track era was upon America and the Contest Board was in the thick of it.

References

• The Automobile, "De Palma, in Mercedes, Wins at 89.84 m.p.h.," 3 June 1915.
• Griffith Borgeson, The Golden Age of the American Racing Car, New York: Bonanza Books, 1966.
• Allan Brown, History of America's Speedways Past & Present, Comstock, Michigan: Brown, 1994.
• Russ Catlin, "The History of AAA National Championship Racing, Chapter 6: 1914, De Palma Wins Again," Speed Age, May 1955.
• Russ Catlin, "The History of AAA National Championship Racing, Chapter 7: 1915, Cooper Takes His Second Crown," Speed Age, June 1955.
• Russ Catlin, "The History of AAA National Championship Racing, Chapter 8: 1916, Dario Resta, the Conquering Invader," Speed Age, July 1955.
• Russ Catlin, "The History of AAA National Championship Racing, Chapter 9: The Coming of the War," Speed Age, August 1955
• Russ Catlin, "How to Save Racing in America," Speed Age, November 1955.
• Tim Considine, American Grand Prix Racing - A Century of Drivers & Cars, Osceola, Wisconsin: Motorbooks International Publishers, 1997.
• Floyd Clymer, Compiler, Indianapolis 500 Mile Race History, Los Angeles: Floyd Clymer, 1946.
• Jack C. Fox, The Illustrated History of the Indianapolis 500 1911 - 1994, Speedway, Indiana: Carl Hungness Publishing, 1994.
• G. N. Georgano, Editor, The Encyclopedia of Motor Sport, New York: Viking Press, 1971.
• George Moore, "Playa Del Rey - Birth of the Boards," Board Track: Guts, Gold & Glory, Kutztown, Pennsylvania: Kutztown Publishing Company, 1990.
• Doug Nye, The United States Grand Prix and Grand Prize Races 1908 - 1977, New York: Doubleday & Company, 1978.
• Harold Osmer and Phil Harms, Real Road Racing: The Santa Monica Road Races, Chatsworth, California: Harold L. Osmer Publishing, 1999.
• John Glenn Printz, "The First 50 Years," The PPG Indy Car World Series 1981, Burlington, Vermont: Competition Images, 1981.
• John Glenn Printz and Ken M. McMaken, "A Listing of Drivers With Five Championship Wins Or More 1909 to 1982 With Historical Commentary," Official PPG Indy Car World Series Annual 1983, Harrisburg, North Carolina: Griggs Publishing Company, 1983.
• John Glenn Printz, "A History And Listing of National Championship Races, " Official PPG Indy Car World Series Annual 1984, Concord, North Carolina: Griggs Publishing Company, 1984.
• Dick Wallen, Editor, Board Track: Guts, Gold & Glory, Kutztown, Pennsylvania: Kutztown Publishing Company, 1990.