Mystery Foto #40 Solved: The G21 Stoddard-Dayton during the Garden City Sweepstakes at the Bethpage Curve
Did you identify this racer on a curve?
Identify;
- The car and driver
#21 Stoddard-Dayton drivnen by A.R. Miller
- Race and date
Garden City Sweepstakes, October 10, 1908- the opening day of the Long Island Motor Parkway
- Location and orientation of the photographer. Provide a rationale.
Looking west to the Bethpage Curve just before the Plainview Road Motor Parkway Bridge in Central Park (Bethpage). Rationale: The water tower and the large sand dune in the background.
- Racer's outcome in the race
Finished third
Comments (3)
Congrats to Frank Femenias, David Miller and Steve Lucas for 100% identifying the Mystery Foto.
Kudos to Frank Femenias for adding jpegs and a map to his answers.
Greg O. and Howard Kroplick
Comments
The silhouette water tower looks familiar. I tried cleaning the photo a bit, see below. Could be the water tower used during Motor Parkway construction in the Bethpage Park (Central Park) area. If correct, the racer is northbound headed towards the eastbound curve under the Plainview Rd highway bridge underpass in the park. The photographer is then looking SW at ground level during the Sept 10, 1908 Motor Parkway Sweepstakes Race, with G-21 approaching the eastbound curve under the Plainview Rd highway bridge. The G-21 Stoddard-Dayton driven by A.R. Miller finished third in the Garden City group, one of five groups in the Sweepstakes Race. This first race was the christening of the newly built Motor Parkway roadway, “to test the new course, timing systems, and crowd control,” for future races to succeed.
This is racer is a Stoddard-Dayton #G21 driven by A.R. Miller in the Garden City sweepstakes held on October 10th, 1908. Finished 3rd. The location here is just west of the Plainview rd bridge. The presence of the water tower and culvert here corroborate this. The photographer is facing more or less southwest. I always love pics of a brand new Motor Parkway. I’m impressed how the wooden guard rails match the curve in the roadway without looking like individual boards angled to each other. It always seems to look like one long single curve board.
That’s the G21 Stoddard-Dayton with A. R. Miller driving in the Garden City Sweepstakes on October 10, 1908. He finished third in that race. Now for the tricky part: I think we’re looking west or maybe northwest on the LIMP in the vicinity of deadman’s curve #2 in Central Park (Bethpage) between the Powell Avenue and Plainview Road bridges. I think I remember other similar photos of the area with the water tank and the hill with the tree line and cleared area in front of the trees.
Tomorrow is the 115th anniversary of this Sweepstakes race.
Amazing observation by eagle-eyed David Miller for identifying the Bethpage culvert by the water tank! I totally missed it