9 replies to this topic

[Oleksij Hrushko]

Hello!
I read the wonderful articles by Uechtel on 8w.forix.com (http://8w.forix.com/df2-intro.html and so on) about the racing in Germany in the first decade after WWII. And I want to read some more. I made a list of books, but I'm not sure that they are all good and useful according to the theme (mostly national car racing in Germany in 1940-1950s). Here it is:
General
C.F. Riedl Schnelle Motoren - Schnelle Männer 1956 94 pages
Günther Molter / Kurt Wörner German Racing Cars and Drivers. Pre-War and Post-War 1950 190 pages
Reinald Schumann Motorsport in Deutschland 1945-1955 1992 288 pages
Wolfgang Melenk Meister des Sports. Der Automobilrennsport in der DDR 2004 192 pages
Horst Ihling Autorennsport in der DDR 2006 192 pages
Erich Rackwitz / Hans Oliva Asphalt-Tempo-Silberpfeile 1953 230 pages
Kirchner, Axel Motorsport in Berlin 1947 bis 1967 2003 189 pages
Rosenhammer und Grassmann Motorsport Almanach 1953 1953 199 pages
Rosenhammer und Grassmann Motorsport-Jahrbuch 1954 1954 180 pages
Arthur Rosenhammer, Günter Graßmann Das neue Motorsport Jahrbuch 1955 170 pages
Rosenhammer, Arthur und Günther Grassmann Das neue Motorsport Jahrbuch 1956 171 pages
Rosenhammer und Thiele Motorsport-Jahrbuch 1957 1957 225 pages
Frankenberg, Richard Internationaler Motorsport 1954: Ein umfangreiche Dokumentation über den Auto- und Motorrad-Rennsport 1954 1954 320 pages
Internationaler Motorsport - Jahrbuch über den Rennsport - Auto und Motorrad - aus dem Jahre 1954 1955 318 pages
Motorsport Competitions in Germany: Auto Races in Germany, Auto Racing Series in Germany, German Motorcycle Grand Prix 2010
75 Jahre ADAC Württemberg. Jubiläumsschrift 1903-1978 1978 160 pages
Biographies
Michael Behrndt / Jörg-Thomas Födisch, Matthias Behrndt "Deutsche Rennfahrer. Portraits, Bilder und Erfolge aus 100 Jahren" 2008 200 pages
Herbert Beyer Paul Greifzu - Ein Leben für den Motorsport 1954 164 pages
Evi Butz Edgar Barth, 30 Jahre Rennen 1966 143 pages
Wolfgang Melenk, Mike Jordan Rennsportlegende Heinz Melkus 2008 128 pages
Citcuits
Motorsport Venues in Germany: Nürburgring, Hockenheimring, Avus, Eurospeedway Lausitz, Sachsenring, Motorsport Arena Oschersleben 2010 56 pages
Michael Behrndt / Jörg-Thomas Födisch / Matthias Behrndt ADAC Eifelrennen. Die Geschichte der traditionsreichsten Motorsportveranstaltung Deutschlands seit 1922 2009 276 pages
Födisch / Völker / Behrndt Der Grosse Preis von Deutschland. Alle Rennen seit 1926 2008 280 pages
Michael Behrndt / Jörg-Thomas Födisch Stille Eifel, schneller Ring. Der Nürburgring aud seine Geschichte 2008 160 pages
Richard von Frankenberg Der Nürburgring 1965 236 pages
Födisch / Ostrovsky Grüne Hölle Nürburgring 1994 128 pages
Jörg-Thomas Födisch Der Nürburgring 1996 408 pages
Thora Hornung Die Nürburgring Story - 60 Jahre Rennsport-Faszination 1992 252 pages
Motorsport in Germany: List of Nordschleife Lap Times, Nrburgring Lap Times, List of Races at the Nrburgring, Auteg Motorsport
Thora Hornung Bremsen-Schalten-Gas - Die Nürburgring-Story 1975 230 pages
Frank-Albert Illg / Thomas Mehne Die Solitude-Rennen 2003 488 pages
Tobias Aichele / Bernd J. Schüppel Das Solitude-Jubiläum. Mythen und Legenden 2004 190 pages
Graf Seherr-Thoss Solitude 1903-1965. Die Automobilrennen 1990 160 pages
Herz / Tesseraux Der Hockenheimring – Eine Rennstrecke in Bildern 2000 240 pages
Eberhard Reuß Hockenheimring. Die Geschichte der legendären Rennstrecke 2008 224 pages
Ernst Christ Wie Hockenheim zu einer Rennstrecke kam 1978 98 pages
R. Kitschigin Rennen Reifen und Rekorde - Die Avus Story 1972 258 pages
Axel Kirchner Die Avus. Deutschlands legendäre Rennstrecke - Acht Jahrzehnte Motorsport 2008 288 pages
Kubisch / Rietner Die Avus im Rückspiegel 1989 112 pages
30 Jahre Sachsenring 1957 78 pages
Hein Schlüter Die Hamburger Stadtpark-Rennen 2009 119 pages
Seiff, Ingo Der Schottenring 1994 128 pages
Henning Volle Bergrekord am Schauinsland. Die Geschichte des berühmten ADAC-Bergrennens 2009 162 pages
Martin Walter, Heinz Jordan Das Herkules Bergrennen in Kassel 2005 112 pages
Cars
Edler / Roediger Die Deutschen Rennfahrzeuge 1988 268 pages
Karl Ludvigsen BMW Racing Cars. 328 to Racing V12 2007 128 pages

Can you add some useful books to this list? Can you help to make a right choice? Do the year books all different? Thanks in advance.

Edited by Oleksij Hrushko, 24 October 2010 - 20:53.

[uechtel]

Hello Oleksij, thanks for the ovations. And quite along list, seems you want to get really into it. Well, as for me this is of course my favourite area of interest I may possibly a little bit biased here and there, but if curiosity is really limited only on the 40s and 50s then my absolute favourite is

Reinald Schumann Motorsport in Deutschland 1945-1955 1992 288 pages
This book was my entry into the subject and by reading it it opened a completely new motor racing scenery of which I had known almost nothing before. It contains a detailed all-embracing overview of the happenings in West Germany, from the technical aspects, the sporting side up to the political backgrounds, in addition with plenty of nice and interesting side stories. My special credit goes to the author as obviously he could resist dedicating too many pages to the Silberpfeil issue. To my taste he could have left out this subject completely, but maybe there had been some market pressure. What I miss in the book is the almost complete absence of the East German part of the history, but one can not really blame the author for this, regarding the circumstances when the book was published around 1990.

To fill this gap I before everything else would also recommend
Horst Ihling Autorennsport in der DDR 2006 192 pages
again a very comprehensive work about the East German motorsport with lots of background on the state-controlled racing team and the various special builders. Compared to the Schumann book it to my taste it lacks a little bit on the descriptions of the races themselves and it could have also done without the pre-war history, which seems to be a little bit off the topic and yet takes a quite big part of the book.

Well, and with the West and the East part being covered now, the missing gap is to be closed by
Kirchner, Axel Motorsport in Berlin 1947 bis 1967 2003 189 pages
as the title indicates this one has a more local focus, but nevertheless remains open to cover also the interrelations to general aspects and the more global developments. One of the highlights of the book is the very complete depiction of the political events on association level in the background. I think the book contains also motorbikes, but I have to admit I don´t had much interest on that.

Unfortunately I still miss a good publication about the fourth part of Germany, the motorsport history of the Saarland, which seems to have been also very colourful and obviously quite different to the rest of the country.

Now after my personal favourites some remarks on the rest (which does not necessarily mean, that these are lesser books, but usually concentrate on particular aspects or are rather historical documents themselves than representing the current state of the history):

General
Günther Molter / Kurt Wörner German Racing Cars and Drivers. Pre-War and Post-War 1950 190 pages
Quite a nice time document. About half of the book is dedicated to Silver Arrow glory of pre-war era, but the rest does contain some nice photos, unfortunately only in very small format. As far as I remember the text is not too revealing, but it is always a nice completion for one´s personal library.

Wolfgang Melenk Meister des Sports. Der Automobilrennsport in der DDR 2004 192 pages
The book has the format of an encyclopaedia, concentrating completely on the various models and its creators. Many nice fotos, but I miss any comprehensive descriptions on the races.

Rosenhammer und Grassmann Motorsport Almanach various years
Like the title says these are yearbooks, mainly valuable to me because of a couple of statistic pages. About the rest one must have the editorial background in mind, it gives the East German public some information about the events of the international sporting scene, but certainly of no really historical important depth. The rest is filled up with fictional short stories and also a little bit propaganda here and there...

Biographies
Herbert Beyer Paul Greifzu - Ein Leben für den Motorsport 1954 164 pages

and in a similar kind:

Rudi Krause: Zwischen Box und Fahrerlager
Well don´t expect too much objectivity from East German publications of the fifties. At least Greifzu could not defend himself any more, but the story is very much instrumentalized for certain propaganda purposes and generally of low journalistic level and historical accuracy.

Citcuits
Generally these books can dedicate only limited parts to the specified time period. You will occasionally find nice fotos and interesting passages here and there, but of course you will always have to buy much more book than you need on the subject.

Seiff, Ingo Der Schottenring 1994 128 pages
A pure photo book. As the majority of events was for motorcycles only a few interesting pages for the automobile sports enthusiast

Henning Volle Bergrekord am Schauinsland. Die Geschichte des berühmten ADAC-Bergrennens 2009 162 pages
A nice and comprehensive work, which was fun to read, but of course a big part of the book is outside the specified range of interest. Nevertheless some nice fotos and some "special chapters" on some side-aspects of the event

Cars
Edler / Roediger Die Deutschen Rennfahrzeuge 1988 268 pages
The book is a re-print of a 1950ies East German edition. A very technical approach without any "stories"


Noteable also:
Hans-Peter Rosellen Die Veritas-Story
To my knowledge still the only biography on this legendary make. But published in the 1970ies it has got a little bit outdated now and contains a lot of inaccuracies.

Ludwig Fischer: Der Kampf des Autorennfahrers
The right book for readers with a proper sense of humour. Not that this autobiography was not meant seriously, but it is expression of a certain degree of self-overestimation by the author and has a quite 'progressive' (others would perhaps say 'chaotic') layout...

[Arjan de Roos]

I suppose a wonderful period of racing. One important word from those days was 'Eigenbau' that is translated as 'Special'. Though the latter would make you believe all were shiny cars as at Indy though the former litterally means 'own built' mostly from other cars parts and even more handcrafted. Especially the various shapes of the cars is interesting for study.

[uechtel]

You can have endless discussions about the words "Eigenbau" and "Spezial", which both exists in German. While the former should be translated as "self-built" to my understanding the latter defines anything 'non-standard', which may be either a much modified variation of a production model, but also any unique specimen if there is no series at all.

[Oleksij Hrushko]

Thanks for response! Received the 'Motorsport in Deutschland 1945-1955' yesterday - great book! Will buy the rest of the books little by little...
And I think that one more book have to be added to the list - Paul Pietsch's biography by Mike Riedner (Doppelsieg. Der Rennfahrer und Verleger Paul Pietsch) - I remembered that he was racing after the war too, and even he was the champion of West German F2 in 1951.
And I have one more question about next books:
Arthur Rosenhammer, Günter Graßmann Das neue Motorsport Jahrbuch 1955 170 pages
Rosenhammer, Arthur und Günther Grassmann Das neue Motorsport Jahrbuch 1956 171 pages
Are they different or the same text (just reprint in adjacent years)?
Frankenberg, Richard Internationaler Motorsport 1954: Ein umfangreiche Dokumentation über den Auto- und Motorrad-Rennsport 1954. 1954, 320 pages
Internationaler Motorsport - Jahrbuch über den Rennsport - Auto und Motorrad - aus dem Jahre 1954. 1955, 318 pages
Are this books differen, or different sellers use different titles?

[David McKinney]

I suspect Motorsport Almancah is a precursor of the 1954 Jahrbuch
It's a 1953 publication covering the sport on two wheels and four, with a strong DDR slant
Edited by Rosenhammer and Grassmann, so probably not related to the von Frankenburg work

Edited by David McKinney, 13 November 2010 - 10:23.

[uechtel]

Correct. The Rosenhammer/Grassmann/Thiele yearbooks are an East German series. The other two I don´t know, but I think you should not expect the same level of information and details as modern yearbooks.

And congratulations for the buy of the Schumann book!

[Oleksij Hrushko]

Received the Rosenhammer/Grassmann 'Motorsport Almanach 1953' today. Very interesting book, especially the chapters 'Motorsportler von A biz Z' and 'Rennmaschinen - Rennwagen'. But I expected more from statistical section of the book and at least a brief reviews of DDR races in 1952.

[uechtel]

...you should not expect the same level of information and details as modern yearbooks...

Edited by uechtel, 30 December 2010 - 13:10.

[Oleksij Hrushko]

Karl Ludvigsen BMW Racing Cars. 328 to Racing V12 2007 128 pages
This is photo album, 1 page = 1 photo. approx 10 pictures relates to the topic

R. Kitschigin Rennen Reifen und Rekorde - Die Avus Story 1972 258 pages
Very interesting book, but only 10 pages dedicated to the 1946-1953. 1 chapter dedicated to 1954 and some pages to 1954-1955 races.

Edited by Oleksij Hrushko, 14 January 2011 - 23:02.