From: www.narhof.com
Nebraska Auto Racing Hall of Fame

Eddie Rickenbacker
Eddie Rickenbacker was running a Firestone-Columbus auto agency in Omaha in 1910 when he started his racing career. After a crash in his first race at Red Oak, Iowa, he entered the races at the one-mile Ak-Sar-Ben race track. He won the first nine events over the two-day meet before the promoter paid him to set out the last race so someone else would have a chance. By 1913, Rickenbacker was racing at Indianapolis, Ind., in the Indy 500. He scored one of his biggest wins at Sioux City, Iowa, on July 4, 1914, and won the event again in 1915. He then won the first race held at the Omaha Speedway board track two weeks later, driving for the powerful Maxwell team. Rickenbacker’s driving career ended when World War I broke out in 1917. In 1927, he purchased the Indianapolis Motor Speedway and ran the world’s most famous race course until he sold it to Tony Hulman in 1946. Rickenbacker passed away on July 23, 1973. He was inducted into the Nebraska Auto Racing Hall of Fame in 2002.