Editing Allison Engine Company (section)

===Allison Speedway Team Company===
Allison started as an engine and car "hot rodding" company servicing the [[Indianapolis Motor Speedway]] in [[Indianapolis]]. James Allison was the owner of the '''Indianapolis Speedway Team Company''', a race car business in Indianapolis, Indiana. While it was founded as the Indianapolis Speedway Team Company, its name changed numerous times, first to the Allison Speedway Team Company, then the Allison Experimental Company and last as the Allison Engineering Company before becoming a division of [[General Motors Corporation|General Motors]].<ref name="Leonard" />

The company's only regular production item was a patented steel-backed lead bearing, which was used in various high performance engines.{{efn|According to the "Allison War Album" produced by the company and distributed to employees prior to the end of WWII (soon after D-Day), this was a steel-backed BRONZE (not lead) bearing. According to the company document, "A Liberty engine [the company had been engaged with rebuilding these for the Army] equipped with an experimental cooling system broke down after a 31-hour test stand run because of connecting rod bearing failure.  The cause was discovered and a cure worked out in the form of a steel-backed bronze bearing. The excellence of the Allison bearing resulted in its wide use in such engines as those of Pratt & Whitney, Wright and the Rolls-Royce, and Allison became one of the leaders of the world in bearing manufacture." A by-product of this experience was the "development of a method of ultra-violet detection of defective bearing material, which won a special commendation from the U.S. Army." A copy of a Western Union telegraph from Brig General George C. Kenny, Materiel Div. Wright Field, citing this accomplishment also appears in the War Album.<ref>{{cite book |title=Allison War Album |publisher=Allison Division, General Motors Corporation |pages=8–9 |url=https://indianamemory.contentdm.oclc.org/digital/collection/AT/id/5842 |access-date=13 September 2021}}</ref>}} It also built various drive shafts, extensions and gear chains for high power engines, on demand. Later its main business was the conversion of older [[Liberty engine]]s to more powerful models, both for aircraft and marine use.

Allison needed a place where his race car engines could be modified and repaired.  On January 1, 1917 Allison moved into a building at what was to become, in later years, the [[Indianapolis Motor Speedway]].  Along with the move, Allison hired Norman H. Gillman, a very talented engineer from a competing race team, as his chief engineer.<ref name="Whitney" />