Four Cylinder Club of America History Project

Many rally-oriented sports car clubs of the 1950s and 1960s undoubtedly had some sort of a kit that contained all of the basic gear needed to conduct a rally.  Here we have the rally kit from the Glendale Chapter of the Four Cylinder Club of America.   This kit was donated to the FCCA historical archives by long-time FCCA member Tachi Shimoyama.  Tachi and her husband Isao were active rally participants in the Glendale Chapter.  The kit includes  an attache case, four World War II era stop watches/carrying cases,  raffle tickets,  club bylaws,  general rally instructions, Larry Reid’s Rally Tables, rally instructions, Exhaust Notes newsletters, waiver and release of liability forms, dash plaques,  entrant number cards, a meeting gavel, inscribed “PRESENTED TO FCCA GLENDALE LEW HIMMELRICH”,  and control cards  for the Las Vegas Economy Run

From former FCCA member Frank Pierce comes the following fascinating  information on the  watches: 

“The briefcase was the property of the Glendale Chapter and the watches were for use by the club’s rally checkpoint crews.  The watches were synchronized and issued to each crew so all check points would have accurate timing.  They were read as each contestant arrived at a checkpooint, the times were recorded on a master checkpoint list, and the same time was marked on the contestants’ card.  The contestants’ card was also marked with a “time out” for the checkpoint which would start their time for their next leg.  The check point master time list was used to calculate the leg times for each contestant and errors were computed by variances from the rallymaster’s calculated leg times ( instruction speeds X leg distance).  Each rally instruction included a mileage check point (usually about 10 miles) so the contestant  could correct their odometer mileage against the rallymaster’s odometer mileage. the contestants’ errors for each leg were added and determined the finish position of contestants. The instruction’s leg speeds were always within legal speed limits.  The rallies were not speed contest and were actually reliability runs.  The very best contestants might finish a rally with an accumulate error of as low as 10 to 15 seconds.  Incidentally, the watches were originally property of the U. S. AAF and were issued to the navigator of each bomber so each navigator had a synchronized timepiece. Each bomber base had a master time keeper who synchronized the watches before they were issued for a raid. He kept track of each watch’s error progression rate (even quality watches had error rates) and were adjusted to minimize the errors. The watches were suspended on a spring-mounted clip to minimize shock and vibrations.  The watches were usually temperature compensated. Most of the watches were manufactured by Hamilton Watch company and were top quality for that era.” — Frank Pierce

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