Otto Merz

Otto Merz
Born (1889-06-12)June 12, 1889
Esslingen am Neckar
Died May 18, 1933(1933-05-18)
Berlin, Germany
Nationality German
Occupation chauffeur, engineer, mechanic, race car driver
Known for race car driver

Otto Merz (born 12 June 1889 in Esslingen am Neckar, Kingdom of Württemberg of the German Empire) was a chauffeur, race car driver, test driver and mechanic. He died during a practice run in a modified Mercedes SSK on 18 May 1933, in Berlin, Germany.

Origin and family

Merz was a son of locksmith Karl Gottlob Merz, and his fathersʼ wife Christine Margarete Merz née Blessing, residing in Esslingen. Otto Merz was also a resident of Esslingen. He married in Schelklingen on 19 October 1918 Maria Hoch, lady help, born Allmendingen 22 January 1889, daughter of Leo Hoch and Maria Hoch née Autenrieth. Her father was leaseholder of the canteen of the cement factory in Schelklingen. Merzʼ profession was that of a chauffeur, and both husband an wife were of Protestant faith.[1]

Otto Merz' wife and daughter in his racing car in front of the canteen of the Schelklingen cement factory where his father-in-law was leaseholder

Early career

In 1906, aged sixteen, Merz was hired by Daimler as a mechanic. He also worked as a chauffeur and mechanic for several wealthy motor car enthusiasts, such as Theodore Dreher (died 1914), Austrian motor sport sponsor and son of the famous brewer, and the Saxon industrialist Willy Pöge.[2]

Adventure Sarajevo

On 28 June 1914, as the chauffeur for Count Alexander von Boos-Waldeck, Merz drove the third car in an official motorcade in which the Archduke Franz Ferdinand toured Sarajevo, and may have witnessed the assassination of the Archduke by Gavrilo Princip. According to the story told later, Merz reacted quickly to the gunshots. One of the first to reach Franz Ferdinand, he lifted the rather stout Archduke from his seat and carried him to a nearby house.[3] However, that day there were two attempts on Franz Ferdinand's life; in the first one, Nedeljko Čabrinović threw a bomb with a 10-second fuse at the archduke's car; the driver accelerated when he saw something thrown at them, and the bomb rolled under the wheels of the following car, seriously injuring Boos-Waldeck, Merz's employer, and Eric von Merizzi. Later in the day, Princip serendipitously encountered the motorcade, and fired his weapon at the Archduke, killing him and his wife. Regardless of the veracity of the story, Merz apparently possessed great physical strength; in 1929, he ripped the parts off his damaged Mercedes with his bare hands.[4]

Racing career

Merz took up on racing in the early 1920s, achieving victories at Solitude and at the Klaussen Pass hillclimb in 1924. His so-called finest hour came by winning the 1927 German Grand Prix at the Nürburgring at the wheel of Mercedes-Benz S sports car, beating his team mate Christian Werner by three minutes at the finish line. The following year, Merz completed the race in second place; Rudolf Caracciola and Werner shared the driving duties in the winning car; similarly Werner also drove the third placed car, in combination with Willy Walb. Merz was the sole driver of the Mercedes Benz SS around the 18 laps of the daunting Nürbrugring Nordschleife, at racing pace, an achievement for which he was widely praised. This tour de force, his amusing ability to hammer nails through wood with his bare hands, together with his reported attempt to rescue Franz Ferdinand fourteen years earlier, forged the imagery of Metz the colossus, as he became known.[5]

Otto Merz

These wins did not catapult Merz into a full-time racing career; he participated in races on occasion, such as in the 1929 Tourist Trophy in Ireland, won by his teammate Caracciola. Merz was usually listed only as a reserve driver, but he did see action at the International Alpine Trial and at the ADAC long distance trials. In 1931 he shared Caracciola’s Mercedes-Benz SSKL in the French Grand Prix at Montlhéry, a grueling ten-hour race in the full 12.5-kilometer circuit, but the car's supercharger failed after 39 laps. That same year Merz obtained a fifth place at the German Grand Prix at Nürburgring in a sister SSKL car. The six points he scored with Caracciola at the French Grand Prix – the duo completed one-third of the race – tied them for the fiftieth-first place in the final classification table of the European Championship, won that year by Ferdinando Minoia. The following year Mercedes stayed away from the racing circles, and Merz continued to work at the firm as an experimental and test driver. Even though Mercedes was officially in hiatus, Merz was entered as an alternative driver for the Großer Preis von Deutschland, but he did not take part on the event.[6]

Mercedes-Benz returned to racing in 1933; the company’s management wanted to win the AVUS Race; that event, to be held on 21 May in the German capital, was to be attended by high government dignitaries and would be a great opportunity to demonstrate Mercedes' technical prowess. Taking the nine-kilometer long straights of the Berlin track into consideration, the Mercedes-Benz team produced a streamlined SSKL for the occasion. Caracciola, who was back to the firm, would be the first choice to drive it, but he was still in the hospital, convalescing from fractures and injuries suffered during a practice accident for the Monaco Grand Prix on 23 April in a private Alfa Romeo. Under such circumstances, Merz had the SSKL seat in the AVUS Race. Possibly he was invited by the team to drive: Merz had been a popular employee since 1906, and was in good standing with the management; it is also possible that Merz offered his services. Although only 43, he had semi-retired from racing, but enjoyed driving and may have considered this race as his last chance to compete in a widely publicized event. Whatever the reason, Mercedes outsiders were surprised to see Metz in the car.[6]

Last practice and death

The first official practice session for the AVUS Race took place on Thursday, 18 May. A heavy rain drenched the track, and Mercedes Team drivers Manfred von Brauchitsch and Merz wanted to try their heavy SSK streamliners under those conditions. Witnesses reported that the cars were sliding in several locations on the track, and that it was very difficult to drive in such a weather.[6]

A few minutes after 13:00, Merz crashed his SSK on the long straight, near the Grunewald station and nearly two kilometers away from the finish line. At the place of the accident the surface changed from cobblestones to tarmac, and traces of the car trajectory were clearly visible on the cobblestones - but suddenly ended. The next mark left by the vehicle was found 36 meters further on, where the car hit the ground again. The Mercedes-Benz crashed into a cement milestone on the right side of the track, and, according to the single eye-witness, it somersaulted and rolled several times. The car stopped with its wheels in the air near an embankment.[6] Ejected from the car, rescuers found Merz on his back on the right side of the track. He was transported to the Hildegard Hospital at Charlottenburg, a suburb of Berlin and very near the accident site, but his condition was beyond help.[6]

Cause of accident

Investigators later concluded that Merz had lost control of the car for a few moments, leading to the accident. A fundamental difference between Brauchitsch's and Merz's Mercedes was determined to have caused the accident. Brauchitsch's had a differently streamlined body than Merz's: on the Brauchitzch SSK, modified by König-Fachsenfeld, the tail comes a high point. Mercedes had modified Merz's SSK differently, and the Sindelfinden-made body of Merz’s car curved down markedly at the rear, a configuration much more likely to create substantial lift.The characteristics of the accident, and the fact that it happened in an untested vehicle has led many experts, including Karl Ludwigsen, to believe that the aerodynamic configuration of Merz’s car may have played an important role in this tragedy.[6]

Racing victories

Record of Merz's wins in the course of his career:[7]

Further Reading

References

  1. ↑ Stadtarchiv (Municipal Archive) Schelklingen, Heiratsbuch (Marriage Register) 1916–1920, Jahrgang (Year) 1918, Eintrag Nr. (entry no.) 10. According to this marriage entry the place of birth of Otto Merz was not Bad Cannstatt but Esslingen am Neckar. Likewise, Otto Merzʼ birth certificate says that he was born in Esslingen, Kupferstraße 7 (today Kupfergasse) .
  2. ↑ The Gold Era of Grand Prix, Golden Era Drivers, "M" Accessed 27 July 2009, Here A dedicated and capable employee, Merz advanced in the Daimler organization and remained faithful to the Mercedes -- and later Mercedes Benz -- throughout his life.
  3. ↑ Motorsport Memorial, here.
  4. ↑ Golden Era Drivers.
  5. ↑ Golden Era Drivers; Motorsport Memorial.
  6. 1 2 3 4 5 6 Motorsport Memorial.
  7. ↑ The Gold Era of Grand Prix, Golden Era Drivers, Accessed 27 July 2009, Here.
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