CrashingTheGoalie

by Ron Spence

I wrote the Shibe Stadium article, as a background for what happened to hockey stadiums later on.

People had leisure time, and money, and suddenly had a place to spend it. Things were getting bigger and better. It was a sign of the times.

While these stadiums were being built, cars were also increasing in size – both the body, frame and its engine.

And, as the cars became faster and faster, they had races to decide which company had the best widget.

There were getting to be so many races, however, that they decided to have just one really big race – the Indianapolis 500.

courtesy of marmon-herrington.com

Some 40 automobiles qualified for the first race in 1911.

The majority of the cars were two seaters. The driver was accompanied by a mechanic, who watched out for the competitors and checked the oil pressure.

Engineer/driver Roy Harroun, working for Nordyke & Marmon Company, helped to design a one seater. It would weigh less, there would be one less body travelling in it, and theoretically it should move faster.

But, who would spot the rival drivers?

That was when Harroun remembered seeing a horse-drawn buggy, that had used a mirror pointed towards its rear.

So, Halloran designed the first rear view mirror, for the Marmon “Wasp.”

courtesy of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway Hall of Fame Museum

The Indy wasn’t just a battle of the egos, however. It wasn’t just about who had the best toy.

It was big money as well. First price was for the Indy 500 was $14,250 – equivalent to about US$300,000 in today’s currency.

The Marmon might appear to be small, but it was large enough to qualify for the race: a minimum weight of 2,300 lb (1,043 kg), and a maximum engine size of 600 cubic inches (9.83 litres) displacement.

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The Marmon won the race at an average of 74.6 miles per hour (Ray Harroun was relieved by Cyrus Patschke for approximately 35 laps, at the halfway point of the race.).

There was some controversy, however. After a crash, some judges ran out to supervise, and another driver claimed to have lapped the Marmon, while they were changing a tire (Balloon tires had yet to be developed, and tires were thin strips of solid rubber, which could be cut and torn without totally destroying the tire, during a race.).

Of the forty cars that started the first Indy 500, 14 fell out. Riding mechanic Sam Dickson was the lone fatality, when his driver, Arthuer Greiner hit the wall on lap 12.

courtesy of the Automobile Quarterly - 1963

There is a certain irony about the first Indy.

At a time, when things were becoming larger – because bigger was better – it was a relatively smaller car that won the biggest race of all. And it was because of ingenuity. A man, and his company, were able to design a smaller and faster car, because of a new invention – the rear view mirror.