Vanderbilt Cup Races

The cute, little 3 year old Marion Spooner, Frank Spooner’s daughter.

From Vintage Motorsport: Candid Cameras- The story behind Nathan Lazarnick and F. Ed Spooner

Frank, The Meadow Brook Club didn’t have access from Stewart Ave. until they acquired property north of Stewart Ave. in late 1929/early 1930 and built the new polo fields. At the same time the Club acquired a strip of land from Stewart Ave. south ( part of which I think is today’s Endo Blvd.), to the CRR.  This tract was used primarily by the polo ponies to and from the stable area and the new fields. Knowing the grade level of the CRR at that point, I’m guessing the Club built an underpass at the time ???

From Mystery Friday Foto #5 Solved: A 1930's view of the Motor Parkway area around Merrick Avenue in Westbury and East Meadow

Gary & Lee, My comment about the underpass… it appears from the two top photos of the bridges it wasn’t necessary to excavate under the CRR to construct the road from Merrick Ave. to the interior of polo grounds. The area around the underpass on both sides of the CRR is at the same level as the road surface. Also, it appears as if the CRR was built on fill thru that area, so in reality… the CRR ended up in “bridging” the polo grounds roadway.

From Mystery Friday Foto #5 Solved: A 1930's view of the Motor Parkway area around Merrick Avenue in Westbury and East Meadow

Possibly Henry Austin Clark Jr driving what resembles a 1904 Mercedes at the Suffolk County Vanderbilt Museum??? Photo appears to be looking west.

From Mystery Friday Foto #6 Solved: Henry Austin Clark, Jr. visiting Lynhurst in Tarrytown in his 1912 Simplex Toy Tonneau in1970

Just speculating but I always thought of the east access road as the service entrance for horses’ arrival to the Club, and the west access road as the main entrance from Stewart Ave.

From Mystery Friday Foto #5 Solved: A 1930's view of the Motor Parkway area around Merrick Avenue in Westbury and East Meadow

The driver appears to be Henry Austin Clark jr. ...................

From Mystery Friday Foto #6 Solved: Henry Austin Clark, Jr. visiting Lynhurst in Tarrytown in his 1912 Simplex Toy Tonneau in1970

Fascinating story.  I have many of their photos of Walter Christie’s automobiles.  Another good photographer of the period was Ted Hansom, I believe.

From Vintage Motorsport: Candid Cameras- The story behind Nathan Lazarnick and F. Ed Spooner

Mystery Foto #6… I want to believe that that is Henry Austin Clark in a 1912 Simplex 50 Toy Tonneau but I don’t know the location.

From Mystery Friday Foto #6 Solved: Henry Austin Clark, Jr. visiting Lynhurst in Tarrytown in his 1912 Simplex Toy Tonneau in1970

I’m probably wrong, but it looks to me like Austin Clark.
Rog

From Mystery Friday Foto #6 Solved: Henry Austin Clark, Jr. visiting Lynhurst in Tarrytown in his 1912 Simplex Toy Tonneau in1970

Austin Clark is behind the wheel of his Simplex toy tonneau. Location 9is Tarrytown, NY at the Lyndhurst historic site. The New York Region of the Veteran Motor Car Club of America ( now name changed to Vintage Motor Car Club of America) used to have an annual pre WWII era car meet there that Austin organized and got a few of us to volunteer to help run, work the registration table, and judge cars. I did all of those areas but never liked to judge cars nor have my own cars judged. I usually drove up there in my 1931 Franklin but one year rode up with noted modern sculptor Richard Lippold of Locust Valley in his 1929 Bentley 4 1/2 litre tourer. That was an exhausting trip in the Bentley - top down lots of wind and Richard drove that car flat out as often as possible. We were doing 75 mph when on the Cross Westchester Expressway. Richard also owned a R-R Phantom II convertible victoria that was bought new by Charlie Chaplin for his new wife Paulette Goddard. Richard was a well known sculptor in gold wire ( yes real gold) and his main work is in the a museum of art in NY City.

From Mystery Friday Foto #6 Solved: Henry Austin Clark, Jr. visiting Lynhurst in Tarrytown in his 1912 Simplex Toy Tonneau in1970

Henry Austin Clark, Jr., driving his 1912 Simplex Toy Tonneau with the Misses Margaret Hoffman, Anne Adams and Mary Ryan as passengers, stopped before the Gothic Revival Mansion owned and maintained by the National Trust for Historic Preservation.

From Mystery Friday Foto #6 Solved: Henry Austin Clark, Jr. visiting Lynhurst in Tarrytown in his 1912 Simplex Toy Tonneau in1970

Oswald Jacoby in his 1962 book “Mathemetics for Pleasure” used a race on the Motor Parkway between “Newcar” and “Jalopy” in one of his math problems.  According to the author the race actually did occur in 1914.

From UPDATE - Kleiner's Korner: The Motor Parkway and the Vanderbilt Cup Race in Literature and Entertainment (Part 2)

Mystery Foto Questions

1) Henry Austin Clark Jr.
2) 1912 Simplex Touring Car
3) ?

From Mystery Friday Foto #6 Solved: Henry Austin Clark, Jr. visiting Lynhurst in Tarrytown in his 1912 Simplex Toy Tonneau in1970

That’s Henry Austin Clark, Jr. driving his 1912 Simplex Toy Tonneau at Lyndhurst Mansion in Tarrytown, NY. His lovely passengers are Margaret Hoffman, Anne Adams, and Mary Ryan. And yes, Gary, I’ve seen the postcard.

From Mystery Friday Foto #6 Solved: Henry Austin Clark, Jr. visiting Lynhurst in Tarrytown in his 1912 Simplex Toy Tonneau in1970

Awesome listen, motivating

From Video of the Week: Gararageinsidertv.com- Rob Ida tells the inside story behind Tucker 1044 and the Holman-Moody Challenger III

Lee During WW 1 the Government leased the property which would become Mitchel Field, the lease had language that the lease would terminate at the end of the war. At the same time the government leased most of the Motor parkway spur south of Stewart Ave. paying $31.90 per month per acre under the same conditions. There came a time when the Government extended Mitchel Field to Oak St. In September 1939 the Parkway sold the 50 foot wide portion of the Hempstead Spur south of Stewart Ave. for $8900.

From Mystery Friday Foto #5 Solved: A 1930's view of the Motor Parkway area around Merrick Avenue in Westbury and East Meadow

This May, 1958 map of the Central extension indicates in hand written notes the approximate location of where Uniondale Ave. (referred to as ‘ex Uniondale Rd.’) once extended past Hempstead Turnpike and crossed through the area that became Mitchel. 

I believe the reference to ‘ex Westbury Rd.’ was actually the extension of California Ave. north of Hempstead Turnpike.  It would not meet Westbury Road until after crossing Stewart Ave. but before they got to the LIMP, the merged route continuing northeastward to Merrick Ave. just south of Old Country Road.

From Mystery Friday Foto #5 Solved: A 1930's view of the Motor Parkway area around Merrick Avenue in Westbury and East Meadow

Al,

Could this the 1906 atlas image you are referring to?  It shows two access roads from Stewart Ave. down the to Salisbury Plains station, one on either side of it, but both to the west of Merrick Ave.

From Mystery Friday Foto #5 Solved: A 1930's view of the Motor Parkway area around Merrick Avenue in Westbury and East Meadow

Also, this 1914 map showing Westbury Road further east of the LIMP Spur across the soon to be Camp Mills, crossing the Central railroad tracks, then Stewart Ave. and merging south of the LIMP with the northern extension (beyond Hempstead Turnpike) of California Ave. from Uniondale. 

It then crossed the LIMP and made its way to a rendezvous with Merrick Ave. (Whaleneck Road) just south of Old Country Road.

From Mystery Friday Foto #5 Solved: A 1930's view of the Motor Parkway area around Merrick Avenue in Westbury and East Meadow

Al,

Found this 1923 map showing Westbury Road east of Oak Street continuing in a northeasterly direction and terminating at the LIMP Spur.

From Mystery Friday Foto #5 Solved: A 1930's view of the Motor Parkway area around Merrick Avenue in Westbury and East Meadow