1904 APBA Gold Cup
[first running]Standard … The First Gold Cup Winner
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It really started as a challenge to a few yacht clubs by the Columbia (N.Y.) Yacht Club and the Gold Cup trumpeted the arrival of the powerboat.
In the summer of 1903, a mystery "autoboat" appeared in New York harbor and proceeded to annoy the pilots of the fastest river steamboats. The Monmouth steamboat could make better than 19 knots running an exacting schedule between the Battery and the Atlantic Highlands due south on New Jersey's north shore. As she swept through the Upper Bay, the "bridge" would occasionally sight a low lying, highly varnished; mahogany craft stalking her.
"She's off the port bow again." The captain whistled down the tube to the engine room, "full steam", he ordered. The boilers of the Monmouth put forth their best effort, however, that was far short of the power needed as the mystery launch toyed with the larger boat and left her "sitting" in its wake.
Later the dignified steamboat Mary Powell logged the unidentified craft as having performed the ritual again.
Within a short time, the public was to become aware of these incredible speed performances. This teeming cosmopolitan area of 3½ million was just starting to get used to new announcements. The first Manhattan subway was now in operation, the new modern skyscraper, the Flatiron Building had been occupied for a couple of years and that new fangled automobile was commanding more than its share of the streets. And now the Tribune broke the story with the identity of the mystery craft. "The Standard, she is of little weight and enormous power . . . and runs over the water at an astonishing rate of speed."
The Standard owners, Carl and Eugene Riotte, were the proprietors of the U.S. Long Distance Automobile Company in Jersey City and not unlike many of their modern day counterparts, they believed the attention-getting boat the perfect promotional vehicle for their business (yet one suspects their enthusiasm for power and racing was more than practical because Standard was no run of the mill boat).
"Her cost," the Tribune reported, "was in the $10,000 range." She was 60 feet long, twice the length of today's unlimited and featured a rounded turtleback deck and three cockpits to accommodate the pilot and crewman, the engine, and four passengers.
The 6-cylinder engine employed an air self-starting system. Three forward cylinders were fed compressed air in metered bursts which turned the pistons over until it fired. The compressed air mechanism also permitted the motor to be slowed, stopped and reversed smoothly and silently, doing away with a gearbox.
The yard long engine developed an amazing 110 H.P. at 400 RPM.
Swinging a 36-inch propeller at that low speed, the entire boat would vibrate when the engine skipped a beat.
The framework of steel, copper tubing, rods, levers and oil caps weighed over 1½ tons.
Within months several members of other yacht clubs showed strong interest in developing an "autoboat". Within a year the first challenge was sounded with an amazing field of eight autoboats answering the call to what had really started as a challenge to a few yacht clubs by the Columbia (N.Y.) Yacht Club and the Gold Cup trumpeted the arrival of the powerboat. Of course the Standard was among the field, and Water Lily, representing the Yonkers Corinthian Yacht Club; F.I.A.T., an advertisement for Hollander & Tangeman, the American representatives of the Italian motorcar; and the names kept flowing, the Express, Boomerang, Aris, Flit and Marciene.
This day, June 23, 1904 was the first challenge for the "Gold Cup" and - within minutes of the starter gun it was evident it would be a three boat race between the Standard, Water Lily and F.I.A.T.
As the field sped across the starting line, the Columbia Yacht Club dock, at 86th St. F.I.A.T. was leading with Water Lily just a few feet behind.
With Carl Riotte at the wheel and his brother-partner, Eugene, at the engine Standard came from behind. By the time the field passed Grant's Tomb, the Standard was in the lead.
F.I.A.T. lost her chance at the Cup when she hit a log, damaged the steering and had to be towed back to port. Water Lily had her difficulties with hazards as she too hit a log, but survived with only a two minute delay.
Six minutes apart, within sight of each other, Standard and Water Lily turned at the stake boat, Queen Bess, anchored off Piermont, New Jersey. Chuckling through a self-satisfied grin Carl Riotte knew the downstream half of the 32-mile heat was his type of water. Standard went on to take the first heat at 22.57 miles per hour.
The next day, Friday, Standard won the second heat at 23.6 MPH, the best time of the regatta. Water Lily was 21 minutes astern.
F.I.A.T., the lightweight craft that could be lifted by three men was unable to start after the previous day's mishap.
Winning the third heat at full throttle against the turning tide, Standard idled to moorage, having won the first Gold Cup in three straight heats.
After the commotion faded away the contracting chatter of six cooling cylinders could be heard as Spaulding Farnham offered his personal congratulations.
Farnham, a yachtsman and artist, had designed the trophy.
The Gold Cup remained in New York until 1915 when a group of Detroiters spirited by their "seasick" young driver, John Milot, defeated their eastern rivals and earned the right to host the following year's Gold Cup Race.
Thus beginning a sixty year tradition of powerboat racing in Detroit.
[Reprinted from the 1976 APBA Gold Cup program]
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© Leslie Field, 2001