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| Cover, 1939 Brand Prix at Belgrade, Yugoslavia
I picked this cover up on Ebay the other day from a dealer in Portugal. Only $10 but also not the best in shape with discoloration around the stamps and also some small tears.
I was very curious about this item, because the date was September 3, 1939, 2 days after the Germans invaded Poland, and yet there was a GP race after WW II had started! I had not heard anything about his event, and thought it was quite interesting. So I did some digging and hear is just the surface of what I found on Wikepdia. Since I have no Serbian language skills, I doubt I can go far with this thread. I did read somewhere else that after WWII Communist authors wanted to reinterpret the event in terms of class and elitism of the cold regime. That change of memory is really of interest to me.
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| Kafana "Srpska Kruna", starting point of a preliminary race |
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| Section at the French Embassy -- A zPreliminary Race |
The September 3 1939 Belgrade Grand Prix was held on the streets of Belgrade, the capital of Yugoslavia and was was won by Tazio Nuvolari. This race which took place at the Kalemegdan Park circuit saw 5 drivers take part - two Mercedes-Benz in their Silver Arrows, two Auto Unions, and a Bugatti.
The international race was planned as the main event within the scope of the celebration of the 16th birthday of the King of Yugoslavia, Peter II, which was on 6 September. It was organized by the Automobile Club of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia, while the patrons were the Queen mother, Maria and the Politikanewspapers.
The entire event comprised 8 separate races. First 7 included car races with lesser known drivers in the less powerful automobiles, motorcycle race and a race for motorcycles with a sidecar and a balancer. The most important race, Grand Prix, was saved for last.[2]
At the time, Belgrade had a population of 360,000 and the race attracted 100,000 spectators, so the organization of the event was challenging. At the request from the organizers which wanted as much audience as possible, the railway reduced ticket prices to Belgrade from other parts of Yugoslavia (Niš, Sarajevo, Ljubljana, Split) by 66%. On 26 August, the airplanes flew over larger cities in the entire kingdom (Belgrade, Novi Sad, Zagreb, Skopje, Niš, Sarajevo) throwing pamphlets with invitations for everyone to "use all the benefits and discounts and not to miss the greatest sports event". The post office issued a special series of 4 stamps marking the occasion. The Cvijeta Zuzorić Art Pavilion in Kalemegdan was temporarily adapted into the post office where visitors could buy a special envelopes and stamps, with also special postmarks.
Several grandstands were constructed, near the entrance into the Kalemegdan. Both were stretching downhill, in the direction of Maršala Pilsudskog to the north and Knez Mihailov Venac to the south. Along the almost entire track, 2.7 km (1.7 mi), rooms for the standing spectators were built. The tickets for seating were 10 times higher than those for standing. Due to the great popular interest, one additional grandstand was added. As it was hastily built, to convince the public that it was properly and quality constructed, the organizers summoned 600 soldiers who tested the grandstand.[2]
The contestants began to arrive in the late August 1939. The most popular were Hermann Lang and Manfred von Brauchitsch from Mercedes-Benz and Tazio Nuvolari and Hermann Paul Müller from Auto-Union. Though announced, Nuvolari didn't arrive. He was in Italy and the ban on leaving the country due to the international situation was introduced. German authorities intervened with its Italian counterparts, so Nuvolari arrived in Belgrade, being one day late. French and Hungarian teams also arrived, but the rivalry between the two German teams was the main attraction. The journalists besieged the Belgrade hotels ("Pariz", “Moskava”) where the drivers stayed. However, the greatest crowd was in front of the "Srpska Kralj" where the team members of Auto-Union were.[2] Starting on 25 August, a members of the German teams travelled in their cars for 1,400 km (870 mi) from Germany to Belgrade. The drivers from United Kingdom didn't arrive because of the safety concerns while, due to the ban on leaving Italy, Alfa Romeo and Maserati were also absent.
On 31 August the first test drive was held. During the second lap, a tire exploded on the car of the Serbian driver Lazar Radić. The explosion blocked the wheel and the car got off the track, hitting a tree and cutting it in half. The car was badly damaged, but none of the spectators were hurt, while Radić had only few scratches.[2]
During the second test drive, on 1 September 1939, Germany attacked Poland. After the news reached Belgrade, French and Hungarian drivers withdrew, while German teams continued as if nothing happened.
The crowd gathered from the early morning on 3 September. The guards and police officers removed people from the streets while special inspections were controlling the quality and the prices of the food and drink stands.[2] Pre-program included 4 car and 3 motorcycle races.
During the races, the news of United Kingdom and France declaring a war on Germany arrived. Alfred Neubauer, the manager of Mercedes-Benz Grand Prix team, came from the German embassy and told the drivers to relax and continue with the preparations for the race. However, showing his patriotism, von Brauchitsch left the venue and went to the airport to leave Belgrade. Lang notified Neubauer, who got furious. He jumped into his car and driving frantically across the city, he arrived at the airport in Bežanija where von Brauchitsch was already boarding in the Lufthansa's plane. Neubauer talked von Brauchitsch to return to the race telling him, among other things: "If you wish war, you can wait for a few hours".
As French and Hungarian teams withdrew, only the two German teams, with their "silver cars" and four drivers, participated in the race. They were joined by the local Boško Milenović, in a blue Bugatti Type 51.
The race began at 16:45. The average speed was 136 km/h (85 mph). However, racing next to the Nebojša Tower, Nuvolari exceeded the speed of 200 km/h (120 mph). Especially attractive was the Knez Mihailova Street section. As it was the highest point of the track, running fast up the hill the cars would literally fly for almost 10 m (33 ft) over the spot and immediately continue going downhill. During the race, a rock bounced from below the von Brauchitsch's car, hitting the goggles of his teammate Lang, breaking them, so Lang retired from the race.[2] He was replaced with Walter Bäumer but he soon went off the road into the grove of the poplar trees near the Nebojša Tower. Bäumer was unharmed. At the final bend (French embassy) in the 16th lap, von Brauchitsch lost control on the polished cobblestone, the car positioned crosswise and shut down. Seemingly out of nowhere, Nuvolari appeared barely missing von Brauchitsch's car. Due to the hot weather and the substrates of the streets which made the course, which was not suited for the races, almost all participants had tire problems.
Nuvolari won the race with 1:04:03, von Brauchitsch was 7.6 seconds behind him and the press described him as the "eternally second", Müller was third and 31.6 seconds late while Milenović finished fourth, albeit being 19 laps behind.
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| Tazio Nuvolari, winner of the race |
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