Chassis No.

2250


Engine No.

AI-779



The 1911 Indianapolis 500 drew forty starters, most of them built by established firms with reputations to defend.

Among them was a car assembled in roughly six weeks by a 34-year-old Ohio machinist who had never before sold a complete automobile, which he called the Bear Cat.

It finished eleventh at an average of 62.375 mph, running the distance without a single mechanical adjustment and stopping thirteen times, eleven of those for tires, with Gil Anderson at the wheel.

Harry Clayton Stutz had his slogan by the following morning: "The Car That Made Good in a Day."



The path to that triumphant Memorial Day had begun with Stutz's arrival in Indianapolis in 1903, followed by the better part of a decade spent moving through the city's young motor trade.

He designed an engine for the American Motor Car Company's Underslung and later served as chief engineer at Marion, all the while pursuing a private invention that combined transmission and ...