1909 Glidden Tour - Preparations

The article in attachment Hower101808 (Indianapolis Star, October 18, 1908) concerns early planning for the 1909 Glidden Tour. The events of 1907 and 1908 were highly regarded and spawned similar contests such as the Indianapolis Automobile Trade Assocition (IATA) sealed bonnet endurance runs in June and October of 1908.
 
This article reports on how American Automobile Association's (AAA) Tour Committee Chairman Frank B. Hower visited Indianapolis to confer with some of the burgeoning auto industry's top leadership about the 1909 Glidden. There had been talk for months that the tour would take a more Western course in 1909 so in addition to the induatry expertise of Indianapolis executives it was a fair assumption they could provide insights to the geography of the potential course. Among the men mentioned in the article as having met with Hower were future Indianapolis Motor Speedway founder and National Motor Vehicle Company executive Arthur C. Newby, Walter Marmon of Nordyke & Marmon,  O.H. Smith of Premier Motor Manufacturing Company and W.H. Brown of Overland Automobile Company. Two Western routes are discussed, one more Mid-West and involving Indiana, Kentucky, Illinois, Iowa and Missouri. The other route was from Chicago to Denver.
 
Attahment Glidden040109 contains an article from the April 1, 1909 Indianapolis Star discussing the enthusiasm of big automobile industry players in Indianapolis for the upcoming Glidden Tour which was scheduled to begin in Detroit and end in Denver. The Overland Company entered five cars with Will H. Brown, P.D. Stubbs, Carl Baumhafer and Hugh Gettner riding. From E-M-F Company were B.W. Tyman and Frank Willis of Indianapolis. Kokomo, Inidana's Haynes Company had professional drivers Frank Nutt and Loring Wagner. H.G. Shafer, Howard Marmon, H.H. Rice were riding with Nordyke & Marmon of Indianapolis. Premier had H.O. Smith, J.W. Weidley, Ray McManare, Henry Hammond and former professional race driver Webb Jay scheduled to drive or ride in cars.
 
Just a few days later in the April 4, 1909 Indianapolis Star the paper published (attachment Glidden040409) a half page of photos of many of the cars and personalities noted above. The photos were accompanied with a brief few paragraphs of copy discussing Indiana car company participation in what was the sixth annual running of the event.
 
An interesting aspect of this article is the automobile enthusiasts in Nebraska were lobbying the AAA to run a portion of the course through their state. Some interesting data was offered to demonstrate the wisdom of making such a choice. For example, the article cites that Omaha had a population of 150,000 people with 600 registered automobiles. Lincoln, with 50,000 residents, had 450 registered cars. The article provides a list of 13 other communities with car registrations ranging from 100 to 15.
 
On a different topic, this article reports that National planned to enter the upcoming Cobe Trophy races in June. This is interesting because in the end no National cars appeared on the entry list. National had said the previous month that they would not participate in the 1909 Glidden Tour.
 
A small item (attachment HowerPremier041809) published in the Indianapolis Star on April 18, 1909 confirms that Indianapolis-based Premier Motor Manufacturing Company would provide the leade car for the 1909 Glidden. Frank B. Hower, the chairman of the newly established AAA Contest Board announced that he would ride in the car. Also, note the mention of Marmon plans embedded in this article elsewhere on First Super Speedway.
 
Attachment Glidden-Hower070809 contains a small article published in the July 8, 1909 Indianapolis Star. The article is useful in that it contains entry lists for both the Glidden and Hower Trophies as well as the Detroit Trophy. Some of the marques listed as entries include:
 
Glidden:

• Marmon
• Premier
• Chalmers-Detroit
• Maxwell
• Pierce-Arrow
• Glide
• Midland
• White

Hower:

• Moline
• Brush
• Chalmers-Detroit
• Hupmobile
• Maxwell
• Pierce-Arrow
• McIntyre
• Jewell
• Lexington

Detroit:

• American-Simplex
• Chalmers-Detroit
• Premier