Tom Cooper (cyclist)

Tom Cooper (1874–1906) was an 1890s champion bicycle racer and early auto racing driver. He is best known for his rivalry with Major Taylor as well as his later work with Henry Ford and Barney Oldfield.

Tom Cooper began his cycling career in Detroit. His talent and athletic ability soon made him a national celebrity in the US as he climbed to the top of the sport. As a champion bicycle racer, Cooper was a contemporary of Barney Oldfield, Carl G. Fisher, Johnny Johnson, Arthur Gardiner, "Plugger Bill" Martin and Eddie Bald.

At the 1898 League of American Wheelmen championship race on the Newby Oval in Indianapolis, Cooper won the half-mile professional event. He went on to win the Bicycle Championship of America for the 1899 season. Cooper was instrumental in the formation of the American Racing Cyclists Union in 1898, a rival to the League of American Wheelmen.

Cooper, like many bicycle racers at the time such as Fisher and Oldfield, was drawn to the nascent automobile industry in the early 1900s. The gears and chains of bicycles were the heart of the powertrains of the earliest automobiles.

In 1902, Cooper formed a partnership with fellow Detroiter Henry Ford to build two high-speed race cars. This was about a year before Ford founded the Ford Motor Company. The result of the project were two wood-frame racers with four cylinder, 1,080 cubic inch engines. The cars were initially temperamental and Ford sold his share of their partnership to Cooper in October 1902. This was just days before Cooper entered them in the Manufacturer's Challenge Cup at Grosse Pointe, Michigan on October 25, 1902. Cooper, assisted by mechanic Ed "Spider" Huff, agreed that Barney Oldfield should drive the machine they had focused on, "999" (named after a New York Central railroad train). The result of the event became the topic of national news when Oldfield defeated millionaire Alexander Winton, founder of the Winton Motor Carriage Company, and widely recognized as America's top race driver.

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