Vanderbilt Cup Races

The man, the myth, the legend!

-The race car and its driver

He’s got his cigar! Of course, Barney Oldfield in a 1909 100hp 20 liter Christie FWD racer.

-The accomplishments of the race car

Barney Oldfield made a lap record on May 28, 1916, in the Christie with a time of 1:27.70, Average 102.623 MPH, at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway. The medal he won for the feat below.

-The race car to the Vanderbilt Cup Races

Walter Christie raced in the 1905 & 1906 Races

-The driver to Wayne Carroll Petersen

Barney Oldfield’s great-great nephew

John Walter Christie’s last and fastest racing car.  Built in 1909. Arguably the fastest oval track race car in the USA from 1912-1916.  Faster even than the mighty Blitzen Benz and the European Grand Prix winning FIAT race cars, on circle tracks, anyway. When Barney Oldfield turned the first 100mph lap at Indy in 1916 in this Christie, even the state-of-the-art European race cars with twin overhead cams and 4 valves per cylinder could not reach that speed. A period drawing of the car shown below.

I recognize those wheels!

Oldfield in the Christie racer.

1909 Christie Front Drive

Barney Oldfield

Walter Christie beat Barney Oldfield and others with his new car at Gross Pointe, Michigan in August of 1909.
Oldfield bought the car and in 1915 in Tacoma he averaged 113.9 mph for a mile, and at Indianapolis in 1916 he set a new lap record of 102.6 mph.

No VCR connection to the car (let’s start the debate again).

Wayne Carroll Peterson is Barney Oldfield’s great, great nephew. 

Information obtained from vanderbiltcupraces.com, firstsuperspeedway.com and The Henry Ford Museum.

Of course, the great Barney Oldfield with his Christie automobile … Where? I really do not know, as he made several race exhibitions in 1910s. Here are another view taken in the same photo-session… Sure many of the contributors will have the exact answer. Sincerely, Pau Medrano-Bigas

Dear colleagues. I enclose a news item published in The India Rubber World magazine, published on November 1, 1913. As you can see, Barney Oldfield is portrayed in the image, at the wheel of his Christie. In any case, the text does not specify much, because as it says: “We reproduce herewith a recent photograph”. I hope this news provides some clue ... Greetings from Barcelona, capital of Catalonia.

J. Walter Christie front drive Christie.
Barney Oldfield purchased the front drive Christie from Walter Christie in 1912.
Oldfield gave Firestone tires big exposure with the “My only Life Insurance are Firestone Tires”.
Barney Oldfield ran the front drive Christie 1912 through 1916.
In 1916 Christie was placed on display across the country.
Oldfield was about at the end of his career.  He raced the “Golden Submarine” 1917 and 1918.

The driver is the famous Ohio born Barney Oldfield, Freestone tires from Akron Ohio.
A front wheel drive, NYC based, Christie.
Thank you for taking good care of the Clarence Peter Helck archives and sharing them along the way.

That’s Barney Oldfield in the 1909 140 HP Christie racer whose main accomplishment was being the first car to have a 100 mph lap at the Indianapolis Speedway on May 28.1916. Barney was Wayne’s great great uncle. The only link to V. C. R. that I could find was that Walter Christie had entered similar front wheel racers in the 1905 and 1906 V. C. races and the 1906 American Elimination Trials.

Mystery Foto #28…
The driver is Barney Oldfield at the wheel of the front drive, 1913 Christie.
As for accomplishments, I believe that Oldfield used this Christie to turn the first lap at Indianapolis at over 100mph.
At least four Christie cars were in the Vanderbilt cup races in 1905 and 1906.
Wayne Carroll Petersen is the great, great nephew of Barney Oldfield.

I believe Petersen is related to Barney Oldfield.  Thats Oldfield at the wheel and at one time he owned that Christie race car.

Colorized image of Barney and the Christie at Indianapolis.

Always looking for more photos of the Christie, ‘under the hood’ photos mainly.  We have about 100 photos of this car, but few from the rear, and only a few under the bodywork.

Lee, Incredible shots of the engine and front suspension. Christie making the engine part of the frame and overall construction of the car was revolutionary for the time.

Greg, There is a lot out there on the web if you search around. This was Christie’s final racing car and it did have some unique features, as you noticed.  The engine is a V4, but a two throw crankshaft. So there are two master connecting rods and two sister or link rods. Each pair of rods weigh approx. 50lbs.
With a 20deg Vee angle, the firing order is uneven, that is, the cylinders don’t all fire 180 degrees apart. That’s not totally uncommon, but it is different than the other large displacement inline 4 cylinder racers of the pre-WWI period.

Greg, I added some info on your other post about Christie stock certificates.

Thank you Lee!

Barney Oldfield’s private shipping car in which he transported his automobiles and promoted Firestone tires.  The arrow points to Oldfield and his wife. 
From “The Spokesman and Harness World” of July, 1910.

Thanks to Howard Kroplick and http://www.vanderbiltcup races.com for Keeping American Automotive Racing History & my Great Great Uncle Barney Oldfield, Master Driver of the World & America’s Legendary Speed King Legacy Alive!