Sports & Leisure

Tennis Racket

The nation's passion for sports is obvious every day—at NASCAR races, kiddie soccer matches, and countless other contests. From a handball used by Abraham Lincoln to Chris Evert's tennis racket to a baseball signed by Jackie Robinson, the roughly 6.000 objects in the Museum's sports collections bear witness to the vital place of sports in the nation's history. Paper sports objects in the collections, such as souvenir programs and baseball cards, number in the hundreds of thousands.

Leisure collections encompass a different range of objects, including camping vehicles and gear, video games, playing cards, sportswear, exercise equipment, and Currier and Ives prints of fishing, hunting, and horseracing. Some 4,000 toys dating from the colonial period to the present are a special strength of the collections.

Place: United States

Boobs Abroad, P.T. Barnum overlooked a few but they are well taken care of at Monte Carlo

Camera-ready art by Rube Goldberg for his two comic strip series Boobs Abroad, and I'm the Guy, titled P.T. Barnum overlooked a few but they are well taken care of at Monte Carlo, dated Wednesday August 13, 1919.
Description
Camera-ready art by Rube Goldberg for his two comic strip series Boobs Abroad, and I'm the Guy, titled P.T. Barnum overlooked a few but they are well taken care of at Monte Carlo, dated Wednesday August 13, 1919. Goldberg drew for the Boobs Abroad series between 1913-1914 and again in 1918. He drew for the I'm the Guy series between 1911 and 1934.
The artist pokes fun at gamblers, especially in Monte Carlo.
Location
Currently not on view
Date made
Wednesday August 13 1919
date made
Wednesday, August 13, 1919
August 13, 1919
original artist
Goldberg, Rube
ID Number
GA.23494
catalog number
23494
accession number
1972.299186

Professor Butts (pencil sharpener)

Camera-ready pen and ink drawing by Rube Goldberg for his comic invention series The Inventions of Professor Lucifer Gorgonzola Butts.
Description
Camera-ready pen and ink drawing by Rube Goldberg for his comic invention series The Inventions of Professor Lucifer Gorgonzola Butts. Goldberg drew for the series between 1914 and 1964.
Cartoon text: Professor Butts gets his think-tank working and evolves the simplified pencil-sharpener. Open window (A) and fly kite (B). String (C) lifts small door (D) allowing moths (E) to escape and eat read flannel shirt (F). As weight of shirt becomes less, shoe (G) steps on switch (H) which heats electric iron (I) and burns hole in pants (J). Smoke (K) enters hole in tree (L) smoking out opossum (M) which jumps into basket (N) pulling rope (O) and lifting cage (P), allowing woodpecker (Q) to chew wood from pencil (R) exposing lead. Emergency knife (S) is always handy in case opossum or the woodpecker gets sick and can't work.
Location
Currently not on view
Date made
Undated
original artist
Goldberg, Rube
ID Number
GA.23487
catalog number
23487
accession number
1972.299186

Our Handy Bottle-Opener

Camera-ready pen and ink drawing by Rube Goldberg for his comic invention series The Inventions of Professor Lucifer Gorgonzola Butts.
Description
Camera-ready pen and ink drawing by Rube Goldberg for his comic invention series The Inventions of Professor Lucifer Gorgonzola Butts. Goldberg drew for the series between 1914 and 1964.
Cartoon text: Elephant (A) eats peanuts (B) - as bag gets lighter weight (C) drops and spike (D) punctures balloon (E) - explosion scares monkey (F) - his hat (G) flies off and releases hook (H), causing spring (I) to pull string (J), which tilts tennis racket (K) - racket hits ball (L), making it spin around on attached string, thereby screwing corkscrew into cork (M) - ball hits sleeping dog (N) who jumps and pulls cork out of bottle with string (O) - my, how simple!
Location
Currently not on view
Date made
October 25 (no year date)
date made
October 25, unknown year
original artist
Goldberg, Rube
publisher
King Features Syndicate
ID Number
GA.23486
catalog number
23486
accession number
1972.299186

Trotting Cracks of Philadelphia Returning from the Race at Point Breeze Park

Color print of a large number of horse-drawn carriages on the road in front of a two-story brick road house (Turner"s Hotel).
Description (Brief)
Color print of a large number of horse-drawn carriages on the road in front of a two-story brick road house (Turner"s Hotel). Eighteen of the horses are numbered and indentified in a key below the image.
Description
A color print of a crowded road in front of a large roadhouse (Turner Hotel, Rape Ferry Rd.) filled with carriages and spirited horses. All of the carriages are occupied by fashionably dressed men. The buggies are without tops – they have flat floors and straight footboards. The roadhouse is in the colonial style. A two story structure stands with a large ring in the rear, three dormer windows above, and a veranda across the front. Here guests stand and watch. Stable boys wait outside the barn in the background. The grounds are well-kept with trees, shrubbery, and picket fences.
Point Breeze Park in Philadelphia was founded in 1855 and raced thoroughbreds for the first time in 1860. It was eventually converted into an automobile race course in the 1900s after trotting faded as a popular sport.
Pharazyn was a Philadelphia lithographer and colorist. He was born 1822 and died in 1902. He had offices at 103 South Street in 1856 and at 1725 Lombard Street in 1870. Made prints for different magazines, as well as fine prints for patrons. Created a large colored folio “Trotting Cracks of Philadelphia Returning from the Race at Point Breeze Park” in 1870. The horses are all named as usual in the subtitle, but the artists name isn’t given; this was normal as the horses were more important than the actual artists.
Location
Currently not on view
Date made
1870
maker
Pharazyn, H.
ID Number
DL.60.3557
catalog number
60.3557

The Futurity Race at Sheepshead Bay

A color print of a race in progress on a track. Three horses take the lead and their jockeys urge them on with whips. The jockeys wear colorful jackets and caps, white breeches, and high boots. The grandstands consist of a two story veranda.
Description
A color print of a race in progress on a track. Three horses take the lead and their jockeys urge them on with whips. The jockeys wear colorful jackets and caps, white breeches, and high boots. The grandstands consist of a two story veranda. The roof has three transverse gables decorated with Bavarian “fachwerk.” An overflow of spectators lines the fence and the extension of the lower level balcony without a cover. The judges’ stand has a cupola roof. A wooded area is in the background.
The Sheepshead Bay Race Track was built at the Coney Island Jockey Club in 1880 in Sheepshead, New York, spurred on by the laying of the Long Island Railroad. Leonard Jerome and William Kissam Vanderbilt sponsored the building of the new track, which contained both a dirt and turf course. Sheepshead ran the first Futurity Stakes on Labor Day 1888 and it was won by Proctor Knott for a purse of $41,675, the most expensive race at the time. It was the largest crowd to attend Sheepshead, and approximately one-fourth of the crowd was reported to be women. This race is still running, although it has moved to Belmont Park. It is open to two-year-old horses and raced on dirt over a distance of seven furlongs. Until 1957, the horses had to be nominated for the race before their birth.
Maurer was born in 1832 in Biebrich-on-the Rhine in Germany, the eldest of five children. He loved to draw in his spare time and was apprenticed to a lithographer for a brief period of time. He then assisted his father as a cabinetmaker. He studied art at Mayence, and in 1851 he emigrated with his parents to America where he immediately went to work as a woodcarver. A friend recommended that he would make more money using his skills as a lithographer, so he applied to several shops before being hired by T. W. Strong at 98 Nassau Street. Later he met Charles Currier, Nathaniel's brother, who recommended that he visit his brother and show him some of his work. Nathaniel was impressed with Maurer and introduced him to Ives who interviewed all new employees. He was immediately hired and put to work in the basement of 152 Nassau Street, where he remained for over eight years.
Maurer excelled at images of horses and sporting subjects and during the eight years he was employed by Currier & Ives, produced over one hundred prints on these subjects, including such icons as the Life of the Fireman series and Preparing for Market. In 1860-1861 he went to work for Major and Knapp and from 1872-1884 he was the head of the commercial lithography firm of Maurer and Heppenheimer. He retired in 1884 and devoted himself to a number of artistic avocations, primarily painting. He lived in NYC until his death in 1932 at the age of 100. He son Alfred Maurer was also a well-known artist in the modernist era, though after the death of his father who he lived with, Alfred committed suicide. The offices of Heppenheimer and Maurer were located at 22 and 24 North William Street in New York City from 1872-1884. Maurer is chiefly known for his prints of horses, caricatures, and the famous Fireman series. At the outbreak of the Civil War he moved to Major and Knapp where he made many famous war prints including “Sherman at Savannah, GA” and “Grant and Lee”.
Location
Currently not on view
Date made
1889
maker
Maurer, Louis
Currier & Ives
ID Number
DL.60.3230
catalog number
60.3230

Sherman Black Hawk

A black and white print of a black stallion running on a hastily erected race track, pulling a sulky. The rider is in a vest, tight pants, a white shirt, and a Homberg hat. The horse’s neck is disproportionately wide.
Description
A black and white print of a black stallion running on a hastily erected race track, pulling a sulky. The rider is in a vest, tight pants, a white shirt, and a Homberg hat. The horse’s neck is disproportionately wide. The center of ring contains two center pole tents with banners which read M…RSHAL and PR…DENT. A judge’s stand is in a circular grandstand with cone-shaped roof and American flag. Spectators line the periphery. The flag in the center of grounds is labeled: US Cr… Society. The scene is the US Agricultural Fair held in West Philadelphia on October 8, 1856.
Sherman Black Hawk was foaled on May 30, 1845 in Bridport, Vermont. He was sired by Black Hawk and Smith Mare, both Morgans, and owned by B.J. Myrick. He was a direct descendent of the founding Sire of the Morgan breed, “Figure” owned by Justin Morgan. At 15.2 hands, Sherman Black Hawk was reputed to be spirited, compact, and well made, and he could trot a mile in 2:40. This enabled him to win first place at both the Vermont State Fair in 1854 and the US Agricultural Fair in Pennsylvania (pictured here) in 1856. The man in the picture is thought to be Hiram Woodruff, a well-known and successful driver of the time. 50,000 attended the race at the 1856 Agricultural Fair in West Philadelphia, PA. Temporary open stands were constructed to seat up to 8,000 people, but people also flooded the infield to watch the main racing attractions.
Location
Currently not on view
Date made
n.d.
maker
Bufford, John Henry
original artist
Humphrey, Charles S.
ID Number
DL.60.3529
catalog number
60.3529

A Good Race, Well Won.; Hartford Races

A color print of an advertising poster. The scene is a race track in front of a judge’s stand. The winning horse, still hitched to his sulky and driver, is getting a blanket thrown over his back. Other horses covered in blankets are being led away. Men push the sulkys.
Description
A color print of an advertising poster. The scene is a race track in front of a judge’s stand. The winning horse, still hitched to his sulky and driver, is getting a blanket thrown over his back. Other horses covered in blankets are being led away. Men push the sulkys. The driver of the winning horse gestures to the judges in the stand with his whip. The spectators are dressed in sporty suits and converse on the track in groups of three or four. The surrounding area has wooded hills.
Worth was a noted comic and genre artist. He was born in February of 1834 in New York City. He sold his first comic sketch to Nathaniel Currier in 1855 and later became one of the most popular of the artists whose work was lithographed by Currier and Ives. Though best known for his comics he also did make may racing scenes. He lived for many years on Long Island, though eventually he moved to Staten Island. Worth died in 1917.
Location
Currently not on view
Date made
1889
maker
Currier & Ives
Worth, Thomas
ID Number
DL.60.3229
catalog number
60.3229

Nothing is important enough to tear a man away from his radio & Steve Himself

Camera-ready pen and ink drawing by Rube Goldberg for the single cell cartoon Nothing is important enough to tear a man away from his radio, and for the cartoon series Steve Himself, undated. Goldberg drew for the Steve Himself series between 1921 and 1930.Currently not on view
Description
Camera-ready pen and ink drawing by Rube Goldberg for the single cell cartoon Nothing is important enough to tear a man away from his radio, and for the cartoon series Steve Himself, undated. Goldberg drew for the Steve Himself series between 1921 and 1930.
Location
Currently not on view
Date made
Monday January 29, no year date
date made
Monday, January 29, unknown year
original artist
Goldberg, Rube
ID Number
GA.23491
catalog number
23491
accession number
1972.299186

The Great International Caledonian Games Held at Jones Woods, New York City, July 1st, 1867 ... 1868

Colored print of Scottish Games. Proof before letters. A ring of spectators, many dressed in kilts with bagpipes, surrounding participants engaged in a variety of games on an open field. Tents in background.Currently not on view
Description (Brief)
Colored print of Scottish Games. Proof before letters. A ring of spectators, many dressed in kilts with bagpipes, surrounding participants engaged in a variety of games on an open field. Tents in background.
Location
Currently not on view
date made
1868
publisher
Kelly & Whitehill
maker
Giles, John Lawrence
printer
Hart, Charles
ID Number
DL.60.2404
catalog number
60.2404
accession number
228146

Predictions for the Year 2070 A.D.

Watercolor drawing by Rube Goldberg for the single cell cartoon Predictions for the Year 2070 A.D., 1970.Considered to be Rube's last cartoon, this watercolor drawing looks humorously at problems with politics, women's liberation, scientific invention and the generation gap, and
Description
Watercolor drawing by Rube Goldberg for the single cell cartoon Predictions for the Year 2070 A.D., 1970.
Considered to be Rube's last cartoon, this watercolor drawing looks humorously at problems with politics, women's liberation, scientific invention and the generation gap, and the potential for those issues to continue for at least one hundred years.
Rube Goldberg (1883-1970) was best known for the invention comic art series The Inventions of Professor Lucifer Gorgonzola Butts that he created for local and national newspapers between 1914 and the 1964. In a career that spanned more than half a century, he created some 50,000 individual and series cartoons. His subjects included American politics, sports, and everyday, timeless concerns. As he said in 1940, "Humor comes from everyday situations, because nothing is as funny as real life."
His best-remembered invention comic series looks at everyday life and our love-hate relationship with technology. The series reminds us of the disquieting feelings we have when using new mechanical devices that offer progress while taking away the comfort of an acquired skill or an older way of performing a task. The automobile, the airplane, the telephone, and the radio, among other conveniences, had not been invented when Rube Goldberg was born in 1883. They were world-wide and life-changing innovations by the 1920s, to which everyone was becoming accustomed. The inventions promised hours of entertainment and freedom, but at the same time created fear and feelings of loss of human importance.
Along with the more common fear that the new technologies would take the place of manual labor and human intelligence, Rube Goldberg also came to believe that individualism was disappearing. The more we gave in to the use of innovations and commodities, he felt, the less room there was for our individual perceptions, concerns, and activities. In 1921, for example, he declared that the telephone had "superseded the dog as man's best friend."
Another of Rube Goldberg's continuing themes touched on the humor of man's situation, even to his last cartoons; that nothing really changes no matter how persistent we are, and that man has a "capacity for exerting maximum effort to accomplish minimum results."
Location
Currently not on view
Date made
1970
original artist
Goldberg, Rube
Goldberg, Rube
ID Number
GA.23483
catalog number
GA*23483
accession number
1972.299186

Scrapbook

Currently not on view
Location
Currently not on view
date made
late 19th century
ca 1880
ID Number
DL.301846.0001
catalog number
301846.0001
accession number
301846

Where to Spend the Summer & Foolish Questions - No. 4,703

Camera-ready pen and ink drawings by Rube Goldberg for the single cell cartoon Where to Spend the Summer and cartoon series Foolish Questions, undated.
Description
Camera-ready pen and ink drawings by Rube Goldberg for the single cell cartoon Where to Spend the Summer and cartoon series Foolish Questions, undated. Goldberg drew for the Foolish Questions series between 1909 and 1934.
The artist looks at the benefits of spending vacation in unusual locations and separately gives a sarcastic look at manual labor.
Location
Currently not on view
Date made
Friday May 18 no year date
date made
Friday, May 18, unknown year
original artist
Goldberg, Rube
ID Number
GA.23490
catalog number
23490
accession number
1972.229186

Alarm Clock

Alarm Clock by Rube Goldberg, circa 1970.
Description
Alarm Clock by Rube Goldberg, circa 1970. This non-working, sculpted model signed by Rube Goldberg was crafted [during the 1960s] to replicate a cartoon from the series The Inventions of Professor Lucifer Gorgonzola Butts that he drew for between 1914 and 1964.
Inscription: At 6 a.m. garbage man picks up ashcan, causing mule to kick over statue of Indian warrior. Arrow punctures bucket and ice cubes fall on false teeth, causing them to chatter and nip elephant's tail. Elephant raises his trunk in pain, pressing lever which starts toy maestro to lead quartet in sad song. Sentimental girl breaks down and cries into flower pot, causing flower to grow and tickle man's feet. He rocks with laughter, starting machine that rings gong and slides sleeper out of bed into slippers on wheels, which propel him into bathroom where cold shower really wakes him up.
Location
Currently not on view
Date made
circa 1970
depicted
Butts, Lucifer Gorgonzola
original artist
Goldberg, Rube
ID Number
GA.23502
accession number
1972.289709
catalog number
GA*23502
accession number
289709

Dan Rice. The Celebrated Shaksperian sic Clown

This black and white print is an oval full-length portrait of the showman/clown Dan Rice, surrounded by six smaller, full-length oval depictions of him in various roles.
Description
This black and white print is an oval full-length portrait of the showman/clown Dan Rice, surrounded by six smaller, full-length oval depictions of him in various roles. The title of the print appears at the top and the word “Clown” at the bottom.
Dan Rice (1823-1900) was one of America's most famous circus clowns, known for performances that included singing, dancing, shows of strength, trick riding, and trained animal acts. He was also a celebrated humorist, whose comedy acts ranged over the years from Shakespearean parodies to biting political satire. Born Daniel McLaren in New York City, Rice worked as a jockey as a boy and launched his performing career at the age of seventeen with a song and dance routine and a trained pig he called Lord Byron. He joined his first circus as a strongman and in 1844 began performing as a clown. By the late 1840s he had established his own one-ring circus, called Dan Rice’s Great Show. Sporting a trademark Uncle Sam beard, he described himself as the “Great American Humorist.” He later entered politics, running for the Pennsylvania State Senate and in 1868 for president of the United States, although he eventually dropped out. Alcoholism contributed to the eventual decline of his circus career, and he stopped touring in 1885.
This lithograph was produced by G. & W. Endicott. George Endicott (1802-1848) was born in Canton, Massachusetts. He worked as an ornamental painter in Boston before turning to lithography around 1828. In 1830, he went into business with Moses Swett (1804-1838), a native of Poland who had worked previously for the Pendleton lithography firm as an artist and draftsman. Endicott & Swett first opened in Baltimore but moved to New York in 1831. The partnership dissolved in 1834, and Swett continued to work on his own in New York from 1834-1837. Endicott stayed on as the head of the company which his brother William (1816-1851) later joined. After George Endicott’s death in 1848, William ran the firm as William Endicott & Co.
Location
Currently not on view
Date made
1846-1849
depicted
Rice, Dan
maker
G. & W. Endicott
ID Number
DL.60.3010
catalog number
60.3010
accession number
228146

Baseball, used in the 1983 Cracker Jack Old Timers Baseball Classic.

Baseball used in the 1983 Cracker Jack Old Timers Baseball Classic. The game was played at RFK Stadium in Washington D.C. on July 18.Currently not on view
Description
Baseball used in the 1983 Cracker Jack Old Timers Baseball Classic. The game was played at RFK Stadium in Washington D.C. on July 18.
Location
Currently not on view
date made
1983
associated institution
Cracker Jack Old Timers Baseball Classic
maker
Rawlings
ID Number
1984.0229.01
accession number
1984.0229
catalog number
1984.0229.01

Playing fields at UCLA

Currently not on view
Location
Currently not on view
date made
before 1972
ID Number
1983.0838.0138
accession number
1983.0838
catalog number
1983.0838.138

Elmore Smith Basketball Card

This Elmore Smith basketball card is number 76 in a series of 264 that was manufactured by the Topps Company Inc. for the 1972-1973 National Basketball Association (NBA) season. The front of the card features a posed picture of the Buffalo Braves center on a pink background.
Description
This Elmore Smith basketball card is number 76 in a series of 264 that was manufactured by the Topps Company Inc. for the 1972-1973 National Basketball Association (NBA) season. The front of the card features a posed picture of the Buffalo Braves center on a pink background. The card’s reverse features a small cartoon image illustrating the factoid that “Elmore is first 7-footer to play for Braves,” as well as a short biography and career statistics.
Elmore played in the NBA from 1971-1979 as a member of the Buffalo Braves, Los Angeles Lakers, Milwaukee Bucks, and Cleveland Cavaliers. Elmore led the league in blocks in 1974 with an average of 4.9 per game, which remains the third-highest ever recorded for a single season. Smith also set the single-game record for blocks with 17 in a 1973 game against Portland.
date made
1972
copyright date
1973
publisher
NBA Properties, Inc.
Topps Chewing Gum
depicted
Smith, Elmore
maker
Topps Company, Inc.
NBA Properties, Inc.
ID Number
1982.0568.108
accession number
1982.0568
catalog number
1982.0568.108

Tips on Hockey

This reccording, Shakey's presents "Tips on Hockey" with Barclay Plager and Garry Unger, was written and produced by The Wayne Agency, St. Louis, Missouri, 1972.
Description (Brief)

This reccording, Shakey's presents "Tips on Hockey" with Barclay Plager and Garry Unger, was written and produced by The Wayne Agency, St. Louis, Missouri, 1972. It is a 45rpm disc with an original printed sleeve in white and light red with two black and white photographs of hockey players on the front.

This was a promotional disc from Shakey's Pizza. a pizza restaurant chain based in the United States, founded in 1954.

Location
Currently not on view
date made
1972
ID Number
1988.0370.01
accession number
1988.0370
catalog number
1988.0370.01

Baseball, signed by the 1965 Los Angeles Dodgers

Baseball signed by the 1965 Los Angeles Dodgers.
Description
Baseball signed by the 1965 Los Angeles Dodgers. That season the Dodgers finished 97-65, 1st in the National League, winning the World Series over the Minnesota Twins 4 games to 3.
Autographs include Ron Fairly; Nate Oliver; Howie Reed; John Kennedy; Sandy Koufax; Don LeJohn; Maury Willis; Ron Perranoski; Hector Valle; Bill Singer; Jim Lefebvre; Derell Griffith; Jeff Torborg; Bob Miller; Lefty Phillips; Nick Willhite; Claude Osteen; Wally Moon.
Location
Currently not on view
date made
1965
associated institution
Los Angeles Dodgers
signer
Fairly, Ron
Koufax, Sandy
Perranoski, Ron
Osteen, Claude
maker
Spalding
ID Number
1984.0228.01
accession number
1984.0228
catalog number
1984.0228.01

Baseball, signed by Don Drysdale

Baseball autographed by Don Drysdale (1936-1993). The right handed pitcher played for the Brooklyn/ Los Angeles Dodgers from 1956-1969.
Description
Baseball autographed by Don Drysdale (1936-1993). The right handed pitcher played for the Brooklyn/ Los Angeles Dodgers from 1956-1969. Drysdale finished his career with a win-loss record of 209-166, having been named to nine All-Star Teams and receiving the Cy Young Award in 1962. He was a contributor to three World Series Champion Dodger teams (1959, 1963 and 1965). Drysdale has had his number 53 retired by the Los Angeles Dodgers, and was elected into Major League Baseball's Hall of Fame in 1984.
Location
Currently not on view
date made
1960s
associated institution
Los Angeles Dodgers
signer
Drysdale, Don
maker
Spalding
ID Number
1984.0228.02
accession number
1984.0228
catalog number
1984.0228.02

College Songs, Vol. 3 - Southern

All-American Glee Club. College Songs, Vol. 3 – Southern (Victor P 34). 3-disc set (album for 1988.0384.23-.-25).78 rpm.Currently not on view
Description
All-American Glee Club. College Songs, Vol. 3 – Southern (Victor P 34). 3-disc set (album for 1988.0384.23-.-25).
78 rpm.
Location
Currently not on view
release date
1940
manufacturer
Victor
ID Number
1988.0384.22
accession number
1988.0384
maker number
P 34
catalog number
1988.0384.22

Honeycomb pool skateboard designed by George Powell and used by Stacy Peralta

This honeycomb pool board was a revolutionary design by George Powell and was used by Stacy Peralta, one of the founding members of the Bones Brigade. It has a formed aluminum core with an aluminum honeycomb epoxy bonded with a filled, polyester close out.
Description (Brief)
This honeycomb pool board was a revolutionary design by George Powell and was used by Stacy Peralta, one of the founding members of the Bones Brigade. It has a formed aluminum core with an aluminum honeycomb epoxy bonded with a filled, polyester close out. The polyurethane wheels, or Bones wheels, were also made by George Powell and the Tracker trucks were designed by Larry Balma. According to Powell, "the decks were changing monthly during this era and we had to accommodate the rapidly evolving style of skating, which quickly went from streets to ditches, to pools and skate parks. The aluminum skins were problematic because the skaters would drag the tails to slow down and that would grind them off to a razor-sharp high strength aluminum edge that was very dangerous if it hit someone. This led me to develop the Tail Bones and Nose Bones I made to protect the tips, and to experiment with lighter, better performing prototypes, of which the "Powell" you have is a prime example. It utilizes aluminum skins, aluminum honeycomb core, and epoxy to close out the edges. The wheel wells are post lamination formed by crushing the honeycomb in those areas, as this was a first, and we wanted to learn if we could get away with this shortcut to making them instead of much more expensive and time-consuming alternatives."
date made
1978
user
Peralta, Stacy
maker
Powell, George
ID Number
1987.0737.001
accession number
1987.0737
catalog number
1987.0737.001

Miss Maud Nelson

date made
ca 1900
ID Number
1986.0020.02
accession number
1986.0020
catalog number
1986.0020.02

Richard Petty's 200th Victory Car

This Pontiac No. 43 — that number was Richard Petty's hallmark, as No. 42 was for his father's cars — follows the 1984 design rules. Note the tubular space-frame, specially built body, racing wheels and tires, and safety gear in the interior.
Description
This Pontiac No. 43 — that number was Richard Petty's hallmark, as No. 42 was for his father's cars — follows the 1984 design rules. Note the tubular space-frame, specially built body, racing wheels and tires, and safety gear in the interior. Like current NASCAR racers, its engine is not fuel-injected but uses carburetion. The car carried Petty to victory in the "Firecracker 400" race at Daytona, on July 4, 1984. The car ran one more race that year, the Talledega 500 on July 29th, but did not finish, retiring with a broken differential immediately after its first pit stop. The car owner was Curb Motorsports, owned by Mike Curb, of the family owning Canon Mills and president of Curb Records. The car was repainted by the crew of Petty Enterprises, Randleman, before presentation to the Smithsonian in late 1984. The car is configured for the last time it ran, at the 1984 Talledega race, and has that engine installed. The tires, however, are Daytona tires.
A uniquely American type of auto racing is "stock car" racing. Bill France, of Daytona Beach, Florida, had witnessed the popularity of pre-war "beach racing." In the late 1940s, he organized beach races for car-owners who liked the idea of competing against each other with more-or-less "stock" automobiles. To help him set rules for stock-car racing, France created the National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing, NASCAR, in 1948. In 1953, France opened a new Daytona Speedway. NASCAR came of age in 1959, with the first running of the Daytona 500 - which was won by Lee Petty, Richard Petty's father, a three-time NASCAR national champion in his own right, during the 1950s.
Richard Petty, of Randleman, NC, began his racing in the early 1960s, winning his first Daytona 500 and first of seven NASCAR national championships in 1964. NASCAR racing in the 1960s consisted of many more top-rank (i.e., Grand National, Winston Cup, and now renamed Nextel Cup) races per year than today. The norm in the 1960s was some 50 or more such races a year. In 1967, Richard Petty won 27 of these (out of 48 races, which included winning 10-straight) to set an all-time record for the most victories in a season. Over his 35-year career, his record of 200 Grand National/Winston Cup racing wins is very likely never to be equaled. (In comparison, the driver with the second-highest total of wins in NASCAR races is David Pearson, with 105 over a 26-year career.)
By the 1980s, NASCAR race-car design rules had changed radically since NASCAR's first season in 1949. That year, NASCAR's series ran under "strictly stock" rules. Cars were - or were supposed to be - unaltered from production cars. But that idea ran counter to the decades-long "tradition" among auto racers of cheating under the hood and in the chassis, i.e., adding hidden changes to the engine and suspension to make the car a better performer. Bill France decided to allow certain modifications to both a car's stock engine and its chassis, and to enforce strict discipline against cheating by employing - to look over each car and its engine in detail before each race - a bevy of inspectors answerable to France. The race series was renamed the Grand National series in 1950, and occasional cheating was not, of course, entirely eliminated. Over the years, more and more departures from "stock" components were permitted by the frequently evolving rule changes - the objective of the rule changes, nearly every time, was to let the cars average faster speeds (which brought in more fans), while at the same time trying to eliminate unfair advantages among the cars (close racing, being more exciting, pleased the fans; a race season dominated by just a few drivers that could "run away from the field" in almost every race decreased both fan interest and the interest of other race-car owners to enter their cars).
By the 1980s, NASCAR race cars were no longer "stock" at all, being entirely purpose-built, with non-stock tubular space-frames eliminating the stock frame, specially designed springing, 700-horsepower engines in which only the stripped, basic block was "stock," and — significantly — added safety and fire-suppression equipment.
Only the basic shape of the hand-made body had to follow the lines of the stock model being represented. "Spoilers" - the lateral flap added to the rear of the "trunk" - used wind to keep the rear of the car down at high speed; headlights became decals; doors didn't exist (the driver climbed-in through the left-hand window opening). Today's NASCAR race cars have even dispensed with following a production car's body lines; the smoothly shaped front-ends of the race cars are designed to reduce wind resistance to a practical minimum. The NASCAR race-car design rules rigidly enforced today are, by far, the most complex of any motorsport; these rules are designed to equalize the cars as much as possible, to provide close, competitive racing.
Location
Currently on loan
Date made
1984
user
Petty, Richard
maker
Petty Enterprises
ID Number
1985.0009.01
accession number
1985.0009
catalog number
1985.0009.01

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