The Glidden Tours: How a Road Trip Proved the Car Was Here to Stay

Today, we hardly think twice about hopping in a car for a cross-country drive. But in the early 1900s, the automobile was a noisy, unreliable novelty—and most Americans trusted a horse over a horseless carriage. That skepticism started to fade thanks to a bold idea from the American Automobile Association (AAA).

In 1904, the AAA launched a 1,350-mile tour from New York City to the World’s Fair in St. Louis. The rules were simple: no racing. Drivers could hit 20 mph on open roads and 15 mph in town. The real challenge was the roads themselves—mud, gravel, cobblestones, and dirt. Out of 77 vehicles that started, 66 crossed the finish line after 18 days.

The message was clear: cars could handle the worst America threw at them, and they did it faster than any horse.

That first tour was meant to be a one-off, but Boston millionaire Charles J. Glidden had other ideas. A retired telecom tycoon who had already driven his car to the Arctic Circle and around the world, Glidden convinced the AAA to make it an annual event. He put up a $2,000 prize and a trophy, and the tour was renamed in his honor.

Glidden even paid for road repairs, tolls, and the occasional farm animal that didn’t get out of the way in time.

The Glidden Tours ran from 1905 to 1913. Automakers like Cadillac, Pierce-Arrow, Oldsmobile, and Stevens-Duryea used their finishes as bragging rights in advertisements. The AAA sent pilot cars ahead to mark routes with confetti and arranged hotels and meals for drivers. It wasn’t always smooth—some motorists were held at gunpoint in Virginia for hitting dogs, and a few spent the night in jail cells when hotels were full.

By the time the tours ended, the numbers told the story. In 1904, only one in a thousand Americans owned a car. By 1913, it was one in 35. The Glidden Tours didn’t just prove cars could survive bad roads—they proved the automobile was here to stay.