1903 Packard Model K-S Gray Wolf Racer

The Packard Grey Wolf is one of the most famous cars in early racing history. In 1901, the Packard brothers went to Europe in search of an engineer to design their first four-cylinder automobile. Charles Schmidt agreed to accompany them if he was allowed to build a race car to demonstrate the performance of the new Packard Model K. Only one example was built, at a cost of $10,000, and in January of 1904, Mr. Schmidt set two land speed records at Ormond Beach, FL, in the Grey Wolf. The original car won several other races and was wrecked several times.

On January 2, 1904, Charles Schmidt drove the lightning-quick Packard Gray Wolf, at 1,430 pounds, to a new five-mile record of 4:21.6 minutes, in the medium weight category. At the same time, the Stevens-Duryea Company brought its Spider to compete in the lightweight category. The Spider, with Otto Nestman at the wheel, set the five-mile record for his class at 4:47.8 minutes.

This example is a recreation of the Grey Wolf, from the original Packard plans. Every part was made exactly per the blueprints, 100 years later. The car returned to Ormond Beach in 2004 to re-enact the land speed record attempt.