acegear
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Joined: 22 Oct 2004
Posts: 973
Location: Enumclaw, WA
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 Posted: Tue Jan 25, 2005 9:56 pm Post subject: Daytona History - The Begining |
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With the start of the 47th Daytona 500 just around the corner, so to speak, I thought it would be appropriate to take a look back at the beginning of Daytona International Speedway.
First of all, how the track looks today:
- Banking = 31 degrees
- Distance = 2.5 miles
- Shape = Tri-Oval
While Indianapolis is the spiritual hub of American motorsports history, Daytona has a richer, deeper heritage that stretches years before Indy was conceived, or Le Mans was even considered.
Located on the eastern seaboard, Daytona Beach now encompasses the original villages of Daytona, Ormond, and Daytona Beach. Settled in 1874 by a group from Connecticut, this area was originally dubbed New Britain, but was renamed Daytona in 1876 with Ormond established further north in 1880. The playground of millionaires, the Hotel Ormond catered to the delights of the more privileged in society of the day. The Vanderbilt’s, Rockefellers, and Gould’s all built palaces of winter leisure. What had drawn them all there was the expanse of beautiful beaches. Five hundred feet wide at low tide, and paved by trillions of quartz granules brought by the rains and rivers from the granite mountains of Georgia and the Carolinas, this beach stretched straight and flat for twenty three miles, south from Ormond, past Daytona to Ponce Inlet.
Racing began early with residents racing their bicycles, horse drawn buggies, and later their automobiles. While local legend has it that Oldsmobile founder Ransom Eli Olds and Alexander Winton, another automobile industrialist, established the first speed contest on the sands of Daytona Beach, modern historians now believe that while they were certainly involved they were just participants of the era. From what most can gather, organized racing began around March 26, 1903 in what became the Winter Speed Carnival, and has evolved into Daytona Speedweeks. This was before the first Grand Prix in 1906, before "the Brickyard" was razed for the 2.5 mile rectangular Indianapolis Speedway to be built in 1909, or the first 500 mile race in 1911.
While the Winter Speed Carnival has become a yearly staple of motorsports fans across the US, it almost never came to be. William J. Morgan, a Welsh born race promoter and journalist, heard about the autos running on the expansive sands of Daytona Beach, Florida and with the expense account of The Automobile Magazine behind him, Morgan bought a train ticket to see this perfect staging area for himself.
Enthusiastically met at the train station by Hotel Ormond's managers, John Anderson and J.P. Price, William Morgan began to establish the parameters for the new contest. The managers were interested in promoting an event that would bring more paying customers to the hotel. And Morgan's employer was interesting in building it's subscription base by sponsoring a premier event.
So the Winter Speed Carnival was born. Set to take place in March of 1903, Morgan headed north to recruit racers for the event. However, trouble was brewing back in Daytona. Two local auto clubs were in conflict over who would promote the event, with one of the clubs "officially" canceling the event. By the time the race date arrived only two "race" cars were in attendance, the "Bullet" of Alexander Winton and a hodge-podge racer built by Ransom Olds, later dubbed the "Pirate" by Morgan himself.
Now remember this event took place before the Wright Brothers had made their historic flight. Autos were a novelty of the rich, and not that well made at that. The "Bullet" was in the "over 2000 lbs" class at the time that heavier was considered better. Whereas the "Pirate" was in the "under 1000 lbs" class, and could at best be considered comparable to a striped down rail dragster.
Neither car did well in the "race". Held in a straight-line speed trial format, the Olds "Pirate" was only able to attain approximately 54 mph, while the "Bullet" didn't do much better at almost 69 mph, which was 10 mph slower than the world speed record of the time. The only bright spot of the meet were the world records set by Oscar Hedstrom of 57.357 mph over 1 km and 56.962 mph over the mile on a motorcycle.
Well needless to say, the "Carnival" did not garner the attention that Morgan had sought. But being the master promoter that he was, Morgan had the tools available to make the Daytona races a resounding success. Confused? You see William Morgan being a journalist, and a promoter, knew the cardinal rule of promoting an event is that the crowd must leave believing it witnessed a much better race than it actually saw. Morgan certainly inflated the attendance figures for the races, not to mention, sold all the other reporters on how they saw a great race of which they conveyed to their many readers.
So the Winter Speed Carnival had made an inauspicious start in the dawn of motorsports history. What many didn't realize, was that Daytona would be the host to the longest running and richest motorsports event in history.
To be continued...
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A win is a win, and second place is never good enough |
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