You want speedway history?
YOU GOT IT....
Quoted from some book I know...
Jack Prince poured excitement into motorcycling in an entirely different way. Prince was a New Jersey engineer who had the soul of a promoter. Velodrome bicycle racing pulled large crowds into grandstands in the early twentieth century, but prince had more spectacular blueprints than push-bike racing. Prince engineered small oval board-track speedways which varied in distance from one-quarter to one-third mile around; the largest "motordrome" stretched out to a half-mile. The turns banked steeply to permit high-speed racing, tilting at forty-five to forty-eight degrees, though some motordrome walls tipped sixty degrees.
Builders constructed a timber framework which anchored into concrete bases. The actual surface of the track was formed with two-by-four pine boards laid on edge, or with two-by-twos. According to Prince, the tricky part was blending the banking and straightaways smoothly together. Not surprisingly, Prince had his own construction methods, which he claimed eliminated blending irregularities in the surface.
After Prince's first wooden saucer opened in Patterson, New Jersey, in 1908, a spree of motordrome construction followed. Dromes went up in major cities - New York, Philadelphia, Chicago, St. Louis, and Los Angeles, among others. Perhaps it was no accident that these dromes were built in or near amusement parks, since the pocket-sized board tracks sold speed and danger in a compact setting. It was comprehensible racing, and well organized too. Promoters put together the American Motordrome League in which cities fielded home and traveling teams. The teams were professional, and league scores were kept in early baseball fashion.
TO BE CONTINUED... if you want....
