A pair of races at the Oakland Speedway and the death of Fred J Wagner

Part Two

Ironically, the next race for the AAA Pacific Coast big cars after famed racing starter Fred J Wagner’s death reportedly from the injuries he sustained at Oakland on New Year's Day 1932 was scheduled for Sunday November 12, 1933 at the Oakland Speedway.  Besides Wagner’s death (actually from heart disease), the face of big car racing on the West Coast had changed dramatically since January 1 1932.

Bryan Saulpaugh, who had set multiple world’s records at Oakland Speedway on New Year’s Day 1932 before his car swerved out of control and struck the judge’s stand, perished in a practice accident at Oakland Speedway on April 22, 1933.


Saulpaugh was practicing when he lost control of Danny De Paolo’s ‘Red Lion Special.’  Witnesses reported that Saulpaugh’s car appeared to clip the outside guardrail as Bryan exited turn four then overturned three times with Saulpaugh crushed beneath the car during the accident. 

April 1933 was a particularly deadly month in West Coast big car racing, as in addition to Saulpaugh, on April 2 Class B racer Tom Forsyth died in an accident at Legion Ascot Speedway, and the 1932 AAA National Champion Bob Carey was killed in a practice crash at Legion Ascot just six days before Saulpaugh’s fatality.

‘Babe’ Stapp, the winner of the 1932 Oakland New Year’s Day race, on the comeback trail after he suffered critical injuries in an April 27 1932 crash at Legion Ascot and missed much of the 1932 racing season, crashed in the October 22 1933 ‘big car’ race at Oakland after a tire blew out and his car hit the inside railing and rolled over.

‘Babe’ was thrown out of the car and fractured his right leg. Although he was only confined to the Fairmount Hospital overnight, ‘Babe’ was again out of racing action for several months but returned in time to race in the 1934 Indianapolis 500-mile race.       

As the AAA Pacific Coast big car championship competitors arrived in Oakland for the 100-mile race on November 12, 1933 there were three men at the top contending for the championship - Ernie Triplett, Rex Mays and Al Gordon.


Ernie Triplett, the 1931 and 1932 Pacific Coast champion had started the 1933 season strong and in the early stages appeared to be headed for his third title in a row, but in the latter part of the 1933 season, Triplett’s usually reliable car suffered a succession of mechanical failures, which opened the door for a young up-and-coming racer from Riverside California named Rex Mays.

After several troubled early 1933 season outings after he graduated from the Class B ranks, the 20-year old Mays served notice that he was for real when he scored a third-place finish at Oakland on April 23. At the next race at Legion Ascot on May 1, Mays qualified well but fell out of the 100-mile feature on the race’s 23rd lap with a broken axle.  On lap 40 Mays took over for veteran Art Boyce in the Sparks & Weirick "Poison Lil"  after Boyce lost the feeling in his left arm after he was hit by a rock and pitted.   Mays rejoined the race in seventh place but stormed back through the field to win in a time of 48 minutes and 14 seconds for his first big car win.

Mays continued to score wins, and before the October 22 Oakland race, Mays led the AAA Pacific Coast championship over Triplett by six points. During that race, both Mays and Triplett dropped out - Mays’ machine with a broken crankshaft and Triplett’s car with carburetor trouble. 

Their retirements opened the door for third place points man Edgar “Al” Gordon to grab the win and make it a three-man race for the 1933 Pacific Coast title. By the time they returned to Oakland in November, Mays led Gordon by 39 markers and Triplett by 74 points. A win at Oakland would reward the winner with 83 ½ points while the second-place finisher would earn 41 points.

During Saturday’s practice session, 18-year-old Oakland resident Lowell Lamoureux presented Ernie Triplett with a hand-built pine scale model of Triplett’s red Miller-powered machine owned by Bill White.  

Al Gordon was the day’s fastest qualifier and he re-set the world’s one-mile dirt track record, as he circled the one-mile oval in 33.86 seconds, with an average speed of 106.32 miles per hour.  Also spicing up time trials were incidents that involved Mac McCulley whose car lost a right rear wheel, and Bob Valla who spun but did not hit anything and finished his run.


Time trials were followed by a series of five-mile Class B races, with wins scored by George “Swede” Smith and Jim Wilkerson. Louis Tomei won the 15-mile semi-main event over Art Boyce and Ray Gardner.

In the 100-mile feature, Cavino “Kelly” Petillo jumped into the lead from his outside front row starting position and led the first eight laps before Gordon steamed by into the lead.  Triplett then got past Petillo, whose machine retired on lap 66 and surrendered third place to another newcomer Harris Insinger who earlier in the week had been named the pilot of the De Paolo ‘Lion Head Special’ formerly driven by Saulpaugh, as a replacement for George Connors.

Al Gordon who lived in Long Beach clinched the 1933 AAA Pacific Coast Championship after he won the postponed 150-lap (92 mile) race at Legion Ascot on December 10 an event during which he re-set the track record at 25.71 seconds. Gordon won again at Legion Ascot the following week, then the final race of the 1933 season a 200-lap race scheduled for December 31, 1933 was postponed by rain for one week to January 7, 1934.

Waldo Stein the acting AAA Western Zone supervisor announced that the points from the rescheduled race would count towards the 1934 tally, but controversy quickly erupted. The decision was reversed, and in an odd situation, the points earned in the first race of 1934 were awarded for 1933.

After all the buildup, Al Gordon breezed to his eighth consecutive victory in the Art Sparks & Paul Weirick owned "Poison Lil" Gilmore Blue-Green Gasoline-sponsored #5 machine.  Despite running out of fuel on the last lap, Rex Mays coasted across the finish line in second place ahead of Kelly Petillo and thus claimed second place in the 1933 AAA Pacific Coast Championship over Ernie Triplett who finished the 200-lap grind in fourth place.  

On January 18, 1934 Ernie Triplett announced that he was retired from ‘big car’ racing events and would restrict his racing activities to Indianapolis and road “stock car” races.  However, early March found Triplett back in a ‘big car’ on the one-mile Imperial Speedway in El Centro California, and he died in an accident that involved "Swede” Smith and Al Gordon that also claimed the lives of Smith and a mechanic Cambern “Hap” Hafley.

Al Gordon would later figure into another accident that claimed the life of another of the racers mentioned in this article. On the third lap of the 50-mile Sunday September 8, 1935 AAA Pacific Coast ‘big car’ race, Gordon’s car hooked wheels with the machine driven by Harris Insinger. Insinger’s ‘Garant Special’ cartwheeled down the back straightaway and Harris just 26 years old, suffered a fatal skull fracture with Gordon cast as the villain in the accident in newspaper reports.     

Al Gordon himself would lose his life in an accident four months later during the January 1936 ‘Ascot 150’ the second AAA championship car race at Legion Ascot Speedway. The grinding crash of Bill White’s cream and blue “Cocktail Hour Cigarette Special” also claimed the life of the riding mechanic William “Spider” Matlock. 

The unfortunate pair of Gordon and Matlock were last two racers to lose their lives at the dangerous oiled-dirt 5/8-mile high-banked oval,  as the track closed days later which brought a particularly dangerous era of West Coast racing to a close.

Prior to the 1938 Indianapolis 500-mile race,  Pearl, the widow of William “Spider” Matlock,  married race driver Al Putnam who had been married previously with two sons. Tragically, Pearl was widowed a second time as a result of an auto racing crash on Sunday September 15 1946 as Putnam perished in qualifying crash at the 'Indianapolis 100' held at the Indiana State Fairgrounds.
        

   

   

A pair of races at the Oakland Speedway and the death of Fred J Wagner

Part One

In time trials for the twice-postponed scheduled 100-mile 1932 New Year’s Day race at Oakland Speedway, a new one-lap, one-mile qualifying world record was set by Bryan Saulpaugh in the Gilmore Lion #19 at 101.95 miles per hour (MPH). The Oakland Speedway, which opened in 1931  was a fast one-mile dirt oval actually closer to Hayward California, the site of which is now the Bayfair Mall.


Ernie Triplett, the defending American Automobile Association (AAA) Pacific Coast ‘big car’ champion grabbed the lead at the start of the feature and proceeded to set new AAA race records at the 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and 10-mile distances. Bryan Saulpaugh grabbed the lead from Triplett and set a new 25-mile race record at 94.163 MPH.

Back in the pack, Ralph Hepburn’s car crashed after the right front tire of his car blew out and the car plunged through the upper guardrail. Hepburn a former champion motorcycle racer who had finished third in the1931 Indianapolis ‘500’ was thrown from the machine in the accident and suffered a broken jaw and a broken kneecap.


Hepburn’s injuries kept him confined to the Hayward General Hospital through the end of March and sidelined him for the 1932 season.  

During the clean-up of the Ralph Hepburn accident it began to sprinkle rain,  but the AAA officials elected to let the race continue. As he neared the completion of his fiftieth lap, race leader Bryan Saulpaugh lost control of his DePaolo/Miller machine and in the crash, the struck and collapsed the judge’s stand.

Saulpaugh suffered serious injuries as his car veered into a guard rail and rolled over after it struck the judge’s stand. Saulpaugh was thrown from the cockpit and suffered a fractured skull and a dislocated shoulder.

Five AAA officials– referee Bert Dingley, assistant starters George Theobald and Les Manning, AAA zone supervisor Hal F Weller and starter Fred J. Wagner - were inside in the 14-foot high wooden stand when it collapsed onto the track surface. The two assistant starters were reported to have suffered “cuts and scratches” while the other three officials were said to only suffered a “mild shaking up.”  

     

Elbert ‘Babe’ Stapp miraculously steered his car through the wreckage of the judge’s stand to complete his 51^st lap and was declared the race winner. The car piloted by Stapp, formerly was driven by Francis Quinn who was killed by a drunk driver on December 13, 1931 in a highway accident just north of Fresno, California. Quinn nicknamed “the Bald Eagle” was on his way home to Southern California after the original Oakland Speedway race date was postponed due to rain. 

Hal Weller, an automotive advertising executive and a resident of nearby Berkeley, had been a member of the AAA Contest Board since 1924 served as the AAA Western zone supervisor and was on hand to oversee the day’s timing and scoring activities.   

Bert Dingley was a retired pioneer-era West Coast race car driver who drove in his first race in 1904 at the Del Monte race track near Monterey California. In 1909 Dingley drove for Chalmers-Detroit and scored two race wins and four top five finishes and for many years, the AAA recognized Dingley as the 1909 National Champion until the AAA Contest Board retroactively made revision to the standings in 1951. 

Bert’s promising racing career ended with an accident on July 4, 1914 as he fought for the lead on the penultimate lap of the 250-mile Montamarathon Trophy Race held on the 2-mile Pacific Coast Speedway dirt track in Tacoma Washington.

Initial news reports following the 1914 accident stated that Bert and his riding mechanic Edward “Swede” Swanson were “probably fatally injured.” They were thrown from their bright green Ono (a chain drive Fiat retrofitted with a Pope Toledo engine) after it ran into ditch and overturned. 

Dingley recovered from his severe injuries, which included a fractured skull, broken shoulder and a compound leg fracture but he never raced again. Dingley worked in the automotive industry and at the time of the 1932 New Year’s Day accident was a vice-president of the Stutz Motor Company and served as a referee at AAA races across the nation. 

The role of starter was an important one in those days before radio communications - the starter controlled the action on the course with knowledgeable assistant starters to help keep track of the action.  Assistant starter George Theobald was the flagman at the original San Jose Speedway while Les Manning, an Oakland police corporal, was the regular starter at Oakland Speedway.

Fred J. Wagner was born in Covington Kentucky in June 1869 and began his sporting career as a track and field star, then became a bicycle racer after which he served as a starter for bicycle races for a dozen years. Wagner claimed to have flagged his first automobile race in the fall of 1899 in Chicago Illinois.

Away from the track, Fred was a shrewd businessman with deep ties to the automotive industry and was at one time was the president of Horseless Age magazine.  He increased his notoriety by publishing his memoirs in serial fashion with the title “Roaming through Speed Mad Years” in the AAA’s American Motorist magazine. Wagner’s historical stories, while entertaining, contained many factual errors. 

“Wags,” as he was known in his younger years, then a resident of Long Island New York was the starter for all but the first of the Vanderbilt Cup races, at the time the most prestigious auto racing events in the United States. There is substantial evidence to support the contention that it was Wagner who pioneered the use of a black-and-white checkered flag to signal the end of an automobile race.

Wagner, served as the starter at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway beginning in 1909 and Fred started the first 1911 International 500-Mile Sweepstakes Race. Wagner’s reign as the starter at Indianapolis ended after the 1912 500-mile race when he and track president Carl Fisher got into an argument.

Their dispute was over whether to flag off the final car still running on the track long after the winner had taken the flag and fans had left. In the early days of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, to collect the prize money, a car and driver had to complete the full race distance.  

Hours after winner Joe Dawson had taken the checkered flag of victory, the Knox of Ralph Mulford continued to circulate around the 2-1/2-mile brick oval, and the sun began to set. Wagner was ready to flag Mulford off the track, but Fisher insisted that Mulford be allowed to finish.

After he lost the argument, Wagner stormed off and never served in any official capacity at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway again. Mulford eventually completed the 500-mile distance but it took nearly nine hours and he finished with an average speed of just 56 miles per hour which makes him the slowest finisher in Indianapolis 500-mile race history.   

As the years passed, Wagner became nationally famous as the pre-eminent starter of automobile races across the United States except of course at Indianapolis. In addition to working the flags at the races, Wagner also shepherded teams from race to race, oversaw track preparations, worked with the local race promoters to ensure a smooth event principally that the competitors got paid and that the AAA received its sanctioning fee.

By the nineteen twenties, as he entered his sixth decade, Wagner became known affectionately as “Pops.” Competitors admired and respected Wagner so much that prior to the 1925 season-ending ending AAA national championship race at the Culver City board track, Wagner was given the keys to a new 1926 Buick sedan, paid for through by a collection from nineteen of the country’s leading race drivers.

After the New Year’s Day 1932 Oakland race, the AAA Pacific Coast ‘big car’ racers moved on to the ½-mile dirt Bakersfield Speedway on January 3, 1932 for a 50-mile feature. The race, aired live on the National Broadcasting Company’s Orange (Pacific Coast) network in a broadcast sponsored by the Richfield Oil Company, was won by Ernie Triplett in Bill White’s car powered by a 151-cubic inch Miller Marine 4-cylinder engine with oval side draft intake ports. 


According to published Bakersfield news reports Fred Wagner served as the race’s starts assisted by Fresno pioneer-era race car driver turned car dealer Eddie Waterman as the referee.

The report about Wagner at Bakersfield seems curious in retrospect, as ten days later, his hometown newspaper described Wagner as recovering from the injuries received on New Year’s Day at his ranch in the orange groves of Covina California.


In early February, Wagner, 66 years old, was reported in critical condition in a Covina hospital from the injuries he had suffered in the New Year’s Day accident. A few days later, a follow-up article stated that doctors had been forced to relocate Fred to a sanitarium for privacy as he had been unable to rest due to the constant stream of visitors in the hospital.

Wagner had sufficiently recovered from his injuries in November 1932 and he returned to his roots as he acted as the starter of a six-day bicycle race held on the temporary velodrome built inside the Winter Garden ice skating rink in the heart of Hollywood.


In late December 1932, Wagner visited the Legion Ascot Speedway and watched the races from a private box.  During a break in the racing action, Wagner was escorted to the track surface where he presented several awards and addressed the crowd for few moments.

In April 1933, Wagner and his friend, former driver and car owner Frank Allen, hosted a dinner for Los Angeles area ‘big car’ drivers that included Louis Schneider, Bill Cummings, Howard “Howdy” Wilcox II, Bob Carey and Ernie Triplett and ‘big car’ owners Art Sparks and Clyde Jones.


The group met to discuss the recent cut of purses by the board that controlled Legion Ascot Speedway (remember the country was the depths of the Great Depression) and Wagner and Allen proposed to act as intermediaries to mediate the dispute which had seen the top drivers refuse to enter events at Legion Ascot.

During the Summer of 1933, Fred J. Wagner’s health took a turn for the worse and he was hospitalized again in Covina in late October 1933, where he passed away on November 5 reportedly at 67 years of age.


The injuries that Wagner suffered in Oakland on January 1 1932 were blamed in newspaper articles as the cause of his death.  Fred was survived by his wife Nancy also known as “Mother Wagner,” he was interred in the Forest Lawn Cemetery Mausoleum in Glendale California.

 A few years ago, fellow racing historian James Thurman researched the circumstances of Fred Wagner's death and found Wagner's official death certificate in the Los Angeles County Records office. The official causes of death listed included chronic myocarditis (inflammation of the heart muscle), chronic aortitis (inflammation of the aorta) and acute bronchitis. The former two conditions were noted as having existed for several years. Thurman's research refutes the period newspaper claims that Wagner died from complications from  the injuries he suffered at the race in Oakland. 

In 1938, five years after his death, Wagner’s memoirs, entitled The Saga of the Roaring Road, (the genesis of which had been published in American Motorist in 1926) were published in hardbound format by Meador Publishing, a small firm based in Boston.  Wagner’s racing stories combined with his memories of working in the early automotive industry written by author John M. Mitchell, were later revised and published in 1949 by Floyd Clymer in both hardbound and softbound editions.  

In 1952, Fred J. Wagner became one of the inaugural ten inductees in the AAA Auto Racing Hall of Fame (now known as the Indianapolis Motor Speedway Museum Hall of Fame) and was a member of the second class of inductees into the National Sprint Car Hall of Fame in 1991.

1930’s Muroc Record breakers

Part three

In our last chapter about the land speed record (LSR) attempts conducted on Muroc Dry Lake during the 1930’s we traced the early history of  the Clyde Adams built “Catfish” race car designed by renowned Stanford aeronautics professor Elliott Grey Reid. The car dropped off  the 1932 AAA (American Automobile Association) national  championship trail- why?  

After the July 2 race at Syracuse race where “Stubby” Stubblefield finished second,  the current Class C world speed record holding car was purchased from Art Sparks and Paul Weirick by the 1932 Indianapolis winner Fred Frame who used it on a nationwide barnstorming tour. According to author Gordon Eliot White, Sparks and Weirick used the $8500 proceeds from the sale to buy a pair of Miller 220 engines stroked to 247 cubic inches which they used in their successful AAA Pacific Southwest circuit ‘big car.’

The “Catfish” & Fred Frame

On Saturday October 29 1932, Frame and the “Catfish” appeared in a match race sanctioned by the AAA against the 1927 Indianapolis 500-mile race winner George Souders who returned to racing after three years.  Severely injured in a dirt track crash at Detroit July 1928 in which he suffered a compound skull fracture and broken bones in both arms, Souders retired as race driver the following February.

The first race on the 5/8-mile West Texas Fairgrounds in more than two years was promoted and officiated by local petroleum products trucking company owner D.H. Jefferies, who imported the 1925 Indianapolis winner Peter DePaolo to act as the official starter. The 75 laps of racing action was scheduled to be divided into three heats- the first heat distance of 30 laps, the second 25 laps, and the last heat 20 laps. 

The interesting twist in Abilene was that the “Catfish” was driven by Souders, not Frame who drove his Miller-powered Duesenberg with which he had finished second at the 1931 Indianapolis ‘500.’ Frame purchased the blue-painted Duesenberg from owner Harry Hartz after the 1931 season, entered it for Billy Winn at Indianapolis in 1932, and then drove the car himself for the balance of the 1932 AAA season. Sometime prior to its appearance at Abilene, Frame had replaced the original Duesenberg engine with a Miller power plant.  

The Frame cars arrived in the Abilene area early in the week and were placed on display. The “Catfish” was parked at Christian’s Super Service the local Firestone tire distributor, while Frame’s Miller-Duesenberg was on display in the showroom of the Fulwiler Motor Company, the local Ford dealer  On Wednesday October 26, as the “Catfish” was towed behind a truck to the race track it bumped the back of the truck which “dented its snout.”

With the damage quickly repaired, Souders practiced the “Catfish” extensively on Thursday while Frame took a local newspaper reporter, Harold L. “Prexy” Anderson, along as a passenger for a few fast laps around the 5/8-mile dirt track. After the run, “Prexy” a long-time Abilene fixture self-described as “one of the most widely read and quoted sports writers in the southwest” wrote that it had been his “first racing ride - and last” while Frame for his part, noted that he had been running “at a snail’s pace.”

The Abilene Morning News reporter noted that while the “Catfish” was super-streamlined which allowed it run faster on the long straightaways at Indianapolis, it had “no advantage on the Abilene short course.” On Friday morning after a few practice laps, Souders directed mechanics to install a lower rear end drive gear in preparation for the following day’s race.

The race program which began at 3 PM on Saturday was very well attended but turned out to be not very competitive. Souders in the “Catfish” which still carried its Gilmore sponsorship logos suffered a flat tire during the first 30-lap heat race and George finished two laps in arrears. Souders was more competitive in the remaining two heat races, but Frame swept all three heat races wins that day.  

Frame and Harry Hartz at Muroc in 1933

 

 

This photograph from the June 1934 issue of Popular Science magazine

show a crew readying the Union '76' Special at Muroc Dry Lake

In March 1933  the “Catfish” powered by a Miller 255 marine engine reappeared at Muroc Dry Lake prepared to set new records driven by Frame and Harry Hartz.  Leading up to the record runs in early March 1933, newspaper articles ran across the country with a photograph of Hartz seated in the “new ultra-streamlined car” which “resembles very much a prehistoric monster.” Sponsorship for the record attempt was provided by with Union ‘76’ gasoline.

The Union Oil Company founded in 1890 in Santa Paula California sold its products through independent and company owned service stations. Union introduced its ‘76’ grade of gasoline on January 2 1932 and on February 6 1932 filed a trademark application which was rejected by the examiner of trademarks. The reason given was that “the number `76' applied to gasoline would doubtless indicate to the purchaser the octane rating….or Baumé gravity (density).”

An affidavit filed by the company responded that “said numeral `76' was not affixed by said Union Oil Company of California to the gasoline to indicate its gravity or octane rating or any other grade, characteristic or quality of the gasoline, but merely as an arbitrary trademark." This dispute clearly outlines the confusion over Union’76’ gasoline, as even 85 years later, there remains the public perception that Union ‘76’ gasoline had a 76 octane rating.

Union newspaper advertisements were carefully worded but bragged of the gasoline’s performance advantages. For example an advertisement in the San Bernardino Sun published in September 1932 read in part “Union 76 gives extra performance - this fresh gasoline broke and still holds every American stock car speed record from 1 to 500 miles.” This is a reference to the records set in July 1932 by Eddie Miller and Earl Cooper in a pair of V-12 powered Auburns.   

The Union ‘76’ ad went on to state “under all motor operating temperatures on the road, new Union 76 Gasoline has the highest anti-knock or octane rating of any non-premium gasoline sold!  Qualities vary in different gasolines. You will find Union 76 with its superior qualities of quick starting, anti-knock and power gives you the economy of greater mileage and smoother performance.”

After numerous appeals and rejections in 1937 the tribunals of the Patent Office affirmed the decision of the Commissioner of Patents’ rejection of the registration. The decision stated that the “numerals ‘76’ are mis-descriptive of a grade or quality of oil and do not indicate origin. It appears that the mark "76" might be understood by the purchasing public to be a grade or quality mark so the appellant should not be given the right to use these numerals to the exclusion of all others engaged in the trade.”

Even today Unocal (Union’s predecessor) states that “in 1932, the company introduced a new high-octane gasoline with the brand name 76. The number 76 is no ordinary number but was incorporated to mark a token of respect to the Declaration of Independence of United States of America dated 1776.”

Harry Hartz, the 1926 AAA national champion had retired from racing after suffering severe injuries and burns in a 1927 crash on the Rockingham board track in Salem New Hampshire. Hartz became a car owner and won the 1930 Indianapolis ‘500’ in car he modified.  

The following year, defending champion Billy Arnold in Hartz’ car led the first 155 laps of the 1931 Indianapolis ‘500’ before he crashed out with a six-lap lead, and Hartz’ second car driven by Fred Frame finished second.  In the 1932 ‘500,’ Frame returned in a Hartz owned machine and won after he led the final 58 laps.

On March 9 Hartz set new International Association Internationale des Automobile Clubs Reconnus (AIACR) records for the “flying” one kilometer and one mile at 148.70 Miles per hour (MPH) and 151.10 MPH respectively. The following day Hartz set the new 10-mile Class C record of 146.71 MPH as he covered the distance in a scant four minutes and 5.39 seconds which broke John Godfrey Parry-Thomas’ record which had stood since 1926. 

On March 11, Hartz set the new five-kilometer standard at 145.93 MPH which broke Stubblefield’s record set in the same chassis by more 12 ½ miles per hour. Fred Frame then took the wheel for the five-mile run that same day and he broke Stubblefield’s nine-month old record by over fourteen miles per hour.

The following day Sunday March 12 1933 Frame set new International Class C standards for 50 kilometer and 50 mile distances from a standing start. Kaye Don had set the old records in 1929 on the high-banked Brooklands track in England, but on a circular course set up on the flat dry lake surface, Frame smashed the old records. Frame’s new 50-kilometer speed of 136.52 MPH broke Don’s record by nearly 13 MPH, while his 50-mile average speed of 139.64 MPH bettered Don’s record by over 15 MPH.

The “Catfish” after the Muroc Class C records

 

Johnny Seymour and Frank Hinkley celebrate qualifying

for the 1934 Indianapolis 500-mile race

Photo courtesy of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway

 

The Clyde Adams built “Catfish” did not appear at any AAA championship races in 1933, but it was entered by Fred Frame as the unsponsored “Streamline Miller” for the 1934 Indianapolis ‘500’ for driver Johnny Seymour.  Johnny, himself a former land speed record holder on an Indian motorcycle had four previous starts at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway all behind the wheel of front-wheel drive machines.  

Fred Frame entered three cars at the Speedway in 1934 - the “Catfish” with the Miller engine de-stroked to just 200 cubic inches of displacement, the old Miller-powered Duesenberg for rookie Rex Mays and the 1930 Indianapolis winning front wheel drive car purchased from Harry Hartz for Frame himself.  Seymour struggled through practice to find sufficient speed, while Mays comfortably qualified on the third day of time trials at 113.639 MPH.

On Monday May 28 the last day of qualifying disaster struck during Frame’s 10-lap qualifying run when a steering arm broke and the front wheel drive entry crashed into the wall and was damaged beyond immediate repair. Frame and his riding mechanic Aloysius ‘Al’ Theisen, a young dirt track racer were shaken but otherwise uninjured.

Frame watched from the pit area as Seymour posted a ten-lap qualifying average of 108.591 MPH to become the slowest car in the starting field. Seymour and his riding mechanic Frank Hinkley started the “Streamline Miller” last in the 33-car field but they were sidelined on lap 22 by either a burnt rod bearing or broken pinion gear 

Frame later sold the “Catfish” to Charles Worley around the time that its International 1-mile, 1-kilometer and five kilometer records were smashed by Rudolf Caraciola in a modified Mercedes W25 Grand Prix car. The record car funded not by an oil company but by the Nazi party, was fitted with a canopy over the driver and powered by a 205-cubic inch straight eight double overhead camshaft engine that developed a reported 430 horsepower. 

On October 28 1934 on five-kilometer stretch of specially constructed roadway known as “the Gyon record stretch” between Budapest and Kecskernet Hungary, Caraciola posted an astonishing two-way average speed of 197.35 MPH for the “flying kilometer” and 196.78 MPH for the “flying mile.” In an enormous jump in speed, both runs were nearly 50 miles per hour faster than Hartz’ records set just a year and half earlier  Caraciola afterwards compared the W25’s ride on the 18 feet 6 inch wide concrete to racing a limousine and the car forever become known as the “Rennlimousine"

 

 

The 1934 Mercedes W25 Rennlimousine

photo courtesy of Daimler AG

 

On December 10 1934 the “Rennlimousine” modified with a lower canopy, a wider windshield and a set of air intakes and outlets made its attempt at the five kilometer record at the AVUS (Automobil-Verkehrs und Übungsstraße) track in the Berlin suburbs which was composed of two six-mile long straightaways connected by tall banked brick curves. At the end of the day, Caraciola smashed Hartz’ record by 46 MPH and establish the new AIACR Class C five kilometer standard of 197.86 MPH

 

Frank McGurk and Karl Hattel pose before the 1936 Indianapolis 500 start

Photo courtesy of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway 

 

The “Catfish” returned to Indianapolis in 1936 powered by a Ford Model B engine with a ‘DO’ (double overhead camshaft) Cragar cylinder head conversion as the ‘Abel’s Auto Ford Special.’  Frank “Wildman” McGurk a Legion Ascot Speedway veteran but a rookie on the Indianapolis bricks was selected to pilot the car he also drove Worley’s ‘big car.’

Karl Hattel a talented 21 year old midget racer served as McGurk’s riding mechanic and the pair qualified the “Catfish” with a ten-lap average speed of 113.102 MPH on the busy second day of time trials to take their place as the 22nd starter. On Race Day, the number 52 “Catfish” was sidelined after 51 laps after the crankshaft broke in the Ford engine.

Before the 1937 Indianapolis ‘500’ ownership of the “Catfish” passed to another of the era’s multi-talented men, Frank Brisko who was a race driver, mechanic, engine and car builder. Brisko first raced on the Indianapolis 2-1/2 mile brick course in 1929 and had introduced his own engine design in 1936. Brisko fitted one of his own 271-cubic inch six-cylinder double overhead camshaft engines between the frame rails of the “Catfish” for rookie driver Dennis “Duke” Nalon. After “Duke” could not get the #21  “Elgin Piston Ring Special” up to speed, veteran Dave Evans, who first raced in the ‘500’ in 1925 gave it a try but fell short as the car could not complete its qualifying attempt.

Postscript

According to Gordon Eliot White, the “Catfish” was driven by Emil Andres in the 1938 Indianapolis 500-mile race but the car was unrecognizable as the “Catfish” as it had been re-bodied with a one-man body after the end of the AAA “junk formula” rules following the 1937 season.  The “Catfish” was gone but it had spawned some similarly styled machines; in 1938, Floyd “Pop” Dreyer built a Harley-Davidson powered midget race car that was a small-scale homage to the “Catfish.”  

Wilbur Shaw's winning "Pay Car" in 1937  

note the similarity to the "Catfish"

photo courtesy of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway

The most famous of the cars inspired by the aerodynamic “Catfish” was the Wilbur Shaw “Pay Car.”  Built by Myron Stevens who rode with Shaw in the car’s debut in the 1936 Indianapolis ‘500,’ the pair lost ten minutes during the race when the hood came loose and the “Gilmore Speedway Special” finished seventh.   The following year the “Pay Car” returned;  Shaw started second, led 131 laps and recorded his first of three “500’ victories.   

THE LIFE OF FRANK SUESS

Left click on the photographs to enlarge

Recently, while cataloging a group of old photographs recently purchased through an online auction site, the author found a reprint of a remarkable newspaper photograph of a 1932 crash that involved driver Frank Suess at the historic Legion Ascot Speedway. Before we discuss the circumstances of the photograph, we will profile the driver and his career. 

Frank Suess' yearbook photo from Santa Monica High School 

courtesy of the Santa Monica High School archives.

Frank L. Suess was born August 27 1910 and raised in Santa Monica California by his parents Frank J. and Ruby along with an older sister Helen and younger brother Gordon. Frank graduated from Santa Monica High School in 1928, and two years later, in 1930, his name first appeared in the press as one of the listed entries for the November 2 ‘Western Circuit Sweepstakes’ at Bakersfield Speedway. 

 

Bakersfield Speedway builder, owner, and promoter Paul J. C. Derkum, a former bicycle and motorcycle racer who raced in the first event held at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway in 1909, promised fans “the greatest aggregation of cars and drivers seen on a California dirt track in the last decade,” a promised Derkum could safely make because the race had been granted American Automobile Association (AAA) sanction number 2407, a first for the Bakersfield track. 

Frank Suess’ #36 ‘Santa Monica Special’ was one of 52 cars entered for the event, in which only the fastest 36 cars participated in a series of short 5-mile heat races to advance to the 25-lap feature race on the one-mile dirt track.  In qualifying, Francis Quinn established a “new world record for mile dirt tracks” with a lap of 39.41 seconds, then drove his “Dayton Thoroughbred Special” to victory in the 25-mile feature easily over Johnny Krieger and Chester ‘Chet’ Gardner.

Suess entered the inaugural race at the new Oakland Speedway on October 19 1931, as the driver of the #71 ‘PAL Special.’ Other notable entrants included Indianapolis 500-mile race veterans Billy Arnold, Ralph Hepburn, Louis Meyer, and Ernie Triplett. No records of Suess’ performance were found, but Triplett led all 100 laps over Hepburn and Meyer on a track surface that deteriorated throughout the event.

Francis Quinn in 1929 behind the wheel of the "Schmidt Special" 

photo from the Ed Reynolds collection owned by the author

Frank Suess and the ‘PAL Special’ were entered for the race at Oakland Speedway scheduled for December 13 1932 which was rained out. 1930 AAA Pacific Southwest champion Francis Quinn enroute to Oakland from Southern California, called ahead and after he learned that the race was rained out, turned around. North of Fresno, a suspected drunk driver crossed the centerline and hit Quinn’s Ford Model A head on; 28-year old Francis Quinn was killed instantly but his $4,000 Miller Marine powered “big car” was miraculously undamaged in the accident.

The rescheduled Oakland race was rained out for the second time on December 27, and eventually was run on New Year’s Day 1932. It is unclear whether Frank Suess was in Oakland that day as the newspaper report listed only the first seven finishers in the accident-shortened race won by Elbert “Babe” Stapp.

Two days later on Sunday January 3 1932, Frank Suess was in action at the ‘Western Circuit Sweepstakes’ held at Derkum’s Bakersfield Speedway. Suess and the ‘PAL Special’ finished fourth in the third of three five-mile heat races, while Ernie Triplett in Bill White’s new four-cylinder 16-valve Miller Marine- powered car won his heat race and the 50-mile feature over Stapp.

A Ted Wilson photograph oF Frank Suess behind the wheel of the PAL Special.
Photograph  from John R. Lucero's book Legion Ascot Speedway 

Frank Suess and the ‘PAL Special ‘began to record better finishes as the 1931 AAA Pacific Southwest season progressed, with a third place finish in the 10-lap consolation race at the 5/8-mile oiled dirt Legion Ascot Speedway on February 28, and a second place finish in the 5-mile consolation race at the Oakland Speedway on March 6.

A week later, on March 13 1932, Suess qualified for the 100-lap feature at Legion Ascot Speedway, but during the course of the race, Suess’ car fell off the pace and Frank hugged the bottom groove of the track as he entered turn three. As Nick Martino sped past, Martino, who was dueling for position, misjudged the distance, and the ‘Stricker Special’ clipped the right front wheel of Suess’ machine and flipped end over end, but Martino escaped unscathed. 

During the 1932 racing season, Legion Ascot Speedway began to stage regular ‘Class B’ events to help develop the skills of the younger, less experienced drivers who drove lesser quality equipment. Besides Suess, Class B drivers included Ted Horn, Chris Vest and George Connor.

Frank Suess cheats death in 1932

photo from the Ed Reynolds Collection owned by the author

Late in the season, Frank Suess was involved in the accident for which he became nationally famous, but a mystery which surrounds the photograph is the date of the crash. The photograph ran in many newspapers across the country between November 1932 and February 1933, without the exact date ever noted. Most of the newspapers titled the photograph with the headline As Death Rushed by Speed Demon, or He Lived to Laugh About It with a caption that stated “Frank Suess probably wouldn’t have given a thin dime for his chances, nor would anyone else who witnessed the crash.”  

The captions generally provided a few details about the crash - Frank’s #40 ‘S & S Special’ lost a wheel as he entered turn three at Legion Ascot during a 5-lap heat race. The edge of the airborne wheel can be seen in above photograph in the upper right corner.  In the original full-frame photograph, the entire wheel was visible, a detail which was lost when this copy was made by amateur photographer Ed Reynolds.  

Just after the photograph above was taken, Frank fell onto the oiled dirt surface and slid 50 feet across the track in the face of oncoming race traffic. Remarkably unhurt, Frank Suess was according to the caption “back in the infield pit area within moments trying to find another car to race.”

The final tally of the point standings for the 20-race 1932 AAA Pacific Southwest circuit listed Frank Suess in the 25^th positon behind Howard “Howdy” Wilcox, William “Bryan” Saulpaugh, and William “Shorty” Cantlon. While Frank raced most of the circuit, those successful Eastern AAA drivers left the West Coast after the early season races at Legion Ascot Speedway to race back East, including at Indianapolis,  and did not return to the West Coast.    

For the 1933 AAA season, Frank Suess moved into better equipment, the #25 ‘Stewar Special’, which featured a drawing of a foaming mug of beer on the cowling. Suess was entered for the March 25 races at Oakland, the second AAA race of the season at the track, which was rained out and rescheduled for April 23.

Before the rescheduled Oakland race could be held, two tragedies befell the West Coast racing fraternity. Bob Carey was killed in a crash at Legion Ascot Speedway while practicing for the ‘Easter Sweepstakes’ on April 16 after the throttle of Joe Marks’ ‘Lion Head Special’ (formerly owned by Louis Meyer) jammed open. On April 22, Bryan Saulpaugh died in a practice accident at the Oakland Speedway after his car overturned and the 28-year old driver was killed after he was thrown out onto the racing surface.       

On April 23, disaster struck again during the 15-lap consolation race which was run after the 150-mile feature race which was won by Chet Gardner. Race leader Chris Vest’s car was apparently touched by the trailing machine of Portland Oregon’s “Swede” Smith (real name George Smyth). Vest lost control and the machine turned right, rocketed up the banking, hit the guardrail, and rolled three times.  

Smith, apparently unnerved by the accident, slowed and was passed by Al Richardson and Suess.  The wreckage caught fire and Vest suffered burns on his chest, a fractured skull and lost four fingers on his left hand, but recovered from his injuries and returned to racing before the end of the 1933 season.

At Legion Ascot Speedway, on May 1, Frank Suess finished in the sixth positon in a remarkable 100-lap feature.  Rex Mays’ original mount was forced out on the 23^rd lap with a broken axle, then on lap 40 he took over for Art Boyce when Boyce lost all feeling in his left arm after he was hit by a rock and pitted.   Mays rejoined the race in seventh place but stormed back through the field to win in a time of 48 minutes and 14 seconds. Suess, in sixth place, trailed Mays, Gardner, former motorcycle racer Johnny Krieger, future 14-time Indy 500 starter George Connor and Seattle’s Eugene “Woody” Woodford to the checkered flag.  

Frank Suess and the AAA Pacific Southwest division ‘big car’ drivers were in action on Sunday June 11 1933 at the new Silvergate Speedway built on the marshlands near the San Diego River. The 5/8-mile dirt track which opened on May 7 1933 was planned as the third major California track along with Legion Ascot and Oakland. This track built by a group of businessman led by Lee Conti was known as “Neil’s Sportsman Park.” 

The 50-lap Silvergate feature was won by George Connor in a time of 26 minutes and 45 seconds. A local newspaper reported the Ted Horn, Frank Suess and ‘Swede’ Smith all failed to finish the main event due to what the paper termed “minor mishaps.”      

The following Wednesday evening, June 14, the same cars and drivers were back in action on the oiled 5/8-mile surface at Legion Ascot Speedway when tragedy struck during the 15-lap ‘Class B’ race. As Ted Horn entered turn one, his car spun into the path of Frank Suess in the ‘Stewar Special.’ Unable to either spin or slow the ‘Stewar Special’ hit Horn’s machine and in turn was struck by the following car, #39 driven by “Frenchie” LaHorgue from Van Nuys California. 

The life and prior career of the third driver in the incident, “Frenchie” LaHorgue is a mystery; even his given name is unknown. All we know of LaHorgue prior to the crash is that in February 1933 he won a 50-lap ‘big car’ race at Neil’s Sportsman Park.

The Ted Wilson photograph of the remains of the Stewar Special 

from the Bruce R. Craig Collection  

courtesy of the Revs Institute of Automotive Research Inc.  

The cars of Suess and LaHorgue slid up and over the banking, tumbled and came to rest resting on their sides against a perimeter wire fence, with the engine torn from the ‘Stewar Special.’  Both drivers were quickly transported to White Memorial Hospital less than three miles away. LaHorgue recovered from injuries, but Frank L. Suess, just 22 years old, died at the hospital in the early morning hours of the following day, June 15, and was later laid to rest by his family in the Woodlawn Cemetery in his hometown of Santa Monica.  

Frank Suess was the thirteenth driver to lose his life in the short history of Legion Ascot Speedway, a track that claimed twenty-four lives before it closed in January 1936.   Just how deadly racing was on the oiled 5/8-mile Legion Ascot racing surface can be shown statistically. In 1933 alone, Legion Ascot Speedway saw six driver deaths, which accounted for nearly 20% of the 32 United States race driver deaths recorded that year.  

While Legion Ascot Speedway was deadly, it also served as a fertile training ground, as many Legion Ascot drivers who raced with Frank Suess including Wilbur Shaw, Rex Mays, Ernie Triplett, George Connor, and Chet Gardner went on to race at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway.