Auto polo

Last updated
Auto polo match in the 1910s at Hilltop Park in New York. Malletmen were often thrown from the cars during matches. Auto polo crop1.jpg
Auto polo match in the 1910s at Hilltop Park in New York. Malletmen were often thrown from the cars during matches.

Automobile polo or auto polo was a motorsport invented in the United States with rules and equipment similar to equestrian polo but using automobiles instead of horses. The sport was popular at fairs, exhibitions and sports venues across the United States and several areas in Europe from 1911 until the late 1920s; it was, however, dangerous and carried the risk of injury and death to the participants and spectators, and expensive damage to vehicles. [1]

Contents

Origins

The official inventor of auto polo is purported to be Ralph "Pappy" Hankinson, a Ford automobile dealer from Topeka who devised the sport as a publicity stunt in 1911 to sell Model T cars. [2] The reported "first" game of auto polo occurred in an alfalfa field in Wichita on July 20, 1912, using four cars and eight players (dubbed the "Red Devils" and the "Gray Ghosts") and was witnessed by 5,000 people. [3] [4] While Hankinson is credited with the first widely publicized match and early promotion of the sport, the concept of auto polo is older and was proposed as early as 1902 by Joshua Crane of the Dedham Polo Club in Boston, with the Patterson Daily Press noting at the time of Crane's exhibition that the sport was "not likely to become very popular." [5] Auto polo was also first played in New York City inside a regimental armory building in 1908 or 1909. [6] The popularity of the sport increased after its debut in July 1912, [2] with multiple auto polo leagues founded across the country under the guidance of the Auto Polo Association. The first large-scale exhibition of auto polo in the eastern United States was held on November 22, 1912, at League Stadium in Washington, D.C. [2] Another exhibition was staged the following day at Hilltop Park in New York.[Brooklyn Daily Eagle, November 24, 1912, p. 14] By the 1920s, New York City and Chicago were the principal cities for auto polo in the United States with auto polo matches occurring every night of the week. [6] In New York, matches were held at Madison Square Garden and Coney Island. [2]

Internationally, auto polo was regarded with skepticism and caution. In 1912, the British motoring publication The Auto described the new sport as "very impressive" and a "lunatic game" that the writers hoped would not become popular in Britain. [7] Hankinson himself promoted auto polo in Manila in the 1910s with events sponsored by Texaco [8] and recruited teams in the United Kingdom. Auto polo was further spread to Europe by auto polo teams from Wichita that toured Europe in the summer of 1913 to promote the sport. [9] In Toronto in 1913, auto polo became the first motorsport to be showcased at the Canadian National Exhibition, but the sport did not become popular in Canada. [10]

Rules and equipment

The Dedham Polo Club first used Mobile Runabouts for their exhibition game in 1902. Dedham Polo Club auto polo in 1902.jpg
The Dedham Polo Club first used Mobile Runabouts for their exhibition game in 1902.

Unlike equestrian polo which requires large, open fields that can accommodate up to eight horses at a time, auto polo could be played in smaller, covered arenas during wintertime, a factor that greatly increased its popularity in the northern United States. [6] The game was typically played on a field or open area that was a least 300 feet (91 m) long and 120 feet (37 m) wide with 15-foot (4.6 m) wide goals positioned at each end of the field. [6] The game was played in two halves (chukkars) and each team had two cars and four men in play on the field at a given time. [11] The first auto polo cars used by the Dedham Polo Club were unmodified, light steam-powered Mobile Runabouts that seated only one person [12] and cost $650 (equivalent to $21,985 today). [13] As the sport progressed, auto polo cars resembled stripped down Model Ts [10] and usually did not have tops, doors or windshields, with later incarnations sometimes outfitted with primitive rollbars to protect the occupants. Cars typically had a seat-belted driver and a malletman that held on to the side of the car [10] and would attempt to hit a regulation-sized basketball toward the goal of the opposing team with the cars reaching a top speed of 40 miles per hour (64 km/h) and while making hairpin turns. [6] The mallets were shaped like croquet mallets but had a three-pound head to prevent "backfire" when striking the ball at high speeds. [4]

Safety and damage concerns

Due to the nature of the sport, cars would often collide with each other and become entangled, with malletmen frequently thrown from the cars. Installation of rollcages over the radiator and rear platforms of the cars helped prevent injuries to players, but falls did result in severe cuts and sometimes broken bones if players were run over by the cars, [11] though deaths due to auto polo were rare. [14] Most of the cars would usually be severely wrecked or demolished by the time the match was finished, [11] leaving most players uninsurable for costly material and bodily damages incurred during the game. A tally of the damages encountered by Hankinson's British and American auto polo teams in 1924 revealed 1564 broken wheels, 538 burst tires, 66 broken axles, 10 cracked engines and six cars completely destroyed during the course of the year. [15] The sport waned in popularity during the late 1920s, mostly due to the high cost of replacing vehicles, [2] but did have a brief resurgence in the Midwestern United States after World War II. [16]

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Polo</span> Equestrian team sport

Polo is a ball game that is played on horseback, a traditional field sport and one of the world's oldest known team sports. The game is played by two opposing teams with the objective of scoring using a long-handled wooden mallet to hit a small hard ball through the opposing team's goal. Each team has four mounted riders, and the game usually lasts one to two hours, divided into periods called chukkas or chukkers.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">E-M-F Company</span> Defunct American motor vehicle manufacturer

The E-M-F Company was an early American automobile manufacturer that produced automobiles from 1909 to 1912. The name E-M-F was gleaned from the initials of the three company founders: Barney Everitt, William Metzger, and Walter Flanders.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Polo Grounds</span> Sports venue in Manhattan, demolished 1963

The Polo Grounds was the name of three stadiums in Upper Manhattan, New York City, used mainly for professional baseball and American football from 1880 through 1963. The original Polo Grounds, opened in 1876 and demolished in 1889, was built for the sport of polo. Bound on the south and north by 110th and 112th streets and on the east and west by Fifth and Sixth (Lenox) avenues, just north of Central Park, it was converted to a baseball stadium when leased by the New York Metropolitans in 1880.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Hilltop Park</span> Former baseball venue in New York City

Hilltop Park was the nickname of a baseball park that stood in the Washington Heights neighborhood of Manhattan. It was the home of the New York Yankees of Major League Baseball from 1903 to 1912 when they were known as the "Highlanders". It was also the temporary home of the New York Giants during a two-month period in 1911 while the Polo Grounds was being rebuilt after a fire.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Baker Motor Vehicle</span> Defunct American motor vehicle manufacturer

Baker Motor Vehicle Company was an American manufacturer of Brass Era electric automobiles in Cleveland, Ohio, from 1899 to 1914.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Robert Wrenn</span> American tennis player (1873–1925)

Robert Duffield Wrenn was an American left-handed tennis player, four-time U.S. singles championship winner, and one of the first inductees in the International Tennis Hall of Fame.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Freddie Guest</span> British politician (1875–1937)

Frederick Edward Guest, was a British politician best known for being Chief Whip of Prime Minister David Lloyd George's Coalition Liberal Party, 1917–1921. He was also Secretary of State for Air between 1921 and 1922. He won the bronze medal with the British polo team at the 1924 Summer Olympics in Paris.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Myopia Hunt Club</span>

Myopia Hunt Club is a foxhunting and private country club in South Hamilton, Massachusetts, northeast of Boston. In the early years of the U.S. Open, the club hosted it four times: 1898, 1901, 1905, and 1908.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">John T. Brush</span> American baseball executive

John Tomlinson Brush was an American baseball executive who is primarily remembered as the principal owner of the New York Giants franchise in Major League Baseball from late in the 1902 season until his death following the 1912 season. He also owned the Indianapolis Hoosiers in the late 1880s, followed by ownership of the Cincinnati Reds for a decade.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">George Grantham Bain</span> American photographer and journalist

George Grantham Bain was a New York City photographer. He was known as "the father of foreign photographic news".

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Foxhall P. Keene</span> American thoroughbred race horse owner

Foxhall Parker Keene was an American thoroughbred race horse owner and breeder, a world and Olympic gold medallist in polo and an amateur tennis player. He was rated the best all-around polo player in the United States for eight consecutive years, a golfer who competed in the U.S. Open, and a pioneer racecar driver who vied for the Gordon Bennett Cup. In addition to his substantial involvement in flat racing, he was also a founding member of the National Steeplechase Association.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">1913 New York Yankees season</span> Season for the Major League Baseball team the New York Yankees

The 1913 New York Yankees season was the club's eleventh. This was their first season exclusively using the "Yankees" name. The team finished with a record of 57–94, coming in seventh place in the American League. The team also moved into the Polo Grounds which they would share with the New York Giants until 1923.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Meadowbrook Polo Club</span>

The Meadowbrook Polo Club, located in Old Westbury, New York, is the oldest continuously operating polo club in the United States, first established in 1881.

The International Polo Cup, also called the Newport Cup and the Westchester Cup, is a trophy in polo that was created in 1886 and is played for by teams from the United States and England. Matches were conducted 12 times between 1886 and 1939, suspended during World War II, and not revived until 1992 due to changing times and interests. Originally contested as a best-of-three series, single-game matches have been held since the event was revived. The most recent match was held in March 2023 at the National Polo Center in Wellington, Florida, won by the English team.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">United States Polo Association</span> Governing body of the polo sport in the United States

The United States Polo Association (USPA) is the national governing body for the sport of polo in the United States.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">U.S. Open Polo Championship</span>

The US Open Polo Championship is an annual polo championship in the United States. It is organized since 1904 by the United States Polo Association (USPA).

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sociedad Sportiva Argentina</span>

The Sociedad Sportiva Argentina was an Argentine multi-sports club sited in Buenos Aires. The headquarters were located in Florida street nº 183 while the stadium was sited in Palermo, next to Hipódromo Argentino. Originally established in 1899 under the name "Sociedad Hípica Argentina" for the practise of equestrian activities, the Sociedad Sportiva would held a large variety of sport events in several disciplines, such as football, athletics, auto racing, aviation, aerostatics, aeronautics, boxing, bicycle racing, motorcycle racing, polo, rugby union, trot, sulky races, show jumping, among others.

Joshua Crane was an American athlete who participated in a number of sports, including court tennis, golf, and polo. He was a four time United States court tennis champion and was on the team that made the finals of the 1904 U.S. Open Polo Championship.

References

  1. ↑ Edward Brooke-Hitching. Fox Tossing, Octopus Wrestling, and Other Forgotten Sports, p.12. Simon and Schuster, 2015. ISBN   978-1-4711-4899-6
  2. 1 2 3 4 5 Carlebach, Michael (2011). Bain's New York: The City in News Pictures 1900-1925. New York: Courier. p. 143. ISBN   9780486478586.
  3. ↑ Staff (July 21, 1912). "Automobile Polo Game". New York Times.
  4. 1 2 Morrison, R.H. (1913). "Playing polo in autos". Illustrated World. 19: 103.
  5. ↑ Staff (18 July 1902). "Auto polo latest fad". Patterson Daily Press. Retrieved 23 August 2012.
  6. 1 2 3 4 5 Perry, Ralph (July 3, 1924). "Miami's new sport will provide thrills for fans". The Miami News. Retrieved 23 August 2012.[ permanent dead link ]
  7. ↑ Staff (January 1913). "Britains fear auto polo". Automobile Topics. 28: 608.
  8. ↑ Texas Company (November 1915). "Texas Star". The Texaco Star. 3: 31.
  9. ↑ Staff (May 3, 1913). "Auto polo for Europeans". Lawrence Journal World. Retrieved 23 August 2012.
  10. 1 2 3 Dinka, Nicholas (August 2005). "Auto Pilots". Toronto Life. 39 (8).
  11. 1 2 3 Staff (October 1929). "Auto Polo". The Billboard. 41 (40): 65.
  12. ↑ Inkersley, Arthur (August 1902). "Auto polo". Western Field: The Sportsman's Magazine of the West. 1: 401–402.
  13. ↑ "The Mobile Company's lightest carriage". The Cosmopolitan. 33: 793. October 1902.
  14. ↑ Staff (September 21, 1922). ""Play to win" is slogan of auto poloists". The Southeast Missourian. Retrieved 23 August 2012.
  15. ↑ Staff (Sep 2, 1925). "AUTO POLO COSTLY AND HAZARDOUS: Even Lloyds Won't Insure Players". The Hartford Courant. p. 2.
  16. ↑ Staff (May 27, 1949). "Photograph". The Milwaukee Journal. Retrieved 23 August 2012.[ permanent dead link ]
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.