In 1875, Wisconsin lawmakers offered $10,000 to an inventor who could "perform a journey of at least two hundred miles, on a common road or roads" in a vehicle "propelled by its own internal power at the average rate of at least five miles per hour."

On July 16, 1878, after two years of experimenting, a pair of horseless carriages went head-to-head to win the prize.

Steaming out of Green Bay on opposite banks of the Fox River that day were the Oshkosh, a streamlined buggy with a simple design, and the Green Bay, a bulky contraption with a maze of gears and tubes.

"Barnum's circus was no greater attraction," the press reported, "and horses could not be kept anywhere near the highway when the machines came along."

The Oshkosh reached its hometown intact, but the Green Bay broke down repeatedly and had to catch up by rail. The next day, they ran head-to-head at the fair grounds (Oshkosh won) before setting off for Madison on July 20.

Along the way, the Green Bay collapsed entirely and the Oshkosh reached the finish line alone, having traveled 201 miles at an average speed of 6 mpr.

Because it failed to meet all the law's conditions, however, judges awarded its inventors only $5,000.

And despite its success, the Janesville Gazette proclaimed "that in no country in the world has there yet been discovered a steam machine which is capable of taking the place of horses."

Drivers had to wait another generation for automobiles.

-- Wisconsin Historical Society
www.wisconsinhistory.org

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