1895: The first U.S. race for gasoline-powered cars has to be postponed. The vehicles couldn't get to the starting line. Within the month, though, they're going to make some history.
Racing started out when cars started out. The legend is that the first car race happened the first time one horseless carriage met another on the road. That's a quaint story, but back in the late 19th century, car races were not run on circuits. They were "open road" affairs, run from one city to the other.
The first organized car race was the Paris-to-Rouen "reliability test" held only a year before the fine fellows at The Chicago Times-Herald came up with their idea to run a race from Chicago north to Milwaukee.
Unfortunately, the roads between the two Midwest metropolises were in terrible condition, so the route was shortened to Chicago to Evanston and back. It would cover only 54 miles.
The original field featured 83 entries in the race, but 76 of them never made it to the race. The high dropout rate seemed largely due to most of the cars not being finished in time for the contest. Organizers postponed the event for a week.
Even pre-race favorite Elwood Haynes had to drop out when his car was damaged en route and unable to compete.
If the new technology weren't already tricky enough, dealing with the local authorities was even worse. Before Haynes and a Mercedes Benz driver could even get into town, they were stopped by the cops. Their infraction? The police said that they had no right to drive their vehicles on the city streets and the competitors had to requisition horses to pull the cars.
Naturally the editors of the Times-Herald flipped out. They postponed the event again, until they could convince the city leaders to pass an ordinance allowing the newfangled vehicles to travel on the streets of Chicago.
By this time, the race had slipped to November 28, Thanksgiving Day, and the course was plagued by muddy roads and snowdrifts.
There were three Benzes in the final field, all of them three-wheelers. The only four-wheeled car to run was a "motorized wagon" from Charles Duryea.
Two electric-powered cars got to the starting line. One of them couldn't even start the race, and the other had to stop twice to replace the primitive batteries that were drained by the November weather. It turned back early, covering only 11 miles of the course.
The only other entries were two "motorcycles," but they lacked the power to climb one of the grades on the course, and had to drop out.
That left only the three Benzes and the Duryea. Not only was this the first car race in America, but it also featured the first auto-racing accident. Shortly after the start, depending on whom you believe, either two of the cars argued over the same piece of road, or one of them, a Benz, ran into a horse cart or was forced off the road by the horses.
Whatever caused it, one Benz was in a ditch and out of the race. Then another Benz dropped out.
It was a nip-and-tuck battle between the last Benz and the Duryea. The Duryea led at the start, but the Benz passed it going into Evanston.
The Duryea regained the lead on the return trip and crossed the finish line first. It took home the grand prize of $2,000 – more than $50,000 in today's money.
The event created significant publicity for automobiles, proving just how fast and how far they could go. The race was completed in just under eight hours, at a blistering average speed of 7 mph.
Photo: The Duryea motorized wagon was an early winner in the world of auto racing.
See Also:
- Nov. 2, 1947: Spruce Goose ... Or an Expensive Turkey?
- Sept. 14, 1904: Birth of the Craziest Road Race Ever
- Nov. 27, 1895: Nobel's Final Will Not Prized by Everyone
- Nov. 8, 1895: Roentgen Stumbles Upon the X-Ray
- Nov. 5, 1895: First U.S. Automaker Gets Off to Slow Start
- Oct. 5, 1895: Cycling's 'Race of Truth'
- Sept. 18, 1895: Is There a Chiropractor in the House?
- May 7, 1895: Calculator Learns to Multiply
- Jan. 29, 1895: Steinmetz Makes AC Practical
