Tag: studebaker

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A Christmas Road Race in Tropico

This intriguing headline appeared in the December 22, 1914, issue of the Pomona Daily Review. The “Tropico Speed Contest” was an amateur road race held on Christmas morning in Tropico, California, and it took place on a two-mile course with many sharp turns, including a hairpin turn at “San Fernando Road and the Pacific Electric Tracks.” In the days leading up to the affair, the drivers hyped it by promising a thrilling performance and declaring that they were “out for blood.”

The main event was a free-for-all with a $100 purse, and a drawing was held to determine numbers and places. The distance was 20 laps, or 40 miles, and this list of cars and drivers was printed in the Los Angeles Evening Express, albeit with a number of typos.

There was also a 30-mile motorcycle race, and a 20-mile race for lightweight cycle cars. The entrants for the cycle car race were as follows:

This photo of Les Rawson, driver of the #17 Christie, being supervised by one Lucille King was also published, but with no explanation as to the identity of Miss King.

There were two additional exhibition races that were referred to as “freak” races. The first of these was a race between two rival jitney bus drivers to settle the question of superiority once and for all. The following comic strip by Gale at the L. A. Times, titled “Mr. T. Wad Certainly Opened Up His Jitney Bus at Tropico!” was published the day before the race.

The other was a race for automobiles considered “antediluvian,” or ancient. One entrant in that race, 73-year-old Tom Morris, declared that he would be taking the turns “wide open.” The Los Angeles Times noted that “wide open” meant fifteen miles per hour provided the racer showed an unexpected burst of speed. Here is a photo of Morris with his automobile, a 1901 Peerless.

Women were not allowed to drive in the race, but some women did enter their cars with a “brother, sweetheart, or friend” driving. Those women were Adele Martin, Helen Holmes, and Jeanne Warden, and it was reported that both Martin and Warden were personally tuning and stripping their cars as well as plotting strategy for the course. One article referred to Holmes as an actress, and there was an actress by that name born in 1893 according to IMDB.

The winner of the cycle car race was H. Lindley in a Mercedes, but the winner of the main event was a druggist named Waldo Throop. Throop had been a sprinter at USC and was among the fastest in the country in 1910, running the 100 in 9.8 seconds. At Tropico, he won the purse and bragging rights in a Ford with a time of 50:15 4-5. R. Dorney drove a Studebaker to second place 40 seconds later, and third place went to G. Pulliam in Helen Holme’s Studebaker, just 21 seconds behind Dorney. There was some controversy as that third-place finish was protested by A. Austria who claimed his Knox was leading Pulliam’s Studebaker at the checkered flag. Also, the driver in the headline at the top of this story, Earl Pitts, claimed he passed 22 of the 24 machines and should have placed.

Waldo Throop is pictured below, the man on the right, and then again in his winning Ford:

This photo is of Helen Holmes in the third-place Studebaker:

There was one crash involving a Buick, but no serious injuries, so the race was a success all the way around. The second annual Tropico race was held on Thanksgiving Day the following year, but a third was not to be. There was no report of why the race was discontinued, but there was a war going on, and then Tropico ceased to exist a few years later when it consolidated with Glendale in 1918. Whatever the reason, it was likely a great disappointment to the thousands of spectators that spent that Christmas Day in 1914 taking in the excitement of the speed, rivalries, and hairpin turns at the Tropico races.

Merry Christmas!

1925 Detroit Motor News Cover

Sources:

“Bill Throop Had Merely a Rebuilt Ford but Ran Like Sin and a Victory Scored.” Ventura Weekly Post and Democrat, 1 January 1915, p. 1.

“Nineteen-Year-Old Boy Does ‘100’ in 8 4-5 Seconds.” Passaic Daily News, 5 October 1910, p. 4.

“Old Car Enters Tropico Race.” Los Angeles Times, 22 December 1914, p. 25.

“Pomona Driver Says Tropico Auto Race Was Unjustly Judged.” 26 December 1914, p. 1.

“Pomona Driver Will Enter Christmas Race.” Pomona Daily Review, 22 December 1914, p. 9.

“Races Again at Tropico.” Pomona Daily Review, 9 November 1915, p. 2.

“Tropico Has Gone Speed Crazy.” Los Angeles Times, 24 December 1914, p. 24.

“Tropico is Busy for Speed Event.” Los Angeles Evening Express, 23 December 1914, p. 4.

“Tropico Ready for Auto Race Set for Tomorrow.” Los Angeles Evening Express, 24 December 1914, p. 3.

“Tropico Road Race Success.” Los Angeles Times, 26 December 1914, p. 6.

“Waldo Throop Wins Tropico Road Race.” San Francisco Examiner, 26 December 1914, p. 14.

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A Rare Radiator Cap

Over the last several weeks, we traveled the highways and byways in search of car parts on the Highway 36 Treasure Hunt, the Nebraska Junk Jaunt, and the Highway 136 Trail of Treasures. We found many amazing parts, some of which will be featured here in the coming weeks, but this radiator cap is my favorite find of all:

The seller of this cap did not know what it was, and other shoppers guessed “Rolls Royce” due to the winged “R”. It does not, in fact, belong to a Rolls.

This ornate cap was originally found on a Rockne, manufactured by Rockne Motors Corporation, a Studebaker subsidiary, and named for legendary Notre Dame football coach Knute Rockne after his tragic death. The coach was enroute to Los Angeles when the airplane he was in burst into flames and crashed near Bazaar, Kansas, on March 31, 1931, just days after being named manager of the Studebaker sales promotion department. The coach and the car manufacturer were a natural pairing as Studebaker and Notre Dame were both institutions of South Bend, and Rockne had been traveling the country giving “pep” talks to Studebaker salesmen. One newspaper article said that he was employed by Studebaker to boost sales “through his knowledge of psychology and ability to lead men.”

Studebaker created the new Rockne as a memorial to the late coach, and it was launched in December of 1931. The first one manufactured was presented to Mrs. Knute Rockne, the widow of the coach. At the unveiling, Studebaker president Albert Erskine said, “It seems to be highly fitting that the finest qualities of Knute Rockne, the man, should be so brilliantly reflected and recalled by as fine an automobile as the Rockne Six will be. It is a source of great pride to us and to his family that this new automobile will honor his name and perpetuate his memory.”

The 1932 Rockne was available in two lines, the “65” and the “75,” with prices starting at $585 and $685.

It was a great-looking car, and reasonably priced, but in 1932 it had to compete with the new Ford V8 which was available at even lower prices:

For 1933, the Rockne Six was offered in the Model 10. It is shown as a sedan with suicide doors in the top photo below, and you can just make out the radiator cap:

When Studebaker’s Paul G. Hoffman introduced the 1933 models to a group of Studebaker salesmen and dealers at a Boston meeting in December of 1932, he was quoted as saying, “Our challenge to depression – there they are!”

Unfortunately, the Depression won this one. In Stephen Longstreet’s history of Studebaker, A Century on Wheels, he put it this way: “The Rockne Six was well engineered, well built. It was also low-priced. But even that price was too much for a nation selling apples at street corners.” Although sales were not bad for a brand-new automobile, Studebaker was facing serious financial problems, and the Rockne was not produced after 1933.

Coach Rockne’s personal car was a Studebaker President Eight Victoria. It was reported in September of 1931 that one of Rockne’s former players, John Edward “Jack” Chevigny, had purchased this car from the coach’s widow. Chevigny is the Notre Dame player that made the famous “That’s one for the Gipper” touchdown in Notre Dame’s game against Army on November 10, 1928. Chevigny was also a United States Marine Corps officer, and, tragically, he was killed in action on the first day of the Battle of Iwo Jima.

Sources:

Advertisement. Ford. The Kansas City Star, 31 Mar. 1932, p. 15.

Advertisement. Rockne Six. Argus Leader [Sioux Falls], 30 Dec. 1932, p. 10.

Advertisement. Rockne Six. The Atlanta Journal, 8 Jan. 1933, p. 15.

“Coach Rockne Killed When Plane Crashes.” The Lafayette Sun, 1 Apr. 1931, p. 1.

“Depression Is Challenged Now.” The Boston Globe, 7 Dec. 1932, p. 30.

“First Rockne Auto Is Given to His Widow.” Battle Creek Moon Journal, 23 Dec. 1931, p. 9.

Fraley, Oscar. “Johnny Has Gone to Join the Gipper and the Rock.” The News and Observer [Raleigh, NC], 28 Mar. 1945, p. 9.

“Jack Chevigny Dies on Iwo Jima.” Buffalo Courier Express, 25 Mar 1945, p. 18.

Longstreet, Stephen. A Century on Wheels: The Story of Studebaker, A History, 1852-1952, New York, Henry Holt and Company, 1952.

“Loud Explosion and Spurting Flames in Murky Sky Heralded Disaster Which Claimed Life of Rockne and 7 Others.” Daily American Republic [Poplar Bluff, MO], 31 Mar. 1931, p. 1.

“New Rockne Six Expected To Be 1932 Sensation.” The Fresno Bee, 2 Dec. 1931, p. 12.

“New Studebaker, Rockne Shown.” The Atlanta Journal, 8 Jan. 1933, p. 15.

“Rockne Accepts Studebaker Job.” The South Bend Tribune, 24 Mar. 1931, p. 5.

“Rockne Joins Studebaker.” Press of Atlantic City, 25 Mar. 1931, p. 12.

“Rockne’s Life.” Los Angeles Evening Post Record, 31 Mar. 1931, p. 1.

“Studebaker Announces New ‘Memorial’ Car.” Kansas City Journal, 1 Dec. 1931, p. 10.

“Studebaker Rockne Six Makes Debut.” The Herald Palladium [St. Joseph, MI], 1 Dec. 1931, p. 11.

Whitaker, John. “Speculating In Sports.” The Times [Hammond, IN], 4 Sept. 1931, p. 22.

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The Year the American Auto Industry First Hit One Million in Inventory

The American auto industry hit the million mark in inventory for the first time in 1960. This story about the new record appeared in March of that year:

Although this article tries to paint a rosy picture, the country was on the precipice of a recession caused in part by industrial overexpansion to meet post-war demand. Another reason for the high inventories in the auto industry was the record output of compact cars which were surging in popularity. During the first week of March, it was reported that the six compact cars accounted for 25.1 percent of the total output for the week. In addition to the AMC Rambler and the Studebaker Lark, the Big Three were offering the Ford Falcon, the Mercury Comet, the Plymouth Valiant, and the Chevrolet Corvair. Chevrolet was outpacing everyone in terms of both production and sales.

Automobile inventories have been in the news regularly for the past few years, due mainly to the lack thereof. It was downright spooky to drive by the empty dealership lots, barren wastelands caused, at least in part, by production cuts during the pandemic and global microchip shortages. The Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis recently published this visual depiction of the fluctuation in domestic auto inventories since 1994.

Domestic Auto Inventories (AUINSA) | FRED | St. Louis Fed (stlouisfed.org) U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis, Domestic Auto Inventories [AUINSA], retrieved from FRED, Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis; https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/AUINSA, June 17, 2024.

As you can see from the chart, inventories have started to rebound from the depths plummeted to in February of 2022. Even so, those unpleasant sky-high prices do not appear to be coming down anytime soon.

For comparison purposes, you could buy a new Chevy Biscayne in 1960 for around $2,300. For a couple hundred dollars more, you could get yourself a new Bel Air two-door hardtop Sport Coupe.

That is roughly equivalent in purchasing power to $26,000 today. There are still some new car options under $30,000 in 2024, but none will give you the same thrill you would get from cruising around in that ’60 Sport Coupe. Let’s hope improving production numbers and rising inventories translate into lower prices and better access for today’s buyers, but even if inventories return to that million mark, buyers will never again have access to the fine and diverse automobiles available the first time it happened:

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A Dictator on Ice

So many fun, and occasionally dangerous, advertising gimmicks were utilized in the early years of the automobile industry. This innovative approach from Blue Sunoco Fuel and Studebaker appeared in December of 1933 and featured an ice-covered Studebaker Dictator:

Here in Nebraska, it is not unusual for an automobile to look like an iceberg on wheels when left outside during wintry conditions, but this Studebaker was a brand-new car, driven right off the production line and into the plant’s refrigeration room. There, with Blue Sunoco fuel in the tank and Sunoco motor oil in the crankcase, the car was loaded down with huge cakes of ice. Then the temperature of the room was brought down to 20 degrees below zero and a wind machine, blowing at a rate of 50 mph, sprayed water on the ice-covered car. In this frigid state, the car was left to sit for almost 48 hours.

During the above process, one window of the car was left open. This enabled one Miss Eloise Metz of South Bend, wearing layers of warm clothing, to be placed through the open window along with heating pads and hot coffee. Once she was ensconced in the ice-laden car, that window was sealed tightly with ice. Then the car was towed to the business center of South Bend where a large crowd and several timekeepers had gathered. Miss Metz was told to start that frozen car, and start it did, taking only three-fifths of a second to do so.

That seems like a fairly effective marketing technique. One has to question the approach of christening the car with the distinctly un-American name of “Dictator” in the first place, however. I have heard it said that the term “Dictator” was chosen because it meant that the car was dictating the standard for the industry, but then why were the other cars in the Studebaker stable called the President and the Commander? Also, check out the caption under this 1934 photo:

That relaxed attitude toward authoritarianism did not last long with Stalin, Mussolini, and Hitler operating nefariously on the international stage, and people soon realized the Studebaker wasn’t the only dictator that should be put on ice. The Dictator name did not age well, and the Studebaker company quietly retired it a couple of years later.

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Another Mystery Car Part (Hint: It Is Not Made by Mercedes)

Do you recognize this emblem?

This three-point star measures three and one-half inches in width and, although it bears a strong resemblance, it is not a Mercedes emblem. A helpful seller recently listed this full set of six, complete with original packaging and part number, on eBay.

These stars were an accessory “star ornamentation” sold by Ford in the 1950s. The back side of the packaging contains the following installation instructions:

Studebaker made a similar tri-star emblem in 1953, although the Studebaker version is considerably larger at around 9″ in width.

I don’t how many Ford owners would be comfortable drilling a total of twelve holes in the fenders of their car just to add these stars, but that may be why I have never seen any actually mounted on an automobile. If you have one, send me a photo at americancarhistorian@gmail.com.

Nebraska State Patrol’s 1950 Ford
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The “Big Three” and “Little Three” Car Companies of 1954

I found this blurb in a 1954 newspaper:

If you’ve been watching the automobile news, you know that there are now only six passenger car manufacturers in the U.S. – the “big three” and the “little three.”

So, can you name the six surviving car companies of 1954?

The Big Three are easy to identify:

Ford

General Motors

1954 Chevy Corvette

1954 Chevy Bel Air

Chrysler

Recalling the Little Three is more problematic as there was a lot going on in the way of mergers and acquisitions. In no particular order, they are:

Studebaker-Packard – Detroit’s Packard Motor Car Company bought Indiana-based Studebaker in 1954 and became Studebaker-Packard.

1954 Studebaker Station Wagon

1954 Packard Clipper Super Touring Sedan

Kaiser-Willys – Kaiser-Frazer had started up after WWII, riding high on the post-war boom. The company struggled in the early 1950s after a series of missteps, and the Frazer name was dropped. In 1953, Kaiser purchased Willys-Overland and, in 1954, the companies merged into Willys Motors, Inc.

1954 Kaiser Darrin

1954 Kaiser

1954 Willys M38A1

American Motors – AMC was formed in 1954 when the Nash-Kelvinator Corporation merged with Hudson.

1954 Hudson Hornet with Twin H-Power

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The Liberty Lens, Manufactured by the Macbeth-Evans Glass Company

It never ceases to amaze me how many glass headlight lenses have managed to survive the rough-and-tumble of the last one hundred years or so. We purchased a large box of such lenses the other day, and two of them were marked “Liberty Lens” with patent dates of 1914 and 1920.

They were manufactured by Macbeth-Evans, a glass company that formed in 1899 when three separate companies combined. That move gave the new entity control of the five largest “lamp chimney” factories in the United States. Like all manufacturers, Macbeth-Evans had to adjust with the changing times, and that included the manufacturing of lenses for automobiles.

States were enacting laws in the teens and twenties regarding headlight glare and acceptable lenses, and Macbeth-Evans wasn’t afraid to use fear of law enforcement as a marketing tool. The advertisement below declares, “State Highway patrols will accost all motorists whose lights do not comply with the new law. Everybody violating the new law will be subject to arrest, a $25 fine, or 5 days’ imprisonment.”

The Liberty lenses were flat with “seven horizontal and six vertical prisms” that controlled and distributed the light, free from glare.

These lenses were available for any motorist to purchase, but, according to these advertisements, they also came as standard equipment on some makes. This ad from 1923 specifically mentions Studebaker:

This advertisement from 1920 enumerates the many different makes that utilized Liberty lenses as standard equipment, including Packard and Nash, so you might keep an eye out for a pair if you own one of the automobiles on this list:

1918 Case Six with a Liberty Lens on the passenger side. This car is located at Pioneer Village in Minden, Nebraska.
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Central Auto Electric Building in Kearney, Nebraska

I was driving past the Central Auto Electric building in Kearney the other day and just had to stop and snap a photo of this ’62 Chevy sitting out front and completing a striking tableau:

This building is just about my favorite in all of Kearney and, thankfully, it remains unmolested with ugly “updates”. It was built in 1946 by Bierman’s Auto Electric, and they moved into this building, their new location, the following year. The business handled GM parts, and this incredible double-sided United Motors Service sign still hangs out front.

Bierman’s didn’t just service GM products per this 1945 advertisement with an emphasis on Studebaker:

Bierman’s advertised their shop as the place to take your car if you wanted “action in your battery, pep in your plugs and power in your engine.” Who doesn’t want those things?

1941 Buick

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WW2 Studebaker Ads

During World War II, Studebaker hired a well-known illustrator and advertising artist by the name of Robert Oliver Skemp to illustrate some advertisements featuring Studebaker employees and their children who were serving in the American armed forces. You may have seen these before as they were very well done and there are still many copies floating around.

This one spotlighted what the ad referred to as “lieutenant, corporal and craftsman,” with the craftsman being Studebaker employee Tom Hinkle who built Cyclone engines for the Boeing Flying Fortress . His son, George, was an air force lieutenant stationed in India and another son, Bill, was a Coast Artillery Corporal stationed in the Fijis.

This advertisement starred Studebaker employee Joe Balaban, who was also wrenching on the Cyclone engines, and his son, Seabee Mike Balaban.

This ad campaign was based on actual people and not just the imagination of some copywriter. In 1944, the Tipton Daily Tribune published a story letting the people of Tipton know that this ad featuring local heroes, the Hinkles, was scheduled to appear in the inside front cover of the June issue of Life Magazine. It noted that Tom had been with Studebaker for 23 years and that both sons had also worked for the company before joining the service. In 1945, the South Bend Tribune likewise included an article on the Balabans. Joe was a 26-year veteran of Studebaker and also had two other children in the service. A daughter, Mary, was a WAVE parachute rigger first class and another son, Eli, was a chief shipfitter in the navy. Because of this ad, a publication of the 99th battalion called Mike Balaban one of the most publicized seabees in the world.

This was a great advertising campaign featuring real people, beautiful artwork and Studbaker’s contribution to the war effort. In addition to the Cyclone engines, Studebaker also built military trucks and and the M-29/M29C Weasel, a tracked personnel and supply carrier like this one at the Heartland Museum of Military Vehicles in Lexington, Nebraska:

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Old Studebaker Dealership

We spotted this old brick dealership building in Red Cloud, Nebraska, a town known for being the home of author Willa Cather as well as the inspiration for some of her novels.

The sign is amazing. It is sun bleached and difficult to read, but the vertical letters spell “Studebaker” while the horizontal letters spell “Killough Motor Co.”

I searched old newspapers in order to date this sign. The only reference I was able to find to this particular dealership, Killough Motors, was at the bottom of this 1940 advertisement:

And yes, that’s a Chevy, not a Studebaker, sitting in the front window, but what a great place to park and display your vintage cars!