The Fast Times of Albert Champion

by Peter Joffre Nye

  One possibility emerged in which either Sloan, six feet tall and 130 pounds, or Chrysler, robust and hardy, would move to Paris and run the company. Sloan and his wife did not have children, giving them more flexibility than Chrysler and his wife, parents of four. Yet Chrysler was a stronger candidate, since he and Durant often clashed on business matters, and Chrysler’s contract as president of Buick, the cornerstone of General Motors, was soon to expire. Moving him to Paris would keep him at GM. After eight weeks of lengthy discussions, on the group’s final day in Paris, they decided to pass on buying Citroën.25

  Since Durant had taken over General Motors the second time, the company prospered as it grew. Production of vehicles had jumped by nearly 60 percent over the previous year, from 251,000 vehicles in 1918 to 378,000 in 1919. Net profits had quadrupled, from $15 million in 1918 to $60 million in 1919. General Motors in 1919 had turned into a vast network of divisions and subsidiaries, which employed a workforce of 86,000.

  A $20 million ($269 million in 2014) building corporation was formed to construct a new headquarters in Detroit, where GM would relocate.26 Plans called for the world’s largest office building—a limestone structure fifteen stories high with thirty acres of floor space to accommodate seventeen hundred offices.27

  However tempted Champion might have been to follow GM to Detroit, he kept his operation in Flint and concentrated on improving spark plugs. He submitted papers to the US Patent Office for three new patents. One of the new inventions, on which he’d collaborated with Albert Schmidt, was designed to improve how the insulator is seated in the shell during assembly without the liability of fracture.28 Another was intended to more effectively insulate the spark plug.29 Yet another enabled production of a better outer electrode.30 Together, the new patents raised his total to six.

  His AC Titan spark plugs were setting world records in three spheres of travel—flying to the roof of the world and speeding on water and land. Roland Rohlfs, chief test pilot for the Curtiss Aeroplane Company in Garden City, Long Island,31 bundled up in heavy leather coveralls, goggles, and a mask over his head, and breathed oxygen from a metal bottle to fly a triple-wing Curtiss Wasp six miles up, to 34,610 feet.32

  Gar Wood, the ace of speedboat pilots,33 set the world power boat record of 77 mph on the Detroit River. Racecar stalwart Tommy Milton drove a sixteen-cylinder Duesenberg over the hard-packed Florida sands at 156 mph.34 Milton’s Duesenberg zoomed through the mile in 23.07 seconds powered by sixteen AC Titan spark plugs firing 9,870 sparks. Every second, 428 jets of flame converted the gas-oil mixture into record-smashing power.35 Duesenberg drove faster than the American airplane record, set by army lieutenant C. C. Mosley on his way to winning the Pulitzer Cup and the American national flying championship piloting a Verville-Packard plane equipped with AC Titans to a speed of 136 mph.36

  Champion, the former bicycle courier who had earned six francs a week, a little over a dollar, had become a multimillionaire and now served as a director of the First National Bank of Flint.37 The bank paid 4 percent on savings deposits,38 and it had capital of $200,000 ($2,320,000 in 2014) and resources of $4,400,000 ($51,100,000 in 2014).39

  Instead of moving to Detroit, however, GM faced a crisis brought on by a national depression. The armistice had set off a brief spending spree, but in the summer of 1920 the US economy tanked. More than a hundred thousand banks failed.40 Sales of GM cars and trucks virtually vanished. General Motors share prices on the New York Stock exchange plunged from a high of $420 a share to $12 by November.41 Durant’s finances were spread thinly among a vast number of stock shares he owned on price margins, and in their freefall he had only hours to make up the difference. His personal wealth had disintegrated from more than $90 million in paper value to a debt load of $30 million to his bankers and brokers.42 His only alternative was to turn to GM director Pierre du Pont and plead for help. Du Pont realized that if Durant failed to pay his debts, GM’s outstanding 4.3 million shares of stock would decline so fast that the corporation would likely suffer a fatal blow. Du Pont formed a syndicate and joined the J. P. Morgan partners to bail out Durant.43 Once again it was time for Durant to leave GM, this time for the long goodbye.

  At the end of November 1920, The Man resigned.44 He was succeeded by du Pont as president and chairman. Du Pont appointed Sloan as vice president of operations.

  Sloan concluded that GM had grown too large and too complex for the one-man show Durant had favored. Sloan overhauled the corporation, dividing it into five automobile divisions and a central administration with a strong office that had financial and advisory staffs to coordinate corporate policies—thus eliminating the prevailing culture of management by crony and implementing an organizational management that prevailed for most of the rest of the century.45

  Alfred P. Sloan, one of the great captains of industry of his age, observed that the keynote of Albert Champion’s success was that he always kept his mind open to constant improvement. Photo courtesy of General Motors Media Archive.

  For several years auto company executives, journalists, salesmen, distributors, and advertisers had reminisced at trade shows about the “good old days” through dinners fueled with drinks and cigars, in the process discussing ways to honor pioneers for their roles in building the industry.46 All the discussions culminated at the banquet of the January 1921 Chicago Automobile Show. In the Gold Room of the Congress Hotel, they established the Old Timers Club.47 The agreement was to levy annual dues of five dollars. Dues payers would receive a lapel button inscribed with the year the possessor broke into the industry. Members guffawed that the money collected would go to help the down-and-outs who had missed their chance early on and needed assistance, like the fund for indigent actors.

  “We gave Elwood Hanes No. 1 membership card in recognition of his claim to having built America’s first gasoline car,” Chris Sinsabaugh recalled when he was editor of Automotive News. “We elected Albert Champion, founder of the AC Spark Plug Company, our first president.”48

  Sinsabaugh was renowned in Detroit restaurants favored by auto execs as the creator of the celebrated Chris Sinsabaugh Martini,49 served up in a glass suitable for holding three times the ordinary quantity and without the olive, which he banished for wasting space. He probably knew about Champion for the longest time among the Fourth Estate, going back to his rookie reporter days in Chicago at Bearings, which first introduced the Frenchman to American readers. From there he moved on to the Chicago Daily News and bestowed the new Chicago National League baseball team with the name “Cubs.”50 He mostly covered the fledgling auto industry, which took him to New York for a job as editor of the American Automobile Association flagship magazine. He later became editor of Automotive News in Detroit. Over the years, he studied racing lore.

  Upon being elected president of the Old Timers Club, Champion asked around for recommendations for how to promote the club. “I came into the picture with a suggestion that clicked with the president,” Sinsabaugh recalled. “I knew that American cars and drivers in the past had made miserable showings in the European road races.”51 Sinsabaugh noted that over the past fifteen years, the records showed that only one American had finished any of the contests, and that was a sorry seventeenth place. He brought up the Grand Prix de France in July and pointed out that the deadline for entry was soon to close. “I suggested that he personally send an American entry to the French Grand Prix,” Sinsabaugh said. “That way, he would be helping his homeland and also his adopted country.”52

  Sinsabaugh had proposed a major mission. The Grand Prix de France was tempting because it ranked as Europe’s—and the world’s—most prestigious road race. The cost of shipping vehicles and crews out and back across the Atlantic plus other travel expenses was prohibitive. None of the large American auto manufacturers building racecars was willing to pay that kind of money.

  Champion had the resources and the will to succeed for his native France, for his adopted America, and for la gloire! He knew from everyone he cam
e into contact with on a daily basis that in recent years US racing cars and drivers had moved up in class. They were at long last ready to challenge the French, English, and Italian racing creations in the strenuous 321-mile Grand Prix over public roads. The best way to prove it, and to promote his spark plugs, was to send an American team for the first time in the history of the famous speed classic. He agreed to underwrite the show.

  Another collaborator joined him in the cause—Barney Oldfield, employed by Firestone, which marketed a tire in the old star’s name and was willing to supply new Oldfield gum tires.53 General Motors directors agreed GM would cover half the entry fee.

  The matter of which American car to send was obvious to Champion—Duesenbergs, made by his fellow Society of Automotive Engineers member Fred Duesenberg and younger brother Augie. The Duesenberg brothers had become a name to reckon with in racing. Their Duesenbergs won national-level events of grand-prix distances. Among them were the previous season’s 250-milers on California board speedways in Beverly Hills and Fresno.54 Both victories were scored by the talented Duesenberg team driver from San Francisco, Jimmy Murphy.

  The Automobile Club of France organized the grand prix, which dated back to 1906. The 1921 edition would be the first postwar contest, ending a six-year hiatus. Automobile Club of France officials reacted to the news that an American team was coming by selecting Le Mans, some 130 miles southwest of Paris, where the population appreciated what US troops had done to save France during the war.55 That beau geste was the most the ACF could come up with—the organization offered no prize money.

  The Duesenberg brothers had been building a new passenger car intended for the commercial market. Rather than entering a one-off auto produced exclusively for the grand prix, Fred Duesenberg decided to enter three of the production models. He sent a cable to the English journalist, W. F. Bradley, who was in Paris serving as the go-between for the American contingent. Fred told Bradley to enter three Duesenbergs. Fred had neglected to send money for the entries so the American team had missed the February 1 deadline.56 The ACF, however, allowed a grace period ending March 1, at the cost of the fee doubling to a hefty 83,000 francs ($10,375 then and $135,000 in 2014).57

  In the intervening thirty days, Fiat bowed out,58 and a composite French-English team of Sunbeam-Talbot-Darracq also withdrew.59 The director of the Automobile Club of France prepared to cancel the race if the Duesenberg entry fee failed to materialize by the end of the grace period, March 1.60

  After Champion’s intervention, half the entry fee was paid by General Motors,61 half by the team of Frenchman Albert Guyot, a veteran driver of the Indy 500, and his compatriot Louis Inghibert.62 Guyot and Inghibert made up a fourth Duesenberg team. W. F. Bradley received the Duesenberg entry money for four teams a week before the due date. However, Bradley held on to the check to make the ACF director worry that the grand prix could turn into a complete fiasco.63 Not until the church bells across Paris were tolling 6 p.m. on March 1 did Bradley enter the ACF headquarters on the Place de la Concord.64 As the final bell rang, he threw open the door of the ACF director’s office, strode up to the man’s desk, and laid down a packet of cash. “This is for four Duesenbergs,” Bradley said. “Now perhaps you’ll have a race.”65

  The first postwar Grand Prix de France was saved. Then the Sunbeam-Talbot-Darracq organization announced it would enter four teams,66 raising the total to thirteen contestants representing three nations on the July 25 race day.67 America’s first-ever contingent to the Grand Prix de France shipped out with Augie Duesenberg, son Dennis, and a team of four drivers, riding mechanicians, and some support folks. Fred and Augie Duesenberg supplied the cars. Firestone donated Barney Oldfield tires. The $60,000 tab ($781,000 in 2014) for transportation and housing was picked up by the American Automobile Association and Albert Champion.68

  The Duesenberg brothers were notorious for being chronically late and short on money, but the crew arrived in Le Mans in time for some days of practice runs. The cars were state of the art and streamlined, with a narrow nose, open cockpit for the driver and mechanician, and a stubby tail. They were painted white, and the stars and stripes were displayed discretely on both sides behind the driver and mechanician. Drivers wore a shirt and tie under their Duesenberg jumpsuits. Their only protection from flying stones and debris were goggles and thin leather headgear with a chinstrap, only good for protecting them from airborne dirt and oil.

  On test laps around the 10.7-mile course laid out on public roads, drivers found the surface slippery. The roads consisted of stone beds beneath a sand composition that had been spread and rolled. One of the French cars, a Ballot, crashed, totaling the vehicle and killing the driver.69 Jimmy Murphy was driving a Duesenberg into a bend in the road when a horse ran in front of him. His foot hit on the brakes, which locked up and sent the car skidding sideways before rolling over. Riding with him was Frenchman Louis Inghibert, who suffered a broken rib and contusions. Inghibert had paid his portion of half the Duesenberg race entry fee, but all he got was a trip to the hospital and confinement to a bed while he recovered.70 The Duesenberg he was intended to drive was given to André Dubonnet, a French wine magnate and avid motorist.71

  Murphy had an easy-going personality, charming and radiant with a thousand-watt smile, but behind the wheel he was serious and aggressive. Orphaned at age eleven when his parents were killed in the 1906 San Francisco earthquake and fire, he was brought up in a modest household by relatives in Los Angeles.72 Fascinated with autos, by eighteen Murphy worked as a mechanic for the Duesenberg brothers. They treated him like a son.

  On July 25, Murphy, despite his accident, was on the start line, taped from hips to armpits.73 Next to him was mechanician Ernie Olsen, serving as extra eyes to warn him if someone was coming up from the outside. Murphy was twenty-six, at the height of his powers.

  The thirteen starters lined up in pairs in front of the grandstand, which was packed with spectators strung out about a mile down the home straight. Each pair of starters was flagged off at thirty-second intervals. Murphy was in the second row. On the second lap, he moved up to the lead, followed by another Duesenberg car.

  At the end of the first hour, the autos pounding over the road had torn the course apart. The sand blew away, exposing bare rock, which broke up into chunks the size of a man’s fist and flew like shrapnel at velocities approaching 100 mph.74 Tires of the heavy and powerful Sunbeam-Talbot-Darracq vehicles shredded so badly that the teams kept pulling into the pits for wheel changes until they ran out of tires.75

  On lap seven, Murphy pulled into the pits to check on his tires, gum-dipped Oldfields. His crew gave them the thumbs up. Seconds later, he dashed back onto the road. He zoomed into the lead on lap seventeen, 181 miles, marking the halfway point of the grand prix.76 Teammate Albert Guyot moved into second place, which he could have held till the end—except that a hurling rock struck his mechanician with great force on the skull.77 Guyot pulled into the pit. The wounded man was pulled from the vehicle and whisked right away for medical treatment. Another man replaced him and Guyot roared back onto the road, now in sixth place.

  A constant barrage of rocks punctured radiators, fuel tanks, and oil tanks, knocking out contenders.78 On lap twenty-nine, Murphy’s race lead was suddenly in at risk as the result of a rock bashing through his car’s radiator core.79 A heartbeat later, a tire blew. He had twelve miles to go, only three tires, and water gushing from the radiator. Murphy did not let up, rationalizing that his momentum would keep him going long enough to reach his pit. The closer the car came to the pit, the more it seemed that every bolt and rivet would bust. Once in the pit, mechanician Ernie Olsen leaped out to change the wheel. Murphy kept the engine revving as the support crew ladled water into the red-hot engine block. Olsen swung his hammer but missed the wheel wing nut. The hammer slipped from his grip and flew twenty feet.80 He had to run over and pick up the hammer before he could change the wheel. Finally, Murphy steered back onto the course. Water they had just taken
on poured out.

  Eight miles remained when another tire exploded.81 Luckily, Murphy had just enough lead to bump over the finish line in first place. Fourteen minutes passed before the runner-up crossed the finish in a French car called Ballot.82 André Dubonnet drove his Duesenberg to fourth place; Albert Guyot’s Duesenberg came in sixth.

  News flashed around the world that the white Duesie with the American flag on the side had won. Duesies had scored three of the top six spots.

  Champion, second from the right, crossed his right leg over the knee of his left to stand upright and compensate for one leg being shorter than the other. Here he joined famous names in international motorsport. From the left are E. C. Chenry who would succeed Champion as company president, André Boillot, English journalist W. F. Bradley, J. Origet, automaker E. U. Ballot, C. E. Sorenson, Champion, and French racecar driver Albert Guyot. From the collections of The Henry Ford.

  Murphy’s beaming smile, his fair skin burned by the sun and covered with dirt and oil outlining where his goggles had been, was published in newspapers and magazines worldwide.

  His victory drew an enormous cheer from the audience. However, his triumph in an American Duesenberg upset some French stalwarts. Officials neglected to have the band perform “The Star-Spangled Banner.”83

  The 1921 Grand Prix de France amounted to what the French call a succès d’estime—a critical success, but no money. For all his effort, at the victory banquet Murphy received from the Automobile Club of France a small medal that fit in the palm of his hand. The rest of the Duesenberg crew headed home with little more than stories to tell of their experiences in France.