New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1911-09-24
Manufacturers and Public with Recent Terrible Accidents
at Syracuse, Brighton Beach and Elsewhere in Mind
Are Asking This Question with Fervor

IF you have strong convictions on the
subject OF automobile racing you VIII
IL be able to find sympathetic listeners
no matter on which side your convictions
may lean. If you will only stroll through
New Yorks Benzine Boulevard and ask the
manufacturers OF automobiles what they
think will be the outcome of the recent
Syracuse catastrophe, in which eleven per-
sons were killed and more than a dozen
injured. BY crossing the street every niue
while YOU will get both sides or the ques-
ton concerning the probable fate OF the
one-mile dirt track for automobile racing
purposes.
II YOU believe It is right for such races
10 be run there are plenty OF manufacturers
who will congratulate you on your Judg-
ment They will let you in on the secret
that. after all, the public should be per-
mitted 10 receive what it is ready to pay
for with such large packages of its money
If you happen 10 have been shocked, are
bitterly stirred and are angrily determined
20 start some new kind Of society whose
object shall be 20 see to II that the one
mile dirt track for automobile racing IS
blackballed, segregated and thrown over
board YOU will also be received cordially,
even by many manufacturers of speed cars.
These sympathizers, you will he glad TO
perceive. exceed in number those OF the
other kind Their opposition TO automobile
racing will sound sweetly in your ears.
When a few Of them will go so far as 10
say that all automobile racing should be
drummed out Of civilized countries, because
the time arrived long ago when 1t ceased
10 teach anything TO the manufacturer, you
may find it difficult 70 keep from breaking
out in song. 1t all depends on how strong
you are for Punishment.
He has vivid impressions OF what should
be done 10 prevent, make impossible for
ever. the recurrence of such an accident as
killed those sightseeing eleven and injured
so many persons at Syracuse, has the anti
racing manufacturer. II acrobats can be
prevented by law from performing without
an ample supply of nets stretched below
them. he is of the opinion that there should
certainly be stopped by the same means
the use Of all one-mile dirt tracks for
death-inviting races. The growing opinion
Of all manufacturers, he says, is that abso-
lutely no useful purpose is served in that
manner. For two long years, it is main
tanned, the manufacturers have not needed
the lives mat races nave cost 10 assist
them in locating mechanical possibilities
for improvement
Racing did answer several useful pur-
poses up 10 two years ago. II taught the
manufacturer how to build cars; few
deaths among drivers and the public
showed the same manufacturer how 10 i'm
prove his output. in fact, the deaths at
that early day, before two years ago, were
it appears, considered the necessary toll TO
progress, good workmanship, better car
buretors improved headlights and all that
sort of thing.
II was figured out something along this
line: Three men killed on a one-mile track
AT Brighton Beach or Kenosha, Wis, multi
piled by one improved method Of pro-
ducing rubber tire in Eastern Ohio, and
henold. a new machine rolled out by some