Chevrolet Wins Atlanta 200 - 1909

This hodgepodge of clips comes from Barney Oldfield's personal scrapbook, but the feature content has little to do with him. The main article is about a race that took place in the autumn of 1909 at a two mile road course near Atlanta. Louis Chevrolet won that race handily, his only setback being an oil fire under the hood of his Buick, which he quickly extinguished. There is another article covering the events of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway's little known speed trial in December 1909. This event was to test (and promote) the newly paved track that was quickly nicknamed the Brickyard. In both these events, Lewis Strang is noted as driving a Fiat. Strang was Chevrolet's teammate through much of 1909, but left the team in October. He was filling in for Ralph De Palma in the Fiat when De Palma was injured in another race. Other smaller items focus on Oldfield's plans to participate record trials and his procurement of a National race car. This may have been the car he dubbed "Old Glory" (it had a giant American flag painted on the hood) and raced frequently in 1909.