LA CHAUX-DE-FONDS, Switzerland -- Louis-Joseph Chevrolet has long been neglected in his hometown, even though he gave his name to one of the world's most popular cars and was one of the early 20th century's best drivers.
Now the townspeople want to make amends.
"I feel very close to this incredible man," said Andre Rochat, one of the originators of the Louis Chevrolet Event, a road rally that started four years ago. This year's rally lasted three days and ended Sunday.
"He had an unbelievable career, and he is very unknown," Rochat said.
Chevrolet is known as creator of some of the world's fastest cars, but he could be for his driving skills.
In his first race, in 1905, he beat Barney Oldfield, then the leading American driver, and set a world speed record, driving a measured mile in a then-astounding 52.8 seconds, or 68.2 miles per hour.
He went on to set records on every major U.S. track.
"He was a great race driver," said Rochat. "At that time he was the best in the world."
If he wasn't driving the winning car, the winner was often driving a car he had designed and built, many with names other than Chevrolet. In fact, he was associated with the firm that bears his name for only a few years.
Besides organizing the annual road rally, La Chaux-de-Fonds has named a street after Chevrolet, noting that he was born here on Christmas Day, 1878.
The timing is special this year: it marks 100 years since Louis Chevrolet set out for the New World.
Marc Schluessel, who came up with the idea of honoring Chevrolet when he was the town's tourism director, said the rally is catching on. There were 13 entrants when it began and about 80 this year.
Some of the cars are antiques. Many of them bear Chevrolet's name, and the drivers are passionate fans of the make.
Ferruccio Nessi, a lawyer from southern Switzerland, said his grandfather father owned Chevrolets and he always wanted one, too, so it was only natural he would buy a red 1957 Corvette.
"We rebuilt the car completely," said Nessi, who even wears a leather Louis Chevrolet-style skullcap when he drives the convertible.
Even more devoted is a participant who came from farthest away -- Steve Della Vella, 50, of Flemington, N.J.
"The baby boomer generation in the U.S. loves the Chevrolet," Della Vella said. "They are the easiest to soup up, they're the most attractive and they hold their value on resale."
He said he still has his first car, a used '57 Chevy convertible his father bought him when he started driving to high school.
The mechanically inclined Chevrolet spent only the first 10 years of his life in the La Chaux-de-Fonds area in the heart of Switzerland's watchmaking Jura mountains. Then the Chevrolets moved in 1888 to Beaune, France, where his father opened a small watch shop. As a teen-ager the boy got a job in a bicycle repair shop.
Legend has it that Chevrolet was discovered by a member of the Vanderbilt family when the rich American's car broke down in front of the bicycle shop in the spring of 1896 or 1897.
The owner of the shop was unable to get the engine going again, but young Louis, who was filing a cogged wheel in the back of the shop, stepped forward to save the day.
The impressed Vanderbilt is said to have told Chevrolet, "Come to America! There's work for you there. When you come, look me up. Here's my address."
Whether he ever found Vanderbilt again is unknown, but in 1900 Louis Chevrolet set out for Montreal, where he worked as a driver-mechanic and learned English. He always retained his native French accent, however.
He soon moved to the United States, where he started working for car makers in New York and taking an interest in car racing.
He started designing his own engine for a new car in 1909 and two years later -- with General Motors founder William Crapo Durant -- started the Chevrolet Motor Car Company of Michigan, which produced the Baby Grand. Chevrolet had differences with Durant over the design and in 1915 sold him his share in the company. The next year Durant brought it into General Motors.
Versions differ on who created the famous Chevy "bowtie." Some accounts say it was Chevrolet, who based it on a wind-swept version of the Swiss national emblem, a cross. But others maintain it was Durant, who saw it in a wallpaper motif he saw in a Paris hotel.
After leaving Durant, Louis Chevrolet continued racing and designing cars.
A car Chevrolet designed and was driven by his brother, Gaston, won the Indianapolis 500 in 1920. Louis gave up race driving that year when his brother was killed in a race, and tried building airplanes, but failed and returned to the Chevrolet company in 1936 as a minor employee.
He died in 1941 and, like Gaston, is buried in Indianapolis.
