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Cindy Starks
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Hoosiers have places to go and things to do
Hoosier-in-training: Part II
When last we left our intrepid explorer, she … uh, I had discovered something about the Hoosier character, using Carolyn Lieberg’s book “Calling the Midwest Home,” as my guide. I learned when and why Hoosiers came to Indiana, your creativity upon arrival, and how you made your marks as farmers, entrepreneurs, businessmen and innovators.
This week I examine your love affair with transportation — boats, automobiles, race cars and planes. Everywhere I looked, everything I read celebrated your invention in getting people from here to there safer, faster, better and in style.
James Eads of Lawrenceburg invented the ironclad steamboat during the Civil War and designed and built the first road and railroad bridge to cross the Mississippi River in the 1860s.
Something in the air in Anderson led Robert Roof to create the racing engine; Frank and Perry Remy to invent the ignition system; and Von D. Polhemus to invent the automatic gearshift there. Robert Arvin of Indianapolis invented the automobile heater and Sylvanus Bowser of Ft. Wayne invented the gasoline pump. Born in Portland, Ind., in 1852, Elwood Haynes built the first successful gasoline-powered car in America in 1893. In 1898, America’s first urban street cars ran between Alexandria and Anderson.
August and Fred Dusenberg of Indianapolis invented the first passenger car, and until the 1920s, Indiana produced more than 200 brands of car, including the Dusenberg, Auburn, Stutz and Maxwell.
Born in rural Indiana in 1888, and with only an eighth-grade education, Clessie Lyle Cummins founded the Cummins Engine Co. in 1919. Called the “Father of the American Truck Diesel,” Cummins earned 33 patents in 56 years and set five world records for endurance and speed for trucks, buses and race cars. In 2007, Cummins Engines of Columbus was a $13 billion business.
The first Indy 500 was run on May 30, 1911, and won by Ray Harroun in his No. 32 Marmon Wasp. Harroun was the only driver to ride without a mechanic in the passenger seat to alert him to the traffic around his car. Harroun had invented the rear-view mirror, which allowed him to see the cars gaining on him or attempting to pass him.
Not content on the ground, you took to the skies. Wilbur Wright was born near Millville in 1867 (brother Orville was born in Dayton, Ohio, in 1871). As you know, the brothers invented and built the first successful airplane and made the first controlled, powered and sustained, heavier-than-air human flight on Dec. 17, 1903. Today, you can visit the Wilbur Wright Museum in Millville.
There was also Bell Aircraft Corp., founded by Menton-native Lawrence Bell in 1935. And the first commercial crop-dusting company was begun by C.E. Woolman, born in Bloomington in 1889. Today, that company is Delta Airlines.
Clearly, Hoosiers have places to go and things to do … and you like to get there fast.
Writer Bob Greene says in the introduction to Lieberg’s book, “No matter how far you travel — how many of the world’s fabled nations you touch down in — you always end up coming back here. People can spend their whole lives flying … places, but when it’s time to land they land back in the Midwest, because there’s no other place on the globe that has ever been able to fill that most essential role: Home.”
I’m enjoying learning about my new home state and its people. Next time, we’ll look at what Hoosiers eat and do for fun. The State Fair’s coming up and I can’t wait to try that deep-fried bananas foster cheese cake on a stick! How about you?
A lifelong Connecticut resident, Cynthia DiTallo Starks and her family moved to Zionsville in 2006. E-mail her at cindy.starks@timessentinel.com.
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