I'm trying something new with this post. I've begun placing the collection on Smugmug.com and I'll be linking the photos from there. I think you'll see a pretty vast improvement in image quality. Let me know what you think, please. The newspaper clippings are fairly low resolution images so they will still be housed on Picasa/Blogger.
I chose Smugmug since a prominent photographer (Trey Ratcliff) whose work I enjoy has said great things about the company. He also mentioned how secure his photos were there, and I've been thinking that it would be a horrible loss if anything happened to the collection. With the photos on Smugmug, my family will have a digital repository of the collection and I won't have to worry about maintaining it. It actually makes it possible for you to print some of the photos if you'd like a copy for your own collection, but I'll address that later.
So, this newspaper article concludes the first scrapbook which contained mostly auto racing, auto makers, some circus photos that didn't pass the interest test, and a smattering of family members that also didn't pass. There are two or three pages after the photos for this post in the scrapbook. Some interesting automobile photos and some disaster photos, which are very interesting.
This article goes into a little pre-race near-catastrophe. One of the drivers apparently mistook a signal and went plowing through the pack, thinking the race had started. That must have been quite a sight. As with the last couple of posts, I'll skip the motorcycle races.
Ivan put this clip of the race results on the next page, too. The news behind the news, right? The article didn't include the times of the other finishers other than first, and Ivan has written them in. I think this is significant.
Here's a little story relating to Ivan's propensity to write stuff down. I had been going through the collection around eight years ago, and I found some letters relating to a project that he and a well-known aviation restoration guy had collaborated on. I called the museum which they donated these items to, and was connected to the curator! I described the project and he told me about how (I'll save the details til later, sorry) it all worked out. He wondered how I knew about it, and I told him about Ivan. "You're Ivan P. Wheaton's grandson?" he said. "Your grandfather's flight suit, goggles, gloves, boots, and helmet were on prominent display here until just last month!" He went on to tell me that many books on early Marine Corps aviation benefited from Ivan's input. Ivan apparently loved writing all this stuff down, and he really loved keeping it. I still have a couple of books to which he contributed. For some reason, he was obsessed with keeping a record of his life. (by the way, I used to play aviator in that suit when I was about 12, when he was out of town)
Anyway, no actual photos of this race, but I do have a few really wonderful pictures of the Hudson he was driving. We saw a photo of the Hudson factory a few posts back, which makes me wonder how his sales of Chalmers, and perhaps his sales of Hudson tie into his racing career.
There is also this portrait of Ivan at the age of what must be 20 or 21. Also, if you examine the first of the photos above, you'll see that Ivan used photos of this Hudson, but the license plate reads "NY 1915". The race was held on Oct 14, 1914 (there's another article substantially the same as the one I posted, but with a date). I'll stay true to my goal not to rearrange the photos due to the actual dates. I figured I'd mention it so you knew I was paying attention.
The next little batch of photos are a bit curious. They are not racing related, but are transportation related, and... interesting.
-kpw
