Here to Obscurity
Richard reveals the remarkable story of Barney Oldfield and his unusual front-wheel-drive,20-1itre-engine race car, the KiIler...
Weenter this world in uniform fashion. The means of egress, on the other hand, are infinite. Motor racing's original fame-chasing self-publicist, Barney Oldfield, did his best to duck out of the gene pool every time he drove his front-wheel-drive Christie V4 at the turn of the last century. Tales of his bravery, some of them of the tall variety, continue to cast a spell on motor sport fans. A similar level of intrigue surrounds the man who created this monstrous machine: John Walter Christie, himself someone who wasn't lacking in fearlessness.
This serial inventor wasn't alone in building a 'front-dragger', but he went a step beyond anything that had gone before by siting the engine transversely between the front wheels. He did so more than half a century before Alec lssigonis came up with the Mini. Christie founded the Christie Direct Action Motor Car Company in 1905.
He had previously manufactured and refurbished gun turret components for ironclad battleships, and boasted a comprehensively stocked workshop in Manhattan. Christie was keen to promote his patented front-wheel-drive arrangement and motor sport was just the ticket. He built a series of racing cars in rapid succession, one of which had an engine at either end. The wildest variant of them all boasted a 1214cu in, 20-litre engine, the crankshaft taking the place of the front axle... However, despite its elephantine dimensions, the V4 reputedly weighed around 816kg (1800Ib). That rendered it a lightweight when compared with most of its contemporaries.
Christie was no mean driver, and in 1907 he claimed to have reached 120mph aboard the V4 (the land speed record at the time stood at 136.36mph). He was, however, painted in some quarters of the media as being a bit too courageous for his own good, and he was fortunate to survive some epic crashes.
Under advisement from the medical profession, he hung up his linen helmet in 1908, and a year later entrusted 'Master Driver of the World' Barney Oldfield with driving his latest front-wheel-drive monster. 'America's Legendary Speed King' made headlines for years to come aboard this beast, and on May 28, 1916 he became the first man to lap the Indianapolis Motor Speedway at more than 100mph (he managed 102.623mph). Nevertheless, even the cigar-chomping daredevil eventually saw the irony of braving a car known as the Killer.
America wasn't through with front-wheel-drive racing cars, though, the brilliant Harry Arminius Miller building a classic speedway racer under his own name. Unfortunately, it bankrupted him. As for Christie, his car designs took a turn for the conservative (all things being relative). He built a handful of four-cylinder tourers and taxi cabs before turning his attentions to designing all manner of often unusual, sometimes brilliant machines ranging from tractors to tanks via amphibious vehicles. His work was appreciated by non-American firms - and governments, too, which didn't always stand him in good stead with bureaucrats in Washington DC. However, Christie was near penniless when he died in 1944, aged 78. As for his racing cars, sadly none are known to survive, mare's the pity. *