Team story
Origins
Wally Meskowski built single-seaters for the American championship, where dirt ovals still played a central role. His presence in the World Championship archive is confined to the 1960 Indianapolis 500. This was the last edition included in the Drivers’ World Championship: the race used American cars and rules, not the usual single-seaters of European Grands Prix.
The Formula 1 journey
Two Meskowski-Offenhausers raced at Indianapolis. Bob Veith, entered by Peter Schmidt, started twenty-fifth and completed all 200 laps in eighth place. Bobby Grim drove William Forbes’s car and was classified sixteenth with 194 laps.
The two owners distinguish separate programmes under the same chassis builder’s name.
Historical timeline
Three chapters in the story of Meskowski
Three episodes to revisit the people, cars and races that shaped this journey.
First appearance · Indianapolis 500
Bob Veith · Indianapolis 500 1960. The recorded position is P8; this number alone does not show whether the driver completed the race distance. This is the first recorded race start, or the first entry if the team never started a race.
Sporting landmark · Indianapolis 500
Bob Veith · Indianapolis 500 1960. The recorded position is P8; this number alone does not show whether the driver completed the race distance. This marks the first win or podium where one exists, otherwise the highest recorded placing for this constructor.
Latest recorded appearance · Indianapolis 500
Bobby Grim · Indianapolis 500 1960. The recorded position is P16; this number alone does not show whether the driver completed the race distance. This is the last race start attributed to this constructor in the archive, not necessarily the end of the organisation behind it.
A distinctive way of racing
The Offenhauser engine connected these cars to the American racing tradition. Meskowski’s work did not revolve solely around the Indianapolis 500, however. The Henry Ford museum preserves one of his 1960 cars built specifically for dirt tracks and driven by A.J.
Foyt: a different machine from Veith’s and Grim’s entries.
What remains
With that car, Foyt won thirteen of the twenty-six races he contested between 1960 and 1963, contributing to his American titles. This was a career outside the Formula 1 World Championship. Alongside the Indianapolis appearance, it shows where the constructor’s work enjoyed much greater continuity and considerably stronger results.