The Aughts, the Teens, the Twenties—Oh, my!
The first several decades of the twentieth century promised great technological leaps forward, and it certainly delivered. No invention achieved as much as the automobile, which completely overturned current transportation modes and the cultures built around them, freeing the world’s population—for those who could afford an automobile—a new way to travel faster and farther.
1897 Knox buggy at Overman Wheel Co. Harry Knox is at the tiller. image courtesy John Hess collection
Auto companies rose and fell with the tides of the economy, no matter what country was concerned. Automotive entrepreneurs—engineers, inventors, visionaries—all swam in this sea from opportunity to opportunity, seeding new possibilities as they created or worked in new auto companies. Some firms succeeded, but most failed. Consider the following three.
Chapter 4: Mercer
Mercer was created in 1910 out of the bankruptcy of another company. The founding members Mercer, successful businessmen in their own right, saw opportunity and jumped on it.
Mercer captured a moment in automobile history when, along with Stutz, they both epitomized the Generation 1 cutdown speedster. Mercer’s 1912 Type 35 Raceabout was low, light, and fast. This was the car to take to the track, strip off the fenders and accessories, win the race, grab a trophy, and be home in time for dinner. It was ingeniously designed, ruggedly built, powerfully equipped, and performed like a champ.
1911 Mercer Type 35 Raceabout. Image courtesy AACA Library
Mercer became a rising star in the teen years of the twentieth century, only to fall apart in the twenties. This chapter considers why a company with such promise would founder and sink during a booming economy—or was it booming? We’ll discuss that and other points.
“Fast Eddie” Pullen was Trenton’s hometown hero and a Mercer man, a journeyman racer who didn’t always win the laurels, but was always a contender. How he managed to perform so well and walk away relatively unscathed from such a deadly sport is part of his mystique which informs the biographic on Eddie.
Eddie Pullen sitting on the tire of his Mercer Type 45. Check out the shoes, man! image courtesy Tim Kuser collection
Chapter 5: Stutz
When compared to the Mercer, Stutz was the bulldog on the porch. Rugged, big engine, made to go fast and far, Stutz Bearcats were tough in a fight and often came out on top.
1912-1914 Bear-cat. By 1914 the hyphen disappeared to become the Bearcat. image courtesy AACA Library.
Harry Stutz was the inventive entrepreneur who started the company in 1911 but got bamboozled by a stock manipulator and squeezed out of his own firm by 1919.
Harry C. Stutz c. 1910. image courtesy Indiana Historical Society
The ideal Motor Car Company, later renamed Stutz, carried on with a variety of speedsters and other luxury-oriented models through the teens and twenties, but fell on hard times in the thirties. Its last-ditch effort to invoke its Bearcat glory days was too little, too late, as the company had long since decoupled from racing as a means to advertise its brand.
1931 Stutz ad, invoking the Bearcat era and its energy. image courtesy AACA Library
Erwin “Cannon Ball” Baker was the Paul Bunyon of early transcontinental elapsed time records. His first major breakthrough came from driving a 1914 Bearcat to a new coast-to-coast record. We ride with Baker in this chapter’s bio piece.
Cannon Ball Baker on his 1914 Stutz Bearcat and under a load of road mud, 1914 transcontinental record run. Image courtesy AACA Library
Chapter 6: Ford Model T
In all of the book, the Ford Motor Company is the only firm that did not officially make a speedster as part of its lineup. They came close with the 1907 Model K Runabout, a strong seller of the era of limited-production quotas. Outfitted with a “big six” and minimally attired, the Model K was a rich man’s speedster, not what Henry wanted to achieve. So it was discontinued.
1907 Ford Model K Gentleman’s Roadster, a.k.a. Speedster. Image courtesy Philadelphia Free Library
After the Model T was introduced in 1908, Ford Motor did produce a 1911 Model T Runabout (for one year only) that was very “sporty” for its day. Once again, the company came close to producing a sport model, but then it backed off in favor of its mandate to produce an affordable People’s car. Which it did—15 million of them by 1927!
1911 Torpedo Runabout. image courtesy AACA Library
In the meantime, track racing arose as a country woke up to the possibility of watching hotshoes at the local county fair tear up dirt tracks as they raced each other for laurels, glory, and cash money.
County Fair Race in Marquette, Michigan. image courtesy Jack Deo, Superior View Photo
Henry’s reluctance to get involved with racing or performance cars did not stop the groundswell of interest among teens and speedster-minded folk who just had to get a jalop to work on and improve. Rather, Henry’s stubbornness inspired youth to forge their own future.
Boy with custom-bodied T speedster, a bridge from the open cutdown to the semi-enclosed sport body. image courtesy AACA Library
Thousands of tinkerers sweated under shade trees and in barns to make Dad’s old cast-off flivver go faster—there were scads of used-up Model Ts sitting around in people’s yards and farm lots by 1912, replaced by newer ones because Model Ts were so cheap.
What arose was a grassroots phenomenon: the Model T speedster movement. Out of this experimentation with engine performance, suspension improvements, body shells crafted to pop onto a Ford Model T or Chevy 490 chassis, as well as baubles and gee-gaws to accessorize and personalize one’s creation—an industry arose to create the products and sell them to hobbyists clamoring for parts.
Early T speedster bodies, cutdown style. images courtesy AACA Library
Sport-bodies for 1922.
Accessories abounded, like these Champion radiators for the Ford model T speedster.
1921 Craig-Hunt Speedway Engine, an example of what you could get if you had enough moola!
The Model T speedster is the root of the American hotrod movement. More than that, it also spawned the modern parts industry and nourished the growth of speed events: landspeed, hillclimbs, track racing and endurance trials. Even drag racing evolved out of the fast Ford movement. This chapter opens that topic for further discussion.
Also covered in this chapter is a look at Edsel Ford, Henry and Clara Ford’s only offspring, a boy who grew to be president of both Ford Motor and Lincoln at the same time. Edsel was also a major benefactor to Detroit’s art culture. And a speedster. nut…
Edsel as a teen, curbside in one of his Model T speedsters. image courtesy The Henry Ford
Edsel, gifted with an artistic sensibility, was designing speedsters by the age of ten. While he was president at Lincoln, Edsel partnered with designer E.T. Gregorie to create three memorable and historic speedsters; the boy had become a man, but the speedster spirit that he developed in his youth had never left his psyche.
1934 Model 40 Speedster, a collaboration between E.T. “Bob” Gregorie and Edsel Ford. Ronald Sieber photo
Edsel was a remarkable personality who unfortunately lived in the shadow of his father’s domineering nature. Otherwise, we may have witnessed a Ford speedster being manufactured in the 1930s! A pity…
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We are climbing a 20-foot ladder while holding a 60-pound bundle of roof shingles. Or, at least it seems that way in working on delivering the book to the printer by October.
What a slog…
But, we are getting there, one rung at a time… wish me luck.
And, practice social distancing—go drive that speedster!