Joe Cooper, driving a Duesenberg car, was killed during the twenty-eighth lap of the first derby on the Des Moines speedway this afternoon. This afternoon he lost control of his machine in rounding a turn and crashed thru a fence. His mechanician, Lewis Peil, was badly injured and may die. The car overturned and the unfortunate driver was caught beneath the machine. When those hurrying to the rescue arrived and righted the machine the man was dead.
DES MOINES SPEEDWAY, Aug. 7 -- Promptly at 1:30 o'clock this afternoon Ralph De Palma in his Stutz special followed by ten other speed kings, cheered by the thousands in stands and parked automobiles, started the first derby on Des Moines' new speedway west of Valley Junction.
De Palma led the field for the first pace. At the conclusion of the second two laps which were a preliminary lap the red flag was dropped, the throttles were thrown wide open and at the end of the first ten miles De Palma was leading followed closely by Cooper, O'Donnell, Mulford and Shrunk in the in the order named. De Palma obtained a good lead at the outset. He was closely pursued at the seventh lap, however, by the other four drivers, who negotiated the mile-lap in 39 seconds.
Bruno Lombardi was the first driver to be eliminated from the number of the starters. At the end of the tenth lap a broken connecting rod put his O.C. Special out of commission and he was forced to retire from the race.
The qualifying races this morning added four entries to the number of starters that began the 300-mile race. Brown, Henderson, Scott and Barndollar, all of whom had failed in a first qualifying trial, succeeded in the tests today.
At the end of the twentieth lap, De Palma was still leading with O'Donnell second; Cooper, third; Mulford, fourth; Chandler, fifth. The official time for the distance was not announced, but was said to be close to 95 miles an hour.
Following is a list of the drivers cars and mechanicians in the order named: