'Doc’ Williams and the Indianapolis '500'

Part one - his early life and first attempts

An early photo of Doc Williams and his riding mechanic 

Location and photographer unknown

Author's Collection

We will continue our theme of persistence as we review the career of race car driver 'Doc' Williams who competed at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway thirteen times between the years of 1933 and 1949 but only made the starting field four times, all in the same front -rive machine that Earl Cooper built in 1927.

Merrill Henry ‘Doc’ Williams was born on October 26 1912 near Franklin Indiana, a small community in in south central Indiana. “Doc,” whose childhood nickname grew out of the profession of his father, Walter Williams a veterinarian, graduated from Clark Township High School in 1930 according to an interview given by his son Johannes published in the June 7 1994 edition of the Franklin Daily Journal.

‘Doc’ Williams had a meteoric rise through the racing ranks, with “great success on the dirt tracks in Indiana, Ohio, Illinois and California” at least according the May 2 1936 issue of the Franklin Evening Star newspaper although the author has found no results to corroborate these claims. At the young age of 20, ‘Doc’ attempted to qualify for his first Indianapolis 500-mile race in 1933 as the driver of the ‘C.O. Warnock Special,’ the first Ford ‘flathead’ V-8 powered machine to attempt to qualify for an Indianapolis race.

Clarence O. Warnock claimed that he built racing cars for Ray Harroun before he joined the Ford Motor Company as a traveling supervisor of service in 1914.  Warnock opened the Barber-Warnock Ford agency in partnership with Hale Barber In 1917, which meant that the agency located at 819 East Washington Street was the oldest Ford dealer in Indianapolis.

The dealership had previous racing history at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway as in 1923 they entered the “Barber-Warnock Ford Special” a race car built by the three Chevrolet brothers. The tiny machine was  powered by an engine that featured a Frontenac SR (special racing)  head on a 122- cubic inch four-cylinder Model T block fed by two carburetors.   

L.L. Corum in 1923 Ford

Photo courtesy of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway Collection

IUPUI University Library Center for Digital Studies

Hoosier native Lora ‘L.L’ Corum, a long-time associate of the Chevrolet brothers, started the Barber-Warnock Model T racer in the ‘500’ from seventh starting position after posting a qualifying time of 86.65 miles per hour (MPH) during time trials.  Corum and the Barber-Warnock Model T finished the 11th annual International 500-mile Sweepstakes on Decoration Day in fifth place just 34 minutes behind Tommy Milton’s winning HCS-Miller and averaged 82.58 MPH over the 200 laps.

A Frontenac SR head and exhaust

The Barber-Warnock team expanded to three Model T racers built by the Chevrolet brothers for the 1924 Indianapolis ‘500’ with Fords claimed to be 75% stock except for Frontenac cylinder heads with racing intake and exhaust manifolds. The team’s drivers were three dirt track veterans - Indianapolis native Bill Hunt, Michigan’s Fred Harder, and Dr. Alfred E. Moss, a British student at the Indiana Dental College and the father of the great Grand Prix driver Stirling Moss.

All three of the team cars qualified for the 1924 ‘500’ starting field in 19th, 20th, and 22nd and last position, and all three ‘Barber-Warnock Ford Specials’ were still running when they were flagged at the finish. Bill Hunt finished in 14th place, nine laps in arrears, followed by Moss and Harder in 16th and 17th place, both 23 laps behind the race winner started by last year’s Barber-Warnock driver, L.L. Corum but relieved by Joe Boyer on lap 112.

The Barber-Warnock Ford agency business partnership was dissolved in 1925, and the dealership continued as C.O. Warnock Ford. The 1930 Indianapolis 500-mile race had ushered in the era of the “Junk Formula” rules package pushed through the American Automobile Association (AAA) Contest Board by Indianapolis Motor Speedway owner Eddie Rickenbacker. The new rules package was designed to encourage more participation by automobile manufacturers to compete with stripped down passenger cars which Rickenbacker believed would lead to larger starting fields and more paying spectators.  

'Doc' Williams after his 1933 qualifying run

Photo courtesy of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway Collection

IUPUI University Library Center for Digital Studies

The 1933 ‘C.O. Warnock Special,’ was a typical example of a “Junk Formula” machine,  a stripped-down 1932 Ford V-8 with a stock chassis and running gear, riding on knock-off wire wheels fitted with Firestone Balloons tires and a racing body finished in plain white. The car was prepared for the race by Robert Roof, the renowned designer and builder of multiple-valve cylinder heads for the Model T Ford engine, with engineering assistance from Don Sullivan, a Ford engineer that had helped develop the flathead V-8.   The engine of ‘C.O. Warnock Special’ was stock except for a pair of Detroit Lubricator model 51 carburetors atop a hand built manifold and a racing exhaust.

 ‘Doc’ and riding mechanic Milton Totten posted an average speed for their ten-lap time trial run of 104.538 MPH on Tuesday May 28th, but ultimately that speed was 45th fastest with the field capped at 42 starters.   Although he failed to qualify the flathead Ford, during the month ‘Doc’ had generated extra cash through the sale of autographed copies of photographs of himself and his car. For $5 more, buyers of the photograph would get his or her name actually painted on the body of the car, according to the 1994 Franklin Daily Journal interview with his son.

The restored 1933 'Doc' Williams Ford on display at a car show

Given the level of the clandestine Ford factory support for the racing debut for the Ford ‘flathead’ V-8 engine, the failure of ‘Doc’ Williams to qualify for the 1933 ‘500’ starting field was a disappointment. The race car was later sold (or given) to Williams who also became a Ford Motor Company employee. Ford returned to the Speedway in subsequent years with much stronger quasi-factory supplier entered entries - in 1934 with the Bohn Brass & Aluminum Company and 1935 with Lew Welch before the disastrous 1936 full-blown Ford factory effort with Harry Miller.

1933 sponsor Clarence Warnock died on Monday December 13 1943 of a heart attack in his home at 4324 Park Avenue in the Oliver Johnson’s Woods area on the city’s near north side.  Just 57 years old, Mr. Warnock had returned just weeks before from a trip to Mexico, as he was an authority on Mexican archeology, with a large collection Mexican pottery and archeological relics.  The C.O. Warnock Ford dealership was purchased by the C. T. Foxworthy Company in February 1944, and continued to operate as Foxworthy Ford at the East Washington Street location until the building was demolished during the nineteen seventies to make way for Interstate 70. 

Over the winter of 1933-1934, the Williams flathead Ford V-8 racer was rebuilt at the Baker Motor Service Company the Franklin Indiana Ford dealership, and ‘Doc’ Williams entered it for the 1934 Indianapolis ‘500’ with sponsorship from Lloyd H. Diehl’s Detroit Gasket and Manufacturing Company. Before practice opened at the Speedway, Williams accepted an offer to drive the #36 ‘Highway Truck Parts Special’ an Earl Cooper built front-drive machine owned by the Goldberg brothers.

Now that he had another ride, Williams signed  Charles Crawford to drive his 221 cubic inch flathead Ford powered racer, but then for reasons that are unknown more than eighty years later, Williams’ ‘500’ entry in the Cooper front-drive was rejected and ‘Doc” wound up a spectator for the 1934 ‘500.’  Two other drivers, Harold Shaw and Orville Smith were also rejected; could this have been for competing in “outlaw”(as the AAA deemed anything but AAA sanction) races or some other reason?

Charles Crawford, the 35-year old rookie driver from Nashville Tennessee qualified the ‘Detroit Gasket Special’ for the race with a qualifying average speed of 109 MPH with Milton Totten again the riding mechanic, but the month was not without problems. During practice a steering knuckle snapped as the car went through the north end of the track and the car hit the wall. The driver and riding mechanic were only slightly injured and the car was repaired in time to qualify for the race.

Crawford started the 1934 ‘500’ from 28th starting position and was forced into the pits for one hour and sixteen minutes when another steering knuckle broke.  Without spare parts, but unwilling to give up, the pit crew stole a steering knuckle off a Ford Model A parked in the infield. They reinstalled the knuckle on the race car and Crawford returned to the race until his 110th lap when the flathead engine’s head gasket failed on ‘Detroit Gasket Special.’

Having the flathead Ford eliminated by a blown gasket was ironic since the Detroit Gasket Company was the lead supplier of their patented "Steelbestos" steel-reinforced asbestos head gasket for the Ford four-cylinder Model B production engine.  Crawford was scored in thirteenth position, and Crawford and Williams split the $860 purse. Crawford unsuccessfully attempted to qualify for the ‘500’ in 1938 and 1947.

‘Doc’ Williams was back in the AAA Contest Board’s good graces for the 1935 running of the Indianapolis ‘500,’ entered to drive his car with sponsorship from Detroit Michigan car dealer Harry Henderson  with the rebuilt flathead V-8 engine now fitted with four carburetors.  During a practice run on May 25 1935, Williams’ Ford V-8 racer suddenly hit the outside wall, then out of control smacked the inside wall and ‘Doc’ was thrown out of his #64 car.

Williams miraculously avoided the same deadly fate that had befallen Wilburn “Stubby” Stubblefield, Leo Whittaker, and Johnny Hannon earlier in the month and escaped with a broken ankle. From his hospital bed, Williams reportedly sold the wreckage of his race car which had all four wheels torn off for $100 according to the May 2 1936 issue of the Franklin Evening Star.

‘Doc’ Williams returned for his third attempt at Indianapolis glory in 1936 assigned to drive the ‘Superior Trailer Special,’ a Miller-powered front drive car originally built in 1927 by Earl Cooper. Before we continue with the ‘Doc’ Williams story, we’ll share the history of the Cooper front drive cars from 1927 through 1935.

The Racing Associates team in 1961

The Racing Associates team in 1961

The Racing Associates team in 1961

"Rocky" Philipp stands behind #86 in dark paints 

with Herb Porter to the right of Philipp

Author's Collection

This faded photograph taken 55 years ago, shows the Racing Associates team for the 1961 Indianapolis 500-mile race posed behind the paddock grandstand. The photo commemorated the team placing all three cars into the starting field. The drivers from left to right are Roger McCluskey, Ebb Rose, and Paul Goldsmith. 

The author was fortunate enough to have one of the surviving team members, Paul Goldsmith, autograph the photo at the 2016 Bench Racing Weekend banquet. 

Left to right Ms. Musetta Yeager, Paul Goldsmith and the author

The Racing Associates team was originally formed in 1955 by three men:  Indianapolis attorney Arthur B. "Art" Lathrop, Nelson G. Johnson an Indianapolis businessman, and D. Coleman Glover from Moline Illinois. Through the years, the team compiled an impressive record with drivers that included Bob Sweikert, Johnny Thomson, and Jim Hurtubise. 

After the 1960 United States Auto Club (USAC) season, the trio of Lathrup, Johnson and Glover sold the Racing Associates operation to Jesse E. "Ebb" Rose from Houston Texas, and team’s mechanics, Hubert “Herb” Porter and Robert "Rocky" Philipp came along in the deal.   

Roger McCluskey's official 1961 IMS photograph

courtesy of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway Collection 

IUPUI University Library Center for Digital Studies 

Roger McCluskey

Roger McCluskey’s 1961 ‘500’ mount was the red and black #22 “Racing Associates Special” Moore “laydown” chassis so called because the 270-cubic inch 4-cylinder Offenhauser racing engine was laid nearly flat on its side just 17 degrees from horizontal.  

Chief Mechanic Denny Moore built the roadster in the John Zink Racing Tulsa Oklahoma shop and it debuted in the 1959 ‘500,’ formally entered by Ellen McKinney Zink, team owner Jack Zink’s wife at that time. California midget standout Bob “Traction” Veith finished the 1959 ‘500’ in twelfth place. The Moore-built Zink roadster was entered for rookie Ebb Rose in the 1960 ‘500’ after Rose alleged received it in trade from Tulsa’s John Zink in exchange for some property according to author Joe Scalzo.

Roger was a 30-year Indianapolis rookie who had driven in six USAC championship races during the 1960 season, first in Arthur Koopman’s Lesovsky dirt car, and then behind the wheel of Phoenix plumbing supplier Harlan Fike’s Offenhauser-powered Kuzma dirt car.  McCluskey born in San Antonio Texas but raised in Tucson Arizona was a long-time racing veteran who began racing locally in 1948 at the Gilpin Sports Stadium and the Tucson rodeo grounds in a jalopy he had built with Hank Arnold. Besides the love of cars, both men shared several other things in common; both wound up in Tucson after their families moved there because of their mothers’ health and both men were accomplished welders and car builders. 

By 1950, Roger became a regular winner in jalopies, and before long he moved into California Roadster Association (CRA) roadsters which soon morphed into sprint cars. His success with the CRA led to racing sprint cars with USAC ‘back east” then onto USAC championship racing. Just days after he was officially entered for the 1961 ‘500,’ Roger won his first USAC feature on April 23 at Williams Grove Pennsylvania driving for Elmer George. On April 30 McCluskey finished second to AJ Foyt in the 30-lap USAC sprint car feature on the high-banked half-mile at Salem Indiana after Parnelli Jones was black flagged for an oil leak on lap 23. 

McCluskey started the 1961 ‘500’ from 29th position after qualifying with an average of 145.038 miles per hour (MPH) for his ten-lap run. Roger started so far back in the field because he qualified on Saturday May 20, the third day of time trials with 24 cars already qualified for the starting field. Roger quickly passed his 135 MPH rookie test during the first week of practice but then the team struggled to get the car to break above a 144 MPH lap speed.

 

According to a May 19 1961 article in the Tucson Daily Citizen, the Offenhauser engine in Roger’s car ran backwards, and had blown up twice in practice, which had caused minor wall contact once. Roger was quoted in the Citizen article prior to the second weekend of time trials that the reverse running engine caused odd vibrations in the car but that the crew was addressing that issue with new shock absorbers.

As shocking as it might seem to modern race drivers, but many of the stars from the Indianapolis Motor Speedway were in action on May 28 at the inaugural race at the 5/8-mile dirt track at Indianapolis Raceway Park in nearby Clermont Indiana. The entry list included five drivers that had failed to qualify for the ‘500’ and three drivers schedule to start the ‘500;’ AJ Foyt, AJ Shepherd, and Roger McCluskey.

After he recorded the quick time during time trials at 27.57 seconds, Roger flipped Mari Hulman George’s “H-O-W Special” (Mari Hulman-George Ober-Roger Wolcott) sprint car in his heat race but escaped with only bruises.  Two days later during the ‘500,’ Roger was involved in one of the most spectacular chain-reaction crashes in Indianapolis Motor Speedway history. 

The accident on McCluskey’s 52nd lap began when Don Davis crashed his “Dart-Kart by Rupp Special” Trevis-Offenhauser on the brick main straightaway and the car came to a stop in the middle of the track. Apparently dazed from the crash, Davis crawled out and walked towards the pit dividing wall. A.J. Shepherd in the “Travelon Trailer Special” crashed to avoid hitting Davis, and then Roger McCluskey and Bill Cheesbourg in the Dean Van Lines Special” came onto the scene, their cars collided and both hit the pit dividing wall.

The author's copy of the press photograph that showed the lap 51 carnage

Lloyd Ruby swerved towards the outside of the track to avoid the carnage and Jack Turner ran over the right rear wheel of Ruby’s “Autolite Special.” Turner’s “Bardahl Special” flipped end-over-end down the main straightaway, as Johnny Boyd and Dick Rathmann miraculously avoided Turner’s flipping car.  When the dust finally settled, all the cars except Ruby’s were eliminated and McCluskey finished his first ‘500’ in 27th position.

The 1961 race marked the first of eighteen Indianapolis 500-mile races for Roger, and when he led in 1962, he became the 100th man to lead the Indianapolis ’500.’  During his career, Roger captured the USAC national sprint car championship twice, in 1963 and 1966, was the 1969 and 1970 USAC stock car champion, and won the 1973 USAC national driving championship, the year that Roger recorded his best Indianapolis ‘500’ finish of third place.  

Roger was a versatile driver, as he also raced in the 1967 Sports Car Club of America (SCCA) Canadian-American Challenge Cup (Can-Am series), the 1966 and 1967 24 hours of LeMans as part of the Ford team, and the inaugural International Race of Champions (IROC) series in 1974. Roger retired from driving in 1979 and went to work for USAC as its competition director and later became the club’s Chief Operating Officer until he passed away in 1993, just five days after his 63rd birthday.

Ebb Rose's official 1961 IMS photograph 

courtesy of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway Collection 

IUPUI University Library Center for Digital Studies 

Ebb Rose

In the center of the photograph is Ebb Rose seated in his pink and black #86 “Meyer Speedway Special” a Porter “laydown” chassis. Rose born in Huntsville Texas on February 27 1925 was the son of the founder of JH Rose Trucking Company.  Fascinated by fast cars, Ebb owned and raced midget race cars and stock cars at Houston area tracks that included Playland Park and Joseph F. Meyer Speedway.

In addition, Ebb also provided race cars for Lloyd Ruby and others. Midget driver Cecil Elliott, the assistant manager at JH Rose trucking, died at the 1/5-mile Dallas Fair Park Speedway on the Texas State Fairgrounds while driving Ebb’s midget on November 10 1957, shortly before that track closed forever to make way for a new livestock coliseum.

Rose also owned a fleet of sports cars: English built AC Ace, the second of three Chevrolet Corvette SR-2 racers which he later sold to John Mecom, and a pair of Maserati sports cars - a 300A and a 450S, and a Kurtis Kraft 5ooS sports car which he raced nationally as the “Micro Lube Special.” Despite a lack of previous championship racing experience, Ebb was allowed to enter the 1960 Indianapolis ‘500’ based on his three years sports car racing experience mainly in the Southeast. After he failed to qualify for the 1960 ‘500,’ Ebb appeared at four other USAC championship races during the 1960 season also without success.

Rose’s 1961 ‘500’ the Porter laydown was essentially a copy of the Racing Associates Ludwig “Lujie” Lesvosky-built laydown which had qualified for the 1959 ‘500’ pole position. Porter and Phillip, the Racing Associates mechanics built the new car over the winter of 1960-1961 after Ebb Rose had purchased the team.

When Racing Associates was first formed by the triumvirate of Lathrop, Johnson and Glover, the team’s initial chief mechanic was Danny Quella, who was later replaced by Roy Sherman. Herb Porter had come to work for Racing Associates after the end of the 1959 USAC season after eight years of running the Roger Wolcott racing team. 

Wolcott’s history of race car ownership stretched back to 1949 when he was a partner in Indianapolis Race Cars Inc. the group which purchased the assets of the Boyle Racing Team after Harry ‘Cotton” Hennings’ death. During the years, Wolcott employed drivers that included Ed Elisian, Jim McWithey, Len Sutton, and Rodger Ward.

Team owner Roger Gould Wolcott an Indianapolis investment broker was found dead on November 1 1958 after the deputies that responded to citizen calls found Wolcott’s Mercedes Benz sedan rammed into a light pole adjacent to the entrance to Marion College on Cold Springs Road in Indianapolis. Although Wolcott’s throat was found badly cut, the Marion County Coroner ruled Wolcott died from a coronary occlusion, and that the cut occurred postmortem. 

The coroner surmised that Wolcott sensed trouble, and leaned across the interior get his bottle of nitroglycerin pills out of the glove box when he was fatally stricken and that the glove box door cut Wolcott’s throat as he was thrown forward after the car’s impact with the pole.  For the 1959 USAC season, Wolcott’s cars were entered by Porter and raced under the banner of the “Roger G. Wolcott Memorial Racing Team.”

Bob “Rocky” Philipp who lived in Culver City California also worked for Racing Associates when it was still owned by Lathrop, Johnson and Glover. “Rocky” notably worked with driver George Amick on apple orchard owner Norm Demler’s team in 1958  but was fired by Demler after the  1958 ‘500’ after the owner was angry that his car finished second 27.65 seconds behind Jimmy Bryan’s similar laydown machine.

In 1959, “Rocky” worked on the new shocking pink colored Racing Associates Lesovsky laydown that Johnny Thomson qualified for the pole position for the Indianapolis ‘500,’ and finished in third position after running much of the last half of the race of three cylinders. Philipp was credited with the creation of the first in-car drinking system for the 1959 ‘500’  by rigging a rubber hot water bottle next to Thomson’s knee which by pressing against the bottle, fed water up to Thomson’s mouth through a tube.

Team owner and rookie driver Ebb Rose qualified for his first USAC race, the 1961 ‘500’ from the 19th starting position after he posted a four-lap qualifying average of 144.338 MPH as the last car to make a run on the first day of time trials. The “Meyer Speedway Special” had an undistinguished run in the 1961 ‘500’ as it retired from running in 13th place when a connecting rod in the Offenhauser engine broke on lap 93 and Ebb Rose was scored as the 23rd place finisher. 

For the 1962 ‘500,’ Ebb Rose drove the same Porter laydown chassis dubbed the “Rose Truck Line Special” to the final race distance to a fourteenth place finish which earned him membership into the Champion Spark Plug 100 MPH club. Don Davis drove the Lesovsky laydown to a fourth place finish only 48 seconds behind winner Rodger Ward.

In the 1963 ‘500,’ the Porter chassis with Sheraton-Thompson sponsorship was driven by Bob Veith but the car retired early with an engine problem. Ebb Rose meantime had purchased a new Watson chassis for the 1963 ‘500’ which shockingly failed to qualify. Rose then jumped into AJ Foyt’s backup “Sheraton-Thompson Special” Watson chassis and bumped his way into the field and finished the ‘500’ in fourteenth place.

The 1963 ‘500’ unfortunately proved to be Rose’s last 500-mile race at Indianapolis.  Absent from the Speedway in 1964, Ebb’s Watson roadster was qualified by Johnny Rutherford and raced as the “Bardahl Special.”  Rose crashed the 1964 “Rocky" Phillip built rear-engine car in practice during May 1965, while Rutherford made the field in the team’s Halibrand–Ford and Bobby Grim missed the field in the Racing Associates Watson roadster. 

Rose was entered for the 1966 Indianapolis ‘500’ but never appeared before USAC officials. Meanwhile the Racing Associates Watson roadster painted “Fontana Rose,” a 1963 Cadillac factory color and now powered by a turbocharged Offenhauser made the starting field driven by Bobby Grim. Considered the last roadster to start the Indianapolis 500-mile race it was eliminated in the pile-up on the main straightaway and never completed a lap.

Ebb Rose returned to the Indianapolis Motor Speedway in 1967 in the gold with black trimmed Mallard “roadster” built by Jim Hurtubise but crashed in practice in his final appearance as a driver at the Speedway and the final hurrah for Rose’s Racing Associates team at the Speedway.  Ebb Rose died in Houston Texas on August 27 2007.  

Paul Goldsmith's official 1959 IMS photograph

 courtesy of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway Collection 

IUPUI University Library Center for Digital Studies 

Paul Goldsmith

The driver in the car at the far right  of the photograph is 35-year old Paul Goldsmith ready for his fourth Indianapolis ‘500’ behind the wheel of the #10 black and gold “Racing Associates Special” Offenhauser-powered Lesvosky laydown roadster. Goldsmith’s first career was as a successful American Motorcycle Association (AMA) Grand National motorcycle racer during the late 1940s through the mid-1950s as he scored five career AMA national wins.

His first AMA national victory came in 1952 aboard a Harley-Davidson at the Milwaukee Mile but his most famous victory came at the 1953 Daytona 200 held on the original beach course.  By the time Paul won his final AMA event at Schererville, Indiana on August 7 1955 he had started his stock car racing career, and in 1956, he became a full-time Chevrolet NASCAR (National Association of Stock Car Racing) racer teamed with car owner and mechanic Henry “Smokey” Yunick.

Goldsmith won his first NASCAR race at Langhorne Pennsylvania on September 23 1956 after he led 182 of the 300 laps. Paul notched four NASCAR victories in 1957 and in the final Daytona 500 stock car race held on the beach course in 1958 he started from the pole in Yunick’s “Best Damn Garage” 1958 Pontiac and led all 39 of the 4-mile laps on his way to victory, five years after his Daytona motorcycle win.  

1958 also marked Goldsmith’s first appearance in the Indianapolis 500-mile race as he drove Yunick’s “City of Daytona Beach Special” Kurtis Kraft 500G2.  Unfortunately, after he qualified sixteenth, Goldsmith in the black and gold #31 roadster was swept up in the massive accident in the third turn of the first lap of the race.  Jerry Unser ran over the back of Goldsmith’s car which launched Unser’s “McKay Bulldog” over the outer retaining wall and Paul finished in 30th place.  Goldsmith became the first and perhaps only man to compete in the Daytona Beach motorcycle race, the Daytona Beach stock car race and the Indianapolis ‘500.’

Goldsmith returned to the Indianapolis Motor Speedway for the 1959 and 1960 500-mile races behind the wheel of Norm Demler’s Quinn Epperly-built laydown roadster and scored fifth and third place finishes respectively. In 1961 driving for Ebb Rose, Goldsmith qualified at 144.741 MPH and started from 17th position the best starting spot of the Racing Associates team in 1961. Paul’s #10 car was eliminated from the 1961 ‘500’ with the same failure as Ebb Rose’s car, a broken connecting rod on lap 160 and he placed fourteenth only because of the high level of attrition, as only twelve cars finished. 

Beginning in 1960, Goldsmith directed his efforts towards USAC stock car racing with car owner and mechanic Ray Nichels and was the 1960 points runner-up before he captured the USAC stock car championship in 1961 and 1962.  Goldsmith and Nichels still ran the occasional NASCAR race, and it was Goldsmith’s appearance in the November 3 1963 NASCAR race on the Riverside International Raceway road course led to Goldsmith becoming famous or infamous depending on one’s point of view.

NASCAR and USAC had a long-running feud that dated to the formation of NASCAR and NASCAR’s sanctioning of sprint, midget and championship racing events during the early 1950’s. In May 1954 the dispute reached the boiling point when Indianapolis Motor Speedway guards escorted NASCAR founder “Big Bill” France off the Speedway grounds. “We have a long-standing disagreement with NASCAR on what constitutes good racing,” explained Harry McQuinn, the AAA chief steward.

The USAC and NASCAR organizations briefly called a truce in 1961 after a group of drivers, headed by Curtis Turner and Glenn “Fireball” Roberts, met with the Teamsters union organizers. According to an article published in National Speed Sport News in August 1961 the drivers met to explore the formation of a “union of all professional drivers cutting across NASCAR, USAC, IMCA and other boundaries.” Of note in the article was the attendance at the Chicago area meeting by “several Indianapolis race drivers including Don Branson and Paul Goldsmith.”

The war escalated in 1962 when USAC refused to allow USAC drivers to compete in the 1962 Daytona ‘500.’ USAC had granted Goldsmith a special exemption in 1961 but refused to do so in 1962 despite the fact that the Daytona 500 was sanctioned by the Federation Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA) international sanctioning organization. 

Goldsmith took the refusal personally, telling reporters “the Daytona 500 is FIA approved….I see no reason why USAC should not allow us to run. I can’t understand why USAC doesn’t get up to date. They are living in the past.” Rodger Ward the two-time Indianapolis ‘500’ champion told the same reporter that “USAC should amend our rules to allow all of our drivers to drive in FIA recognized races regardless of the sanctioning body. Our organization must grow with the times.”

USAC had a 1963 season agreement with NASCAR and the SCCA (Sports Car Club of America) so USAC drivers were free to compete in NASCAR races for most of the season.   The night before the November 3 1963 NASCAR race at Riverside, USAC issued a warning to its drivers that there would be consequences if they appeared in the 148-lap race, as USAC claimed the agreement had expired at the beginning on November. Drivers Dan Gurney, who had qualified on the pole in the Wood Brothers Ford, AJ Foyt, Parnelli Jones, Rodger Ward and Roger Penske all heeded the USAC warning and withdrew from the event.

Goldsmith did not withdraw from the “Golden State 400,” as he believed he was protected by his FIA international license. On November 5 1963,   Goldsmith was proved wrong as he was suspended by USAC for a period of one year for competing in a race that was not USAC sanctioned and all the points that he has accumulated during 1963 were suspended.

This was not an unprecedented action by an open-wheel sanctioning body, as drivers received lengthy suspensions from the American Automobile Association (AAA) Contest Board for driving in unsanctioned (non-AAA) races. For example 1949 Indianapolis ‘500’ winner Willard “Bill” Holland was suspended for a year after driving in  3-lap Lion’s Charity two-car match race at a Florida dirt track in November 1950.  Holland’s AAA suspension was extended another year after he publicly challenged the AAA and competed in several other “outlaw” races while he was under AAA suspension during 1951.

In early 1964 Goldsmith filed a lawsuit against the United States Auto Club, USAC chairman Thomas Binford and USAC Competition Director Henry Banks for $75000. Goldsmith’s suit also asked for issuance an injunction against the USAC ban that would allow him to compete in the May 3 USAC Stock car “Yankee 300” at Indianapolis Raceway Park and the Indianapolis ‘500.’  

On May 7 1964 Judge Henry Stickler denied Goldsmith’s request for an injunction and dismissed portions of the suit against Binford and Banks but left alive the suit against the USAC organization. Thwarted by the legal system, Goldsmith pressed forward with his fight through international racing politics through his FIA membership.  Later in May 1964 the head of Automobile Competition Committee for the United States (ACCUS) Charles Moran (a onetime Indianapolis driver)  stated that ACCUS, as the United States representative of the FIA would not permit any foreign drivers to compete in the 1965 Indianapolis ‘500’ unless Goldsmith was reinstated.

In June 1964 there was a contentious meeting of ACCUS members. Tom Binford not only the USAC chairman but also a member of the group of 15 businessmen that owned the Indianapolis Raceway Park (IRP) wanted ACCUS to recommend that the 1965 US Grand Prix be held on the IRP road course instead of at Watkins Glen in upstate New York. The other members of the ACCUS which included NASCAR, the SCCA and the National Hot Rod Association (NHRA) would not agree until Goldsmith was reinstated by USAC. USAC refused and the US Grand Prix remained at Watkins Glen for 1965.   

Goldsmith continued to race in NASCAR events during 1964, and based on precedence, USAC could have extended the suspension which ran out on November 5 1964 around the same time that Goldsmith’s appeal of Judge Stickler’s ruling was denied. It took time, but the eight-man board of USAC directors finally caved into the international political pressure and Goldsmith was reinstated with full competition privileges by USAC on March 23 1965.

Goldsmith returned to USAC stock car action on May 2 and finished second at IRP in the “Yankee 300” driving Ray Nichels’ Plymouth. Goldsmith was entered for the 1965 Indianapolis ‘500’ as the driver of the new Halibrand “Shrike” chassis owned by first-time ‘500’ entrants Jack Adams, Jack Walls, and Robert Carr with sponsorship from Jack Adams’ Aircraft Sales Corporation.

Paul practiced in the Shrike but encountered problems with the durability of the car’s odd “short stroke” 240-cubic inch Offenhauser engine and never got comfortable in the rear engine machine. The Halibrand chassis which like all eight built in 1965 used 67 individual castings, at least 50 of which were magnesium was formally withdrawn on May 22 and subsequently sold as a roller to Dan Gurney’s All American Racers for use as a back-up car.

The day before the 1965 Indianapolis ‘500,’ Goldsmith started from the pole and led all 150 laps of the USAC stock car race held on the IRP road course. During the course of the 1965 USAC stock car season, Paul won three more races and again wound up the series runner-up. 

Thereafter, Goldsmith concentrated on NASCAR Grand National competition with only an occasional USAC stock car appearance until he retired from driving during the 1969 season. Goldsmith, 90, a longtime pilot, owns and operates a small regional airport, the Griffith-Merrillville Airport south of Chicago will be inducted into the Indianapolis Motor Speedway Hall of Fame on May 26. 

Persistence - the Rudolph Wehr story 

part two 

Throughout the long history of American automobile racing, few men have personified persistence as did Rudolph K. B. Wehr. The previous chapter dealt with Wehr’s efforts through 1932;  this chapter will pick up with his entries for the 1934 Indianapolis 500 and carry through his last Indianapolis attempt in 1940.   

1934 Indianapolis 500 

Sometime after the running of the 1933 Indianapolis ‘500’ Wehr purchased the two quasi-factory Hudson entries built by former driver Russell G. “Buddy” Marr, an employee of the Hudson factory experimental department. In 1928, Marr successfully qualified the #35 supercharged Miller owned by B.W. Cooke owner of the Chicago based Coyne Electrical School for the ‘500’ field at 109.685 MPH. Marr was scheduled to start 28th in the 1928 ‘500,’ but the day before the race, his designated relief driver, a 25-year old rookie driver named Clarence “Chet” Miller took the car out for practice and crashed which damaged the Miller beyond repair.  Marr evidently held no ill will towards Chet Miller, as Miller drove Marr’s Hudson entries in the 1931, 1932 and 1933 Indianapolis 500-mile races, the last two teamed with the unrelated Allen Miller. 

Willard Prentiss looks over the Wehr powerplant in 1934

photo courtesy of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway collection

IUPUI University Library Center for Digital Studies 

Denver driver Willard Prentiss was the nominated driver of the #64 ‘Wehr Rotary Valve Special’ for the 1934 Indianapolis 500 powered by a Wehr rotary valve engine the details of which are unknown to the author. After the Wehr car proved to be too slow, Prentiss replaced Lockbourne, Ohio’s Bill Chittum as the driver of the #59 “G & P Hudson Special.” Prentiss qualified on May 28th with a 107.797 MPH average for his 25-mile time trial run, initially good enough for the 30th starting position, but he was later bumped and wound up on Race Day as the first alternate.

 1937 Indianapolis 500

Three years passed before Rudolph Wehr made another Indianapolis attempt, when he posted two entries for the 25th running of the International 500-mile Sweepstakes.  The two Hudson chassis, fitted with new awkward-looking grille shells, were powered by all-new 4-cylinder two-cycle supercharged rotary valve engines. There had been previous experiments with two-cycle engines at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway first with Fred Duesenberg’s factory two-cycle entry for the 1926 ‘500’, followed by Leon Duray’s 1931 supercharged “U” (cylinder side-by-side) 16-cylinder monster, and Clessie Cummins’ 1934 oil-burning two-cycle experiment, all of which were later deemed failures by their builders.

The June 1937 issue of the Automotive Trade Journal provided technical details of the Wehr entries. Each cylinder of the Wehr engine measured a 4-inch bore while the piston had a 4 ¼-inch stroke for a total engine displacement of 213 cubic inches. The rear-mounted Roots supercharger was fed by a single Winfield down-draft carburetor, with the fuel mixture ignited by Champion Spark plugs supplied energy through Packard ignition cables from the Bosch magneto. Each wheel of the 1931 Hudson chassis was equipped a Hartford-Fageol friction disk shock absorber from Oakland California and mechanical brakes, and each car weighed 1986 pounds dry.     

A May 19, 1937 article in the Indianapolis Star explained the advantage of the unique rotary valve design as “it eliminates most of the up-and-down motion in the motor, except that of the pistons. The two-cycle engine is intended get twice the explosions that a four-cycle engine. The rotary valves, according to the inventor, do away with much of the intricate machinery of the engine and do not even require a camshaft in the motor. According to experts, the principle is perfect, but it merely doesn't function.” 

"When it does work," proclaimed Wehr, "I will have done away with all valve trouble not only in automobiles but also in airplanes. It will make plane travel safer than ever.” The Star article went on to state that Wehr’s “principal fear was that the motor will become overheated. Since bringing the two cars here several weeks ago he has spent hours in the garages trying to overcome his problem and has signed up two drivers to qualify them.”

The drivers were identified in the Star as Frank Wearne and Thomas Cosman, described as “two newcomers to Indianapolis who have been racing on the Pacific Coast for several years. Both are inclined mechanically and are working with Wehr in ironing out his problems.”  "I don't expect to set any speed records with my cars," Wehr said, "All I want to do is make them run fast enough to qualify, say around 114 miles an hour. I want my rotary valve and two-cycle engine to run in the race."

The May 19 1937 Indianapolis Star article wrapped up with a depressing recounting of Wehr’s history with rotary valves at the Speedway which began “in 1916 when Wehr built his first rotary valve motor for a racing automobile. It failed.” After the historical recap, the article closed by stating that “these are the one hundred and seventh (107) and one hundred and eighth (108) engines that Wehr has built with rotary valves. Not one has worked.”  Rudolph Wehr was persistent if nothing else.

According to the author’s friend and fellow racing historian Jim Thurman, Thomas Charles “Tommy” Cosman, born on May 13 1908 in Pennsylvania, had a decent racing career in California, twice finishing in the top 30 (28th in 1933) (35 in 1934) in AAA Pacific Coast points, and apparently finished 11th in the 1933 Legion Ascot "Class B" classification. When not racing, Cosman ran a car wrecking business, and after he failed to qualify the #63 ‘Wehr 2-cycle Rotary Valve Special’ for the 1937 ‘500,’ he never returned to the Speedway. Cosman passed away in 1973 and is buried in Whittier California.

Frank Wearne in 1939 

photo courtesy of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway collection

IUPUI University Library Center for Digital Studies 

Frank Wearne was another Legion Ascot veteran who for a period drove the Frank Kurtis-bodied ‘Atlas Chrome Special,’ one of the top rides on the AAA Pacific Coast ‘big car’ circuit. After his #64 ‘Wehr 2-cycle Rotary Valve Special’ was withdrawn during the month of May with terminal engine problems, Wearne picked up the ride in Leon Duray’s Miller-powered Stevens chassis for his first Indianapolis ‘500’ start.  Wearne went on to race in seven consecutive Indianapolis 500-mile races, with his best finish of seventh in the “Boyle Valve Special” Stevens-Miller in 1940.  

While the author does not profess to be expert on the theories of the operation of an internal combustion engine, it appears as though a rotary valve design could have several significant advantages over a conventional poppet valve train. The rotary valve assembly is less complex and more compact than a conventional pushrod system, which would result in a lighter weight cylinder head.

The rotary valve engine would have the potential for a higher compression ratio and without the weak point of valve springs, the engine could turn more revolutions per minutes (RPM) than a conventional design. However, the rotary valves cylinder head design would require special attention to valve lubrication and cooling to prevent the valve from overheating.  Valve overheating was apparently the problem with which Wehr most struggled, the failure of which newspapers referred to as “frozen valves” and catastrophic engine failures.  

1939 Indianapolis 500 

For his fifth Indianapolis entry in 1939, Rudolph Wehr and his new partner, Edwin Anderson entered the #23 “Wehr-Anderson Rotary Valve Special” powered by a supercharged four-cylinder four-stoke rotary valve 181 cubic inch engine without a driver named. The 1939 chassis which weighed a hefty 2021 pounds, rode on 18-inch wheels, and carried 4-wheel hydraulic brakes and Delco shock absorbers with the engine fed by a single “Speed” side-draft carburetor and the Roots-type centrifugal supercharger.    

Author's copy of the 1939 AAA technical specifications sheet

 for the Wehr-Anderson Rotary Valve Special 

George Robson a rookie driver from Huntington Beach California took his rookie test in the “Wehr-Anderson Rotary Valve Special,” and then drove it in practice. Towards the end of the month of May the Indianapolis Star newspaper proclaimed that “if she (the car) manages to go all the way through the race, Robson will earn the undying gratitude of a man (Wehr) who has stuck with an idea despite obstacles which would have throttled the ordinary person years and years ago.” Alas, by the final day of qualifying, Robson abandoned Wehr’s rotary valve entry for a more competitive machine. 

George was the eldest of the three racing Robson brothers, born in Newcastle England in February 1909, before the Robson family relocated to Canada and eventually in Huntington Beach California around 1924. Harold Junior “Hal” was born in Canada in 1911, followed by James “Jimmy,” born in 1917, Albert, and the family’s youngest child, daughter Amy. All the brothers worked in their father Harold’s machine shop, Robson Engineering, and three of the brothers- George, Hall and Jimmy- raced. 

The two older Robson brothers both began racing in 1930 but eventually the Robson trio advanced to race “big cars” up and down the West Coast, particularly at the half-mile dirt Southern Ascot Speedway in South Gate, the third Los Angeles area “Ascot” track which operated from 1937 until the cessation of racing due to World War 2 in 1942.

George Robson 1941 Maserati 

photo courtesy of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway collection

IUPUI University Library Center for Digital Studies 

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On the final day of 1939 Indianapolis ‘500’ time trials, George qualified Artha B “Deacon” Litz’ Maserati for the starting field with a 4-lap time trial run that averaged 116.305 MPH for the 28th spot but was the slowest car in the field. Litz’ Maserati Tipo V8RI, chassis # 4501, was powered by an unsupercharged 4 ½ liter (270 cubic inch) V-8 engine fed by four Linkert motorcycle-type carburetors. The 225-pound Litz (billed as the “biggest race car driver in the world”) had earlier abandoned his own entry in favor of Dick Wharton’s similar Maserati Tipo V8RI chassis #4502 powered by a supercharged 3-liter (182 cubic inch) engine that Litz qualified for the starting field at 117.979 MPH.

Louis Tomei easily qualified Frank Griswold’s supercharged 8-cylinder Alfa Romeo for the final starting spot with a run of 118.454 MPH and the field was filled. Billy Devore, the son of racer Earl Devore, in Leon Duray’s four-cylinder supercharged ‘Barbasol Special’ made a qualifying attempt, but during his run the brake handle broke and he coasted over the last lap and posted a four-lap average of 104 MPH, below the required 110 MPH minimum. Mechanics quickly repaired Devore’s car, but he stalled as he left the pit area for second attempt.

Duray’s mechanics pulled the car back, restarted it and Devore was pushed off just two minutes before the final gun sounded to end time trials. Devore’s first lap was too slow at 115.207 MPH, but over the next three laps Devore picked up his pace and completed his 10-mile time trial run with an average speed of 116.527 MPH, and “crowded out,” or bumped, George Robson out of the field. All this exciting action occurred while the “Wehr-Anderson Rotary Valve Special” sat in the dark inside garage #17 and once again in 1937 Rudolph Wehr’s creation missed “the big show.”

George Robson would qualify for the Indianapolis ‘500’ starting field again in 1940 and 1941, then he was joined in the 1946 ‘500’ by younger brother Hal.  Jimmy Robson never made it to Indianapolis, as he retired from race driving after he suffered severe injuries in an American Racing Association (ARA) “big car” crash in 1941 at the high-banked Oakland Speedway as he practiced for a Labor Day 500-lap race.

Hal Robson at Funk's Speedway in 1948

author's collection

George Robson, the surprising 1946 ‘500’ champion, was killed during a 100-lap race at Georgia’s dusty Lakewood Speedway on September 2 1946 in an accident that also killed George Barringer.  According to historian Norm Bogan, Hal Robson was originally scheduled to drive the #7 Wolfe Special in place of Barringer.

1940 Indianapolis 500

Rudolph Wehr and partner Edwin Anderson’s entry of their #51 “Wehr & Anderson Special” for the 29th running of the International 500-Mile Sweepstakes was received in the Speedway offices on May 2.  The same machine as the 1939 entry, the entry blank arrived at the Speedway without a driver named, but the following day, Emrel Gene “Port” DeFraties, a one-time outlaw “big car” racer during the nineteen thirties on the Illinois and Kansas fairground circuits, was named as the driver. “Port” practiced the “Wehr & Anderson Special” but never made a qualifying attempt.   

Later after he retired from driving, DeFraties became a traveling announcer with the AAA Midwest midget circuit before he started his own hardtop sanctioning body in 1949. Through the nineteen fifties the “DeFraties Circuit” made weekly stops during the racing season at track located in Springfield, Farmer City, Macon, Lincoln, Mazon, and Peoria Illinois. 

Rudolph Wehr never returned to the Indianapolis Motor Speedway after his sixth failed attempt to qualify a car in 1940, but he had established a record of persistence in the face of adversity. 

Rotary valve development after Indy by Wehr and others 

The author found a reference to Rudolph Wehr in Paul Smith’s book Merchants of Speed which a stoty that in 1953 Chet Herbert found a Wehr 183-cubic inch rotary valve two-cycle four-cylinder engine in a junkyard that he planned to use a power plant for his Bonneville car.

Herbert found the engine had 14:1 compression ratio and used piston rings to seal the rotary valves a system which did not work (Wehr’s final patent #2368956 attempted to address the sealing issue).  Chet fitted the Wehr engine with a hydraulic-actuated tapered cone system of his own design to seal the rotary valves and fitted the engine with a GMC supercharger. During testing the revamped engine reportedly self-destructed on the dynamometer.

The book erroneously attributes to engine to an Wehr 1932 Indianapolis attempt, which of course did not occur.  Most likely what Herbert found was the 1932 Legion Ascot ‘big car’ engine although that engine was not described as a two-cycle engine. 

The Crosley rotary valve engine 

the author suspects this was Wehr's work 

According to Daniel Strohl’s article in the February 2016 issue of Hemmings’ Classic Car magazine after World War 2, Rudolph Wehr worked to develop a rotary valve cylinder head for the Crosley overhead valve four-cylinder engine for midget racing, an example of which the author believes  is on display at the Museum of American Speed.

Photo of Wehr patterns by Daniel Strohl 

Daniel Strohl also reported that a number of Wehr’s parts and wooden patterns were offered for sale by Wehr family members at the October 2015 Hershey, Pennsylvania Antique Automobile Club of America (AACA) swap meet.  The author would appreciate any leads to these sellers, as he would like to obtain one of these patterns - please contact the author at kevracer@aol.com

Smith's rotary valve patent drawing

In the nineteen thirties San Angelo Texas inventor Thomas Noah Smith developed a rotary valve system which  received US patent 2336756 in 1943.  However this is not "true" rotary valve system, as the rotary valves work in concert with a center "master" poppet valve. Smith had a big car built by Harry Lewis (who also built Ted Horn's "Baby" big car) which reportedly raced only once before it was parked in a garage in San Antonio for 50 years. The restored Smith car resides in Ed Justice's museum.   

exploded view of Rotax 532 

In the modern era, Austrian engine manufacturer Rotax used rotary intake valves in their now out-of-production two-cylinder two-stroke 31 cubic inch engine design the 532 for ultralight aircraft and continues to use rotary intake valves in the 532's larger successor, the 36 cubic inch Rotax 582

Coates International Limited currently builds and markets the Coates C86GE engine-generator system which with a 855-cubic inch displacement Inline 6-cylinder engine which can run on natural gas, propane, digested land fill gas, hydrogen, and other fuels such as diesel which the manufacturer claims can develop up to 400 horsepower. The engine uses the” Coates Spherical Rotary Valve System” which replaces the poppet valve system with a pair of rotary valves (one intake and one outlet) operated by overhead shafts.