Sigurd Olson Haugdahl was born in Verdal, Nord-Trøndelag, Norway in 1891, he would move to the United States in 1910 to live with his uncle in Albert Lea, Minnesota. Always fascinated with mechanics, he started working at a local machine shop and began tinkering with motorcycles and eventually cars. He started ice racing in 1912 on a sled powered by an Indian motorcycle engine in the winter, during the warmer months he could be found competing in motorcycle dirt track races. By 1913 Sig had graduated to racing cars promoted by J. Alex Sloan, who would go on to found the International Motor Contest Association or IMCA in 1915. The IMCA promoted races across the mid-west with races stretching from Canada to Texas.
With Sloan's backing, Sig built the 'Wisconsin Special' powered by the 836 cubic inch Wisconsin 6-cylinder aircraft engine which produced 250 horsepower. The Wisconsin Special had one goal, to set a land speed record, for the better part of a decade Sig and his team worked on improving the car. In 1922, it was reported that Haugdahl and the Winsconsin Special reached 180 mph at Daytona Beach, Florida. This would have beaten the existing record by 47 mph, however, an official sanctioning body recognized by Association Internationale des Automobile Clubs Reconnus (eventually this became the FIA). 180 mph wouldn't officially be reached until 1927 by Henry Segrave and his 1000 hp Sunbeam.
Always the showman Haugdahl partnered with Mabel Cody's Flying Circus, who flew her plane above Sig Haugdahl's car on Daytona Beach while a stuntman would climb from the moving car to the plane. Mabel Cody, the niece of Buffalo Bill Cody, performed her aerial stunt show at fairs and for events organized by real estate developers to attract potential land and homebuyers to Coral Gables.
When not chasing land speed records, Sig could be found racing as far west as California before returning to the mid-west to challenge the IMCA National Championship which he won six years in a row from 1927-1932. He picked up the nickname "the Flying Norwegian" and using his relative fame, toured the country with the first manned rocket-powered car, of his own design. His first exhibition with the rocket car took place on June 17, 1932, at the Bo Sterns Speedway, Wichita, Kansas.
Haugdahl eventually retired from racing in 1934 and moved to Florida where he took up golf, but he couldn't stay away from motorsports for long and in 1936 he, Millard Conklin, and Bill France designed a 3.2-mile oval course that was partly on Daytona Beach and State Road A1A, the first AAA action stock car race was held on March 8th, 1936. The race drew thousands of fans, but they arrived before the ticketing booths were set up so the event lost thousands of dollars, but this experience went on to inspire Bill France to found NASCAR, just up the beach at the Streamline Hotel in 1947. Sig would attempt to promote one more race in 1937, but eventually retired completely from motorsports and lived out his life in Florida, passing February 4, 1970. He was inducted into the National Sprint Car Hall of Fame in Knoxville, Iowa in 1994.
Images via: Florida History, & Daytona Beach Historic Society
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