Transcript
Page 1: AMIGA - Detroit (AGA) Manual

Detroit (AGA)© 1994 Impressions

Manual DETROIT - OWNERS MANUAL =======================

Thank you for buying this product. It is the result of a great deal ofhard work and careful thought, and we hope that it will give you many hoursof enjoyment.

We are proud of our games, but we know that they can never be perfect. Ifyou have any ideas about how we can improve, we would be delighted to hearfrom you. Please take the time to fill out the enclosed registration card.We can then add you to our mailing list, and keep you informed of newproducts and special offers as they come out.

Please read the file on your game disk entitled README.TXT for informationon changes made and additional features added to DETROIT after this thismanuscript went to press.

TABLE OF CONTENTS-----------------

Welcome to DETROIT Objectives Installation The Game Interface

The Basics Starting Off in DETROIT The Main Factory Screen Essential Concepts Setting The Game options

Getting Things Rolling Summary Of Game Play The Roads Must Roll: Producing Your First Car The One To Buy: Creating The Demand and Supplying It.

Shifting Into High Gear The Car of the Future:Designing New Automobiles Your Own Personnal Growth Industry: Expansion and Innovation

Charting Your Progress Feedback: Gauging Your Progress with Reports Analysis: Finding Trends Over Timw With Graphs

WELCOME TO DETROIT------------------

Objectives

DETROIT begins in the year 1908. The streets of the world are filled withhorse drawn carriages and wagons, and no one has even heard of gas stationsor auto mechanics bills.

You're going to change all that.

You are a bright young entrepreneur with a dream: to use the newtechnology of the assembly line to bring the automobile to the average man,and thereby to build a company that will last a hundred years and reachevery corner of the globe. You start with a single factory, one salesoffice, $60,000 in capital funds and the design for a prototype car. Fromthat foundation, you will guide your company`s expansion, while constantlyworking to stay ahead of your competitors by creating better and bettercars for your factories to produce. You`ll make marketing decisions, hireand fire your employees, build and modernize your factories, invest inresearch to stay on the cutting edge of automobile technology, andincorporate that technology into successful designs for new cars. Yourgoal is to see to it that your company survives to the year 2008, and, inthe process, becomes the most successful automobile manufacturer in theworld.

Happy Motoring!

Installation------------

For complete instructions on how to install DETROIT and where to find helpif you need it, please refer to the technical Supplement and Tutorialbooklet

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The Game Interface------------------

DETROIT is designed to be played equally well with a keyboard and mouse, orwith a standard keyboard alone. Since most players prefer to play with themouse this manual assumes that you have one. If you don't, you can find acomplete list of keyboard commands on the included icon card

The Mouse and the Pointer

In general, clicking the left mouse button executes a command, and clickingthe right mouse button causes the game to exit the current screen withoutexecuting any of the commands you may have entered. When you are told toclick on something, assume that you should use the left mouse button unlessthe instructions specifically say otherwise.

On every screen that appears in the game, you will see a number of commandbuttons, which appear as small rectangular boxes with keywords for variouscommands on them. Clicking on a command button is the easiest way to giveinstructions to DETROIT. In many cases when you click on a command button,additional screens or "panels" will pop up on your monitor with morecommand buttons or more information, or both. Most of the time the buttonsare obvious but on some of the game screens they have been incorporatedinto the scenery. When the pointer is over a hidden button, the pointersymbol changes from a red "X" to a green arrow, and a message appears inthe message box (which will be described a little furthur on) telling youwhat that button does. Most panels will have a button labeled Done orExit, which you should click when you want the game to save your changes orexecute your commands and then close the panel. Some panels will offer youa lettered list of choices, and expect you to highlight the one you want.You can do this by clicking directly on your choice, or by clicking andholding down the mouse button while dragging the pointer through the listuntil the one you want is reached, then releasing the mouse button.

The Keyboard Input Box

Sometimes, when you select a command button, a small rectangular windowcalled a keyboard input box will pop up. This happens when DETROIT wantsyou to type in some information. If DETROIT is asking you to namesomething, such as your company, your save file, or the new car model youjust designed, you should type in the name from the keyboard and pressenter. The first letter of any such entry must be a character, not a spaceif you type a space accidentally press Escape and start over. If you wantto edit the text already in the box, use the left arrow key to back upwithout erasing the entry. The mouse commands will not work when thekeyboard input box is in use.

Sometimes, when DETROIT is asking you for a number instead of a name, theuse of the keyboard is given as an option instead of a requirement therewill usually be two mouse command buttons nearby, one with a plus sign andone with a minus sign, which you can use to enter in the requested number.Clicking on these buttons raises or lowers the value in the box until youhave the number you want. If you click on one of these buttons and holdthe button down, the numbers will scroll rapidly in the indicateddirection. If the number you want is very large, however, you can simplytype the value in from the keyboard. Press Enter when you finish to returnto mouse command mode (the mouse will not work while you are in keyboardinput mode). To exit keyboard input mode without executing your changes,press the escape key.

The Menu Mover

DETROIT has a special feature to allow you to customize the appearance ofyour game to a certain extent. Each of the pop-up panels that appears onthe screen will have a small yellow box in the upper left hand corner. Byclicking on this box, and then clicking elsewhere on the screen, you canrelocate the panel to any position you like. Once changed, the panel willshow up in that position whenever it appears for the rest of the game, evenafter saving and restoring. When you begin a completely new game, however,your settings will be lost.

In a multiplayer game, each player can customize the location of his ownpanels separately - the game will remember which arrangement goes withwhich player and will bring up the right one at the right time. If youclick on the Menu Mover box and then decide you don`t wish to relocate thepanel after all, just right click and the panel will return to its originalposition.

THE BASICS----------

Starting Off in DETROIT

Each time you start up DETROIT, you will be given the option to start a newgame, load a previously saved game to continue playing it, or quit back to

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DOS.

If you have already played and saved a game, you can select the Load buttonat this point. You will be given a list of up to twenty saved games tochoose from, each preceded by a letter

Highlight the game you want to load, then click on Use, and your game willbe loaded and ready to play.

If you are starting a new game, click on Start. The computer will presentyou with a number of panels that will appear only when you first begin agame, and not thereafter.

Set the Number of Players

First, you will be asked to set the number of players for the game. Eachgame can have up to four players. If there are fewer than four players,the remaining slots will be played by the computer. The first slot isautomatically set to human and can't be changed. (We have assumed that thefirst player will be human; if this is incorrect, we apologize.) Each ofthe other three slots can be toggled between computer and human byclicking.

Choose a Starting Territory

Next, you will be presented with the territory Map screen. DETROIT dividesthe world into sixteen territories: Northern Europe, Southern Europe,Eastern Europe, Northeastern USA, Southwestern USA, Southeastern USA,Northwestern USA, Canada, South America, Southeast Asia, Australia, Africa,China, Japan, India, and the Mid East. Choose one of these territories tobe your starting area by clicking on it. Since DETROIT strives forhistorical accuracy, not all starting territories are equal. For yourfirst game, we recommend starting in North America or Northern Europe.Later, for more of a challenge, you can choose other territories as yourhome base. In general, when lists of territories are displayed, yourstarting region will have a check mark beside it.

Name Your Company and Your Car

Once you have selected your starting territory, a keyboard input box willappear. Type in the name of your company ("Megabux Autos" for example),and press Enter. your company name may have up to fifteen characters init, which may be letters, numbers, or spaces. Then do the same thing toname your prototype automobile. Once you have baptized your company andyour car, you will be presented with the Main Factory Screen, and can beginplaying.

To Exit DETROIT

At any point in the game, you may edit DETROIT by pressing Alt-X andconfirming that you wish to edit to DOS. Your current game will not beautomatically saved, however. If you want to keep your current game, usethe disk icon or the file cabinet in Administration to save it beforeexiting.

The Main Factory Screen.------------------------

This screen shows a picture of your company's headquarters. At the bottomof the screen is a wood grain bar with a variety of information on it,called, simply enough, the Info Bar. Keep an eye on the Info bar, becausethere are several useful things on it.

The Info Bar

At the left hand edge of the Info Bar is a square box. When you start agame, this box will say "Jan 1908". As time progresses, this box willupdate to show you the current month and year of your game.

At the right hand edge of the Info Bar is another square box. When you areon the main factory screen, this box shows a calendar-like grid called theMonth End icon. Clicking on this box ends your turn. When you are on mostother screens, this box displays a silhouette of a factory. Clicking onthis icon returns you to the Main Factory Screen. When you call up areport or a graph to see your company's progress, this box holds an icon ofa stack of papers under a red arrow. Click on this icon to close thereport.

The center section of the Info bar shows you three things. At the topcenter, your companys current funds are displayed, followed by yourcompany's name. At the bottom centre is the message box. Whenever yourpointer is over a command button, obvious or hidden, a message will appearin the message box telling you what that button does. Sometimes this maybe your only source of information, so pay attention. Also, if you try todo something that the game doesn't permit, the message box will say"Message Present" to let you know that somewhere else on the screen, apanel has popped up explaining what you did that caused the problem.

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The Game Tools

Between the message box and the End Turn/Return to Factory icon are sixsmaller icons. The first icon, the floppy disk, allows you to quickly andeasily save your game at any point. The other five "gateway" icons will,when clicked on, take you instantly to one of the five main game areas asshown below.

Floppy Disk: Saves your GameBar Graph: Takes you to the Administration Office ScreenWorld Map: Takes you to the Sales/Factory ScreenTools: Takes you to the Research ScreenNewspaper: Takes you to the Marketing Office ScreenAutomobile: Takes you to the Design Screen

Saving Your Game

There are two ways to save your game for later play. The easiest way is toclick once on the disk icon which appears on the info bar. You will beshown a lettered list of available game slots. Click on the slot you wantto use, and enter the name of the saved game into the keyboard input boxthat appears. If you click on an already-occupied slot (one with a nameother than "Empty"), you will overwrite the old game stored there, so becertain that`s what you want to do before you do it.

Up to twenty games may be saved at one time. Your game file will be savedin whatever directory DETROIT is being played from. The game in the A slotwill be saved as DETROITA.SAV, the one in the B slot as DETROITB.SAV. andso on.

The Factory

Embedded in the picture of the factory are six hidden buttons, eachcorresponding to one of the buildings in the picture. These buildings arethe places where you will manage the various aspects of your company.

As you move your mouse pointer around on the screen, you will know when youencounter a button because the pointer will change to a green arrow and amessage will appear in the message box telling you what building you arepointing to. Clicking on the button takes you inside the building, whereyou can get to work running your business. The use of each department willbe covered later in this manual.

Essential Concepts ------------------

The two most important concepts in DETROIT are the ones most important toreal businesses everywhere: Time and Money.

Time: Beginning and Ending a Turn

DETROIT is an entirely turn based game and has no real time component.Game time runs in months and years. Most operating costs are figuredmonthly, although a few aspects of the game are figured yearly, such as theinflation rate. You alone determine when the month is over by clicking onthe Month End icon on the Info Bar. The number of game actions which maybe performed during that month is limited only by your strategy andpatience.

After the Month End button has been selected, you will be presented with aMonth End Summary Screen, showing all the possible game actions with acheck mark displayed next to those you have taken. A confirmation box isalso displayed. If you discover that there are further actions you'd liketo take before declaring the month over, click on "No" and you will bereturned to the Main Factory Screen. If you are certain you have doneeverything you wish to click on "Yes". If you are playing the game insingle player mode, your companys Profit/Loss report (which will beexplained later) will appear. When you are done reading it, click on theClose Report icon to begin your next turn. If the game is being played bymore than one human player, a warning flag will appear to give the playersthe opportunity to change seats so that the next person`s turn can begin.

Money

As should be obvious, money is very important in DETROIT. Every playerstarts with the same $60,000 in capital funds the speed with which thatamount increases (or decreases) is the only measure of how well yourcompany is doing. Most operating costs are deducted monthly, but someexpenses are subtracted from your company's funds instantly, such as thecost for opening new sales offices and upgrading factories. Money from carsales accrues monthly. There are both obvious and easily controlled costssuch as employee wages, and less controllable expenses such astransportation charges. You should always have more cash on hand than youthink you will need. If your company funds ever drop to zero, you may takeout up to three loans to save your company - but after the third strike,your company will go bankrupt and the game ends.

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Inflation will increase your operating costs as time passes, and wages wilhave to rise as well if you expect to keep and increase your work force.This will necessitate raising the prices on your cars - but raise them toofast, and you could wind up with a stockroom full of unsold autos, and abankrupt company! If you get into a cash crunch through poor planning, youcan turn to the bank for a loan, but the bank can be stingy and will expecta high rate of interest on the money it lends.

DETROIT and Reality

DETROIT is, above all else, an entertaining strategy game. We haveendeavoured however to make it as historically accurate as possible withoutlosing playability. The game takes into account issues such as the changein demand for different types of cars over the years, historical rates ofinflation and wage increase, and differences in demand from one territoryto another. For the easiest starting conditions, you may want to beginyour business in North America or Northern Europe. For a more difficultgame, you might pick China or Africa as your starting location.

File Management

You can, at any time, save your current game of DETROIT by clicking on thedisk icon. You may also access the save file command, as well as otherfile management commands and the game options commands, from the filecabinet in the Administration office. From the Main Factory Screen clickon Administration, and then click on the picture of the file cabinet at theright edge of the screen.

Save: Allows you to save your current game. As with saving from the disk icon,click on the slot to which you want to save the game and enter the nameinto the keyboard input box.

Load: Allows you to load a previously saved game to continue playing it. Thisoption is also available at game start. Your current game will not beautomatically saved. When you restore a saved game, your original savefile remains. If you wish, you can assign the game a new name the nexttime you save it, so that you can go back and replay the game from theearlier save point if you want.

Restart: After confirmation, this option will end the current game (without savingit) and return you to the start of the game.

Quit: This option allows you to exit to DOS after confirmation. Your currentgame will not automatically be saved before exiting. You can also exit toDOS at anytime by pressing alt-X.

Setting the Game Options.

Select the Configure option in the file management menu to set the gameoptions for DETROIT.

Sound: Toggles the game's sound effect on and off.

Music: Toggles the game's music on and off.

Dissolve: Toggling this option changes the screen-exit effect from a gradual dissolve(when ON) to a slow fade (when OFF), which may speed up the transition onsome computers.

Delay: Use this option to set the length of time that message panels will remainon your screen before disappearing. Hold down the leFt mouse button toscroll rapidly through the settings.

GETTING THINGS ROLLING----------------------

Summary of Game Play

There are several independent facets to DETROIT, all of which work todetermine your company's success. When the game begins, you have a cardesign, some money and minimal facilities (one sales office and one factoryin your chosen starting territory). Your first order of business is to getyour prototype built and marketed so that your company has income to relyon for expansion. The next step is to invest in research, for withoutresearch, you will never have new parts to use in your cars and they'llquickly become obsolete. Once your technicians have made some advances,you will need to design new cars, put your factories to work making them,

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and get your sales offices selling them.

When your company is securely grounded, you'll want to think aboutexpanding into new territories: first by opening sales offices supplied byfactories that already exist, and later by setting up new factories tosupply sales offices in distant parts of the world. You will also need tomake decisions along the way about what types of cars to sell where, whento upgrade your factory facilities, and when to stop production on carmodels that are no longer selling well. If you make wise decisions, yourcompany will grow and prosper - but if you are foolish, bankruptcy liesaround every corner.

The Roads Must Roll: Producing Your First Car---------------------------------------------

At game start, you have the following assets: one factory and one salesoffice in your starting territory; the design for your first car; and$60,000 in your checking account. What you don`t have is cars to sell, soyour first task will be to build some.

Hiring, Firing, and Paying Your Employees

In order to get your autos built, you need people to work for you.Employee relations are handled through Administration. Clicking on theAdministration building on the main factory screen brings up theAdministration Office with its four hidden buttons. The use of the FileManagement option has already been covered, and the use of Reports and theBank will be covered later

Click on the Personnel door to bring up the Personnel Menu. There are fourbuttons at the top of the screen (Benefits, Assm, Tech, and Done), a columnshowing the total monthly wages paid to all your employees, and two smallerinset panels where you will do your hiring and set wages.

You can hire two types of employees: Assembly workers (shown as "Assmworkers") to put your cars together, and Technicians, to work in yourResearch department. (You don`t need to hire people for your sales officesthey are automatically staffed) In each panel, a column of informationappears. Avail tells you how many workers are available for you to hire.This number will change from month to month depending on the wages you set.Idle tells you how many workers you have hired but not assigned to jobsites. Emp tells you how many workers you have who are assigned, and Wagesis the monthly pay rate you have set for them. The subtotal will tell youhow much money you are spending on your employees for that month.

To put more people to work, click on Hire for the type of worker you want.A keyboard input box will appear. Enter the number of employees you wantto hire, either with the mouse buttons or the keyboard, then click on Wageto set their monthly pay rate. If you want to lay off some employees,click on Fire and handle it the same way.

Once you have hired some workers, click on Benefits to set aside apercentage of the total wages you are paying to be used for benefits foryour workers. You don't have to give your workers benefits but it might bea good idea.

Putting Your Employees to Work

Once you have people hired, you have to give them work to do. Assemblyworkers need to be assigned to Factories, and Technicians need to beassigned to Research.

There are two different paths you can take to assign your workers.Assembly workers are assigned through the Factories subpanel in theSales/Factories section, and Technicians are assigned through the researchMenu panel. On the Research screen. In addition, you can access either ofthese two screens directly from the personnel panel. Either way, you endup at the same set of screens. If you are assigning new employees, thepersonnel screen is the most direct, but if you are shifting your employeeassignments around, you may find it more conveinient to go straight to theappropriate area from the Main Factory screen.

If you enter the Sales/Factories screen from the Main Factory, you will beshown the Territory Map. Click on the territory to which you want toassign factory workers. There will be a separate Sales/Factories panel foreach of the sixteen world territories in DETROIT. If you enter theSales/Factories screen from the Personnel screen, the panel for yourstarting territory will automatically show up.

To assign workers to your factory, first be sure that you are in thecorrect territory screen. At the start, the panel for your startingterritory should show one sales office in the Sales box and a level onefactory in the Factory box. DETROIT allows you to have only one factoryper territory - the number indicates how modern your factory is, not howmany of them you have in that area.

Click on Detail in the Factories box. This panel allows you to start,

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stop, and modify your assembly lines. Click on one of the assembly linesto highlight it, then click Model. A panel will pop up showing a list ofyour current car models. Highlight the model you want on that line (yourprototype is your only option at the start) and then click Use. That modelwill show up on the selected assembly line. Next, click Assign, and akeyboard input box will appear. Enter in the number of workers you want tostart working on that line. (The maximum number you can assign to a singleline is two hundred and fifty five.) Repeat this process for each assekmblyline you want to get running. If you want to shift your workers around,highlight an assembly line and click on Free. Enter in the number ofworkers you want to free up by taking them off that line. Once the workershave heen freed up, you can reassign them to another line with the Assignbutton. If you want to stop one of your assembly lines entirely, click onStop. The use of the rest of the buttons on the Factory panel will beexplained later.

When you have opened sales offices or set up a factory in more than oneterritory, you can use the Prev and Next buttons on the Sales/Factory panelto cycle through the sixteen territories until you find the one you want toadjust. Clicking on List will show you how many sales offices you have ineach territory, and what level factory, if any, is there.

Once you've staffed your factory with workers, you want do the same thingfor your Research department by assigning your newly hired Technicians tovarious projects. If you are already in the Personnel Menu, click on Techto bring up the Research Menu. If you are at the Main Factory screen,click on the Research building to bring up the Research screen, then clickon the picture of the lab technician to access the Research Menu. Thereare a total of seven hidden buttons on the Research screen

When you access the Research Menu either through Personnel or throughResearch, a panel will pop up showing a list of the seven systems and partsthat go into one of your cars: engines, brakes, suspension, coolingsystems, body design, safety features, and luxury options. You can assignTechnicians to do research on any or all of them. Highlight the part you want to be researched, then click on Assign. Setthe number of Technicians for each research department with the keyboardinput box in the same way you assigned Assembly Workers to your factory.(The maximum number you can assign is to one project is two hundred andfifty-five.)

When you click on done for each part, a check mark will automaticallyappear in the box by that part on the main Research panel If, later on, youwant to stop research on that part, you can manually toggle off the checkbox by clicking on it. Even if there are Technicians assigned to the part,no research will take place unless the check mark appears If you want toshift your Technicians around, highlight one of the parts, and click onFree to free up workers by taking them off that project They can then bereassigned to a different department with the Assign button

The One To Buy: Creating the Demand and Supplying It.----------------------------------------------------

Now that your factories are rolling, you have to do something to let peopleknow that you have cars for sale, and get them interested in buying. Youalso have to see to it that your dealers have cars to sell to them. Inother words, you have to market your wares, and get them out to the lot sothey can be bought.

Selling Your Cars

From the Main Factory Screen, click on the Marketing building. TheMarketing Office screen will appear, with the Info Bar at the bottom. Youhave several choices for what media to use to advertise your autos, but notall of them are available at the start. In order to advertise on Radio andTelevision, you'll have to wait until they've been invented.

There are six hidden buttons on the Advertising Screen. Five are yourmarketing options, and the sixth brings up a quick reference Marketing List

The Marketing List will give you a summary of the advertising expendituresyou`ve set for each territory. Clicking on Prev and Next will let youcycle through the territories. Marketing decisions must be made separatelyfor each territory in which you are trying to sell cars.

Clicking on Billboards or Sports will bring up a keyboard input box withplus and Minus buttons. There is a minimum cost associated with eachchoice, and the price will increase over time as inflation takes its toll.Clicking on the plus button will cause the minimum amount to show up in thewindow. If you don't want to spend that much, either click on the minusbutton to change the amount back to zero, or right click to exit the panel,and go in search of more economical advertising medium.

Magazines, Radio, and Television are slightly different. Clicking on theseoptions will get you a list of various specialty markets in which you canadvertise your cars. In Magazines for example you could choose to target

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Sports publications, or Women's magazines, or any of the others. For Radioand Television, you can decide what kinds of programs you want to air yourcommercials on. Highlight the publication or program area of your choice,and click on it. You will get a keyboard input box like the one for theother three options, which can be dealt with in the same way. You can'ttarget specific models to specific markets, however there is no way toadvertise just your sports cars in sporting magazines, or just your familywagons on television sitcoms.

Advertising costs, like most costs, are deducted from your funds at the endof each month.

Getting the Cars to the Buyers

Now that your clever advertising campaigns have stirred up public interest,you have to get those cars into the showrooms.

From the Main Factory Screen, click on the Sales/Factories building. TheTerritory Map will appear, with icons indicating where you have openedsales offices or factories. Sales offices are represented by a light bluebuilding icon, with a number showing how many offices are open, andfactories are represented by a black building icon where the numberrepresents the factories level. At the start, you will see one of eachicon in your starting territory (Refer to Territory Screen to see how theterritory map would look with a sales office and factory in each territory)

Click on the territory for which you want to adjust your sales offices oryour factory. The Sales Offices and Factories panels will appear. (Yousaw these earlier when you were assigning your assembIy workers and gettingthe assembly lines rolling. As explained before, you can also get to thesepanels through Administration: Personnel, if you choose.) The Next andPrev buttons on this panel allow you to cycle through the territories.

In the Office panel, click on Detail. A screen will pop up showing you alist of models and prices, with a number of command buttons. Yourprototype will appear in the first slot, highlighted. There are two thingsyou need to do to get your cars to the dealers: the first is to establishsupply lines from your factories so the cars will be shipped, and thesecond is to set the price. Both of these things are done from the OfficeDetail panel.

A single factory in one territory can supply sales offices in a number ofother territories, if it is making enough cars. When you begin the gameyou will have only one factory and one sales office, both in the sameterritory. Click on Supply Line. You will notice that you can have up tothree supply lines for each territory, and that your starting territory islisted in the first slot. This shows that you already have one supply lineautomatically running from your factory in your starting territory to yoursales office there. Any time you have a factory and a sales office in thesame territory, that factory automatically becomes the first supply linefor that office. Thus you do not need to do anvthing to set up the supplyline for your first sales office. When you have factories and salesoffices to several territories, arranging supply lines becomes a morecomplicated matter. This will be covered later, in the section onexpanding your company.

Setting a good price for your cars is crucial to your company's success, soDETROIT gives you a number of options for pricing your automobiles.Pricing strategies must be set individually for each territory. Make sureyou are on the right panel before you start, then click on Office DetailHighlight one of your current production models from the lettered list,then click Price. A keyboard input box will appear, with a number ofcommand buttons nearby. This panel automatically appears in the Singlepricing mode, which allows you to set the price for a single model of carin a single area. The other three modes (Model, Territory, and Global) areuseful only after you have multiple models of cars being sold in severalterritories, so they will be covered in the section on expanding yourcompany.

Use either the plus and minus mouse command keys or direct keyboard inputto specify the price in dollars for the selected model. Click Done orpress Enter when finished. on the displayed list of production models, theprice will appear next to the model name and the box will turn into a checkmark. As long as the check mark is toggled on, that model will be sold atthat price in that location. If you decide not to sell that model fromthat showroom, click on the check mark to toggle it back into a box, andthat car will no longer be offered for sale in that territory.

SHIFTING INTO HIGH GEAR-----------------------

If your factory is building cars which are selling, and your company isoperating at a profit you're off to a good start. It's time to think aboutwhat your next product is going to be, and to start extending yourcompany's reach.

The Car of the future: Designing New Automobiles

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Your prototype, great car though it is, won't stay in style forever. Yourcompany is going to have to come up with something new to offer consumersif you want it to last more than a few years. Here's where your investmentin Research pays off.

Obtaining New Technology

If you have invested in Research, sooner or later your Technicians willcome up with some new automobile technology. When they do, at the start ofthe month a panel will appear informing you that new developments have beenmade. To find out what your people have come up with you can go toResearch and call up the Systems Details panels. To see what the new partlooks like, and to put it into a new car, you need to head over to yourDesign department.

Designing a New Car

From the Main Factory Screen, click on the Design building. The first pageof the design worksheet will appear with your prototype car designdisplayed. There are two pages to each car design, the first for designingthe body and look of the car, and the second, click on functionalcomponents that will make it run. To get from the first page to thesecond, click on Part. On the second page, click on Body to return to thefirst page. To begin an entirely new design, go to the first design pageand click on New. The first design page shows you a summary of the components in the designfor each car, and has command buttons to let you page through your currentdesigns or load an old design from the Archives (the use of the Archiveswill be explained later). You can have up to sixteen current designs at atime. A picture of the car currently being worked on appears on the rightside of the screen to the upper right hand corner of this inset displaywill be either the word "New" indicating that this design is indevelopment, or a number such as "1/16" to indicate which of your sixteencurrent designs you are presently looking at.

Most of the actual design work is done on the second page of the designworksheet. The one exception to this is the body of the car, which youspecify on the first page. All other components the engine, brakes,suspension, cooling system, and luxury and safety features - are added fromthe second page.

On the right hand side of the first page are the buttons that allow you todesign the body for your new car. First, you need to decide what type ofcar you're building - a sports car? A van? A compact? Click on the Typebutton to cycle through your options. A basic body design for each vehicletype will be presented. After a basic type has been selected, you can thenmodify any or all of the three body sections (front, middle, and back)until the car is exactly to your liking. Highlight the section of the bodyyou want to design, then click on the plus and minus keys to cycle throughyour options. Mix and match them to until you have the exact combinationyou want. Use the Color button to select a color scheme for your newmodel.

When you are happy with the body of your vehicle click on Part to startdesigning the rest of it. The second page of the design screen has fourboxes, one each for the Engine, Brakes, Suspension, and Cooling System. Ineach box, click on the plus and minus keys to cycle through the availablechoices for each part. If you want more information about a particularcomponent click on Detail to pop up a screen with the designspecifications.

To add luxury or safety options to the new car, click on either the Luxuryor Safety button. A list will pop up, showing which of each of theseoptions has beemn added to the design. If you are starting from scratch,these lists will be empty. the small inset panel at the bottom allows youto cycle through the available options with the plus and minus keys. Clickon Detail to get more information about the feature. To add an option tothe car, highlight one of the lettered slots and click Use. The optionthat appears in the inset window will be added to the design. Likewise, ifyou highlight an option on the list and click Remove, that option will betaken off the car. You can add up to ten luxury and five safety options toone car. To return to the first page of the design, click on Body.

Your design options will be very limited at first, until your Techniciansprovide you with enough new components to give you a decent selection tochoose from.

Once you have more than one design on the boards, you can click on Prev andNext on the first page of the design sheet to cycle through your currentdesigns. When you fill up all of the sixteen available slots with cardesigns, you will have to make room for more, either by saving some of yourcurrent designs to the Archives or by getting rid of some designs. To filea design away in the Archives, click on Put, and the current design will besaved directly to the Archives. If you are unhappy with a design and wantto get rid of it completely, click on Del, and after confirmation the

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current car design will be deleted permanently from your records.

Sometimes, you may want to make modifications on an already existingdesign. If the design is current, you can simply make whatever changes youlike, then save the new design under a different name. If the old designhas been saved in the Archives, click on Get. The first page of theArchive records will appear. Click on the design you want, then click onUse, and the design will be put back onto the current list, assuming thereis room for it (Click on Prev/Next on the Archive panel to page through therest of the Archive records if the one you want isnt on the first page.)

To see what a sample car design looks like, look at the designspecifications for your prototype This is a very simple car, of the "FamilySedan" type. By clicking on Part, you can see that the only components thecar has are the engine - a four-cylinder in line - and a simple hand brake.It has no suspension or cooling system, and no luxuries or safety devices.Theres a lot of room for improvement.

Testing Your New Design

When you have designed a new car to your satisfaction, return to the firstpage of the design worksheet, and click Make. This directs yourTechnicians to make and test a prototype of your new automobile. Akeyboard input box will pop up to allow you to name your new design, andask you to confirm your decision to have the test car built. Then yourtest drivers will start putting the new car through its paces to check itsperformance.

The testing screen allows you to choose which of five performance checksyou want to put your new car through, and to watch the car as it is tested.Initially, the viewscreen at the top right shows an interference pattern.Once you start testing the car, this window allows you to watch the testingas it progresses. The five available testing categories are Acceleration,Braking, Handling, Capacity, and Fuel Economy. To order a test, click onthe test name. The cost of the test will be added to the computer printoutin the lower right quarter of the screen. Each test costs a differentamount. To select all of the tests at once, click on Test All.

When you have selected the tests you want, click on the button that saysRun. The cost for materials and testing will be deducted from your funds,and the viewscreen will show you the car as it is put through its paces.If you don't wish to watch the tests as they take place, left click on theviewscreen as each test begins and the results will be instantly displayed.

The testing results are read as follows;

Acceleration: shows you how long in seconds it takes the car to go from zero to sixtymiles per hour.

Braking: tells you the distance required in feet for the car to go from seventymiles per hour to a full stop.

Road Handling: gives you the number of gees at which the car stops holding the road.

Capacity: "Seating" tells you the number of people the car can carry, and "Cargo" isthe holding space the vehicle has in cubic feet.

Fuel Economy: shows the miles per gallon of gasoline the car get in the city and on thehighway.

The Overall rating of the car is a percentage value showing how well thatcar is predicted to market as that type of vehicle. Different types ofcars will require different emphasis in design: a van needs more cargospace than a sports car, while a sports car requires better accelerationthan a van.

Using the Archives

You can have up to sixteen current car designs in production at any time.If you exceed that number, but still want to hang onto your older designsyou will have to store them in the Archives.

To reach the Archives, go to the Main factory Screen and click on theArchives building in the upper left part of the screen. The Archives panelwill appear. Click on Put, and you will see a list of your sixteen currentdesigns. To move one to the archives, highlight it, then click on Use, andthe design will be taken out of the current list and stored.

You can also bring an older design back from the archives if you discover aneed for it. From the main archive panel, click on Get. A list of thefirst twenty archived designs will appear. You can archive a total of onehundred designs. To see the rest of the archives list, click on Prev and

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Next to cycle through the pages of the archives until you find the one youwant. When you`ve located the design to be loaded, highlight it, thenclick on Use. The current design list will appear. Highlight an emptyslot and click on Use in that window. The selected archive design willmove to the current list. If you highlight an occupied slot on the currentlist and click Use, the selected current design and the selected archiveddesign will swap places.

If you should happen to use up all the space in your archives, or if youjust want to keep your archive lists short and easy to handle, click onDelete from the main archives panel. The archived design list will appear.Highlight the design you want to get rid of and click Use. The game willask you to confirm your instruction; if you are sure you won't ever wantthat design again, click Yes. Once a design is deleted from the archive,it's gone forever, so be sure you`re finished with it before you confirm.

Your Own Personal Growth Industry: Expansion and Innovation

Opening up New Territories

Setting up sales offices and factories in new territories greatly adds tothe complexity of your game, and is essential. For your company'scontinued growth since a factory can supply sales offices in more than oneterritory if it is producing enough cars, you probably want to start yourexpansion by adding sales offices in territories close to your startingterritory. The farther away from the factory your sales offices are, thehigher the hidden incidental costs such as transportation fees will be forgetting the cars to the showrooms. Because of this, it might not be a goodidea to try to supply all your worldwide sales offices from a singlefactory.

To open a new sales office, go to the Main Factory Screen and click on theSales/Factories building. The Territory Map will appear. Click on theTerritory you want to expand into. The Sales and Factory panels for thatterritory will appear. In the Sales Offices section, click on Open Thecost of opening the new office will be immediately deducted from yourcompanys funds. If you want to shut down a sales office, click on Close.Closing a sales Office is not free - it costs one-half of what it cost toestablish the office in the first place, and as with Open the money isdeducted immediately. Therefore,the game will ask you to confirm anyoffice openings or closings. Since the deduction from your companys fundstakes place straight away and cant be undone, decisions to open and closeoffices should be made with some care. You can open up to ten salesoffices in any one territory. New icons will appear on the territory mapeach time you establish a sales office or factory in a new territory.

Opening a new factory is very similar to opening up a new sales office.Click on Raise to establish a Level One factory in that territory.Clicking on Raise again will improve the level of your factory by one. Ahigher level factory is more efficient, but expansion gets progressivelymore expensive as the factory level increases. Clicking on Lower willdownsize your factory at a cost of one third the price of expansion. Aswith sales offices, costs for improving or downsizing your factories areimmediately deducted from your company funds

Pricing and Supply on a Global Scale

Once you have more than one model of car to sell, more than one factoryproducing your cars, and more than one territory to sell them in, pricingand supply become more complicated. The possible strategies for arrangingyour supply lines and setting your price strategies multiply enormously.

To set up new supply lines for a territory, or change existing ones, go tothe Main Factory Screen and click on the Sales/Factories building. TheTerritory Map will appear. Click on the territory where you want to adjustyour suppIy lines or prices. The Sales Office/Factory panel will appear.Each territory has its own panel, so make sure you're in the rightterritory before you start making changes. If you wind up in the wrongterritory, clicking on Prev and Next will allow you to cycle throughterritories until you find the right one. Clicking on List from anyterritory panel will give you a summary of the number of sales offices andthe level of the factory, if any, in each territory.

In the Sales Offices section of the panel, click on Detail, then on SupplyLine to get the three slot lettered list of supply lines for that office.If there is no factory in your new sales area, you will have to arrange tohave the cars shipped in from elsewhere. Click on one of the three linesto highlight it, then click on the plus and minus buttons to cycle throughthe available territories until you find the one you want. Naturally, youhave to have a factory established in a territory before you can use it asa supply line. To stop shipping cars, cycle through the territories untilyou find the "None" option. You may remove the automatic in territorysupply line from a factory in the same area, if you wish.

When your supply lines are set, click on Price. You will have to set theinitiqal price for each separate model of car you want to sell from thatoffice using Single mode as described earlier. The other three buttons can

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be used to make more sweeping changes in the prices of your cars.

Clicking on Model allows you to raise or lower the cost of a particularmodel of car in every territory. It doesn't matter which territory panelyou are currently using - the change will be applied everywhere that modelis being sold. Use the plus and minus keys or direct keyboard input tochange the price on that model by percentage of the current cost, not bydollar amount. To lower the price, click on the minus key until you getnegative numbers.

Clicking on Territory changes the price for every model of car being soldin the current territory. Again, the change is in percentage of thecurrent prices, not dollar amount. Similarly clicking on Global allows youto adjust the prices on every model in every territory.

Note that if you are selling a particular model of car in a certainterritory there must be a supply line going to that territory from afactory which is making that particular model of car. It`s pointless totell your salespeople to sell "Megabux Electras" if none of the factoriesthat are supplying them with cars are producing Electras.

Once you've supplied your new sales area with cars, and set the pricingstrategy, be sure to remember to head over to marketing and spend someadvertising money in that new territory, if you want your cars to sell.

Using the Bank

The bank is the place to go if you are expecting a cash crunch, are lookingto finance a costly new expansion, or want to put some of your money awayto accrue interest for a while. To get to the bank, go to the Main FactoryScreen and click on Administration. When the Administration Officeappears, click on the phone. The banking panel will pop up.

The top section of the panel shows your current funds (in Checking), yourfunds in savings, and the current yearly interest rate accrued on yoursavings. (Your checking account does not earn interest). To transfermoney from checking to savings, click on Check. A keyboard input box willappear for you to enter the amount of money you want to transfer. Likewiseto shift money from savings to checking, click on Save and enter theamount.

The bottom section of the panel shows your current loans, and the yearlyinterest rate the bank will charge you for the use of its money. To takeout a loan, click on Loan and enter the amount in the keyboard input box.If the bank agrees to the loan, the money will be added to your checkingaccount. If the loan is denied, the box will clear when you press enter,and you`ll have to try again. Click on Term to set the length of time youwant the loan to cover. This will determine the size of your monthlypayments.

The minimum payment on your loan will be deducted from your checkingaccount automatically at the end of each month. If you want to pay morethan the minimum in a given month, click on Repay and enter in the amount.It will be deducted from your checking account and the amount remaining onyour loan will be reduced.

CHARTING YOUR PROGRESS----------------------

So by now you've hired people, put them to work in the factories and inyour research department, advertised your product, set the price tag, andgot the cars shipped to the showroom. Maybe you've even expanded youroperations already. Your cars are selling, but you need to plan for thefuture. Or perhaps your cars aren't selling, and you need to figure outwhere the probIem lies. Your trusty staff of researchers and accountantsstands ready to assist your business decisions with a wide variety ofreports and graphs to show you just how well your company is or isn'tdoing. (Note: Some additional reports and graphs may have been added toDETROIT since this document went to press. Please see the TechnicalSupplement and Tutorial booklet for details.)

Feedback: Gauging Your Progress with Reports.

Reports give you a picture of how well your company is doing in the shortterm. Each report shows the figures for the month just past, and only forthat one month. To get reports, enter the Administration Office screen andclick on the pile of papers in the center of the desk. (if you do this inthe first month, you will see that there are no reports available, sinceyou have not started production yet). A menu of available reports in thefirst two columns and graphs in the third one. Click on one of the reportbuttons to bring up that report. All reports are free with the exceptionof the Demand report, which must be commisioned from an outside researchagency and paid for when ordered. Click on the stack of papers under thered arrow pictured at the right end of the info bar to close a particularreport or graph.

Many of the reports and graphs have word-toggles you can click on to obtain

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more information or change the way the information is presented forviewing. all text that appears in red is associated with a toggle and maybe clicked on to change the display. When you are finished readingreports, click on Done to return to the Administration Office.

PROFIT/LOSSThe Profit/Loss Report is the most basic indicator of your company`shealth. In addition to being available through the Report menu, thesefigures are automatically presented to you at the start of each new month.The first column shows you your company's itemized expenses, while thesecond shows your income by territory. Click on Income to toggle your viewof your profits between model and territory.

TERRITORYThis report gives you detailed information on how well you are doing ineach territory in which you have an installation. Click on the territoryname to cycle through your territories (only those areas in which you havesales offices or factories will appear) There are five columns ofinformation on this screen, each of which can be toggled between twodifferent sets of information. To toggle the column, click on the columnheader

Toggles:First column: model name/model typeSecond coIumn: the number of assembly lines making each car/the price of the car in that territoryThird column: the number of cars built in that territory in the previous month/the labour costs for making each carFourth column: the number of cars sold in that territory in the previous month/the material costs for making each car.Fifth column: the number of cars in stock in that territory/ the profit made on each car at the current price

MODELThis report tells you how well each of your models is doing in eachterritory. Click on the model name to cycle through your current models.There are four columns of information on this sheet, each of which can betoggled between two sets of information. To toggle the column, click onthe column header. (The column titled "Territory" does not toggle)

Toggles:Second column: the number of assembly lines making each car/ the price of the car in that territory.Third column: the number of cars built in that territory in the previous month / the labour costs for making each car.Fourth column: the number of cars sold in that territory in the previous month / the materials costs for making each carFifth column: the number of cars in stock in that territory/ the profit made on each car at the current price

COMPAREThis report is your main source of information on how well your competitionis doing. from this report you can see the expenses, income, and profit orloss margin for each of your three competitors. (There are no toggles onthis screen.)

MARKET TThis report shows your marketing expenses arranged by territory. Click onthe territory name to cycle through the territories. Click on the word"Territory" to toggle the display between the sums for each territory tothe total sums for all territories.

MARKET MThis report is very similar to Market T, except that your marketingexpenses are arranged by media type. Click on the media type to cyclethrough the available media. Click on the word "Media" to toggle thedispIay between the sums for each media type to the total sums for allmedia.

DEMANDThis report is the only report that costs you money to acquire. To obtaina demand report, select a car model to get a report on by clicking on it,then click Use. You may get a demand report on only one model per month.Select the territories you wish a report on by clicking on them. You mayselect as many territories as you like, at a cost of $100 per territory.

Click on Use to order the report. The game will ask you to confirm theorder. when you do so the cost will be immediately deducted from yourcompany's funds and the demand report will appear on the screen showing youhow many cars could have been sold in that territory in the past month.The demand in a particular territory may change from one month to the nextbased on your competitor's actions, your own advertising, or other factors.Once ordered, the demand report cannot be changed until the next month -you may not change the model type or add to or subtract from theterritories list.

The second and subsequent times you order a demand report, you will first

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be given the option of ordering a New report or viewing the last demandreport you purchased (click on Old). Only the last report is available.

DISTRIBUTIONThis report shows you the supply lines for each of your sales offices.Click on the territory name to cycle through the territories. By clickingon any column heading you can change the display to show you thetransportation costs involved in maintaining each supply line.

Analysis: Finding Trends Over Time with Graphs

Graphs allow you to gauge your company's progress over an extended period.The information available in the graphs is more concise and therefore lessdetailed than the information you can get from reports. Graphs can beaccessed from the same place reports are accessed. Click on one of thebuttons in the third column of the Reports/Graphs menu to bring up a graph.Click on the stack of papers icon at the right side of the info bar toreturn to the Reports/Graphs menu, and click Done to return to theAdministration Office

ProfitThe vertical axis on this graph shows you your profits for each month,compared to those of your competitors. By clicking on the scale indicatorfor the vertical axis, you can toggle the scale for a range of settingsfrom tens of dollars to hundreds of millions of dollars. Only those scaleswhich are appropriate for the profit levels shown will be available,however, so if the most any company made in any month shown was $2000, youwill not be able to change the scale to anything greater than thousands ofdollars.

The horizontal axis displays seven months of profit records. A year'sworth of records are kept stored at a time. To access months not currentlyvisible on the screen, click on the first or last month displayed.

ProductionThe vertical axis on this graph shows you how many cars you and yourcompetitors built each month. The vertical axis scale can be changed torange from tens to hundreds of millions of cars produced per month. Onlythose scales which are appropriate for the production levels shown will beavailable, however, so if no company produced more than sixty cars in anymonth shown, the scale will not go above tens of cars.

As with profits, the horizontal axis displays seven months worth ofproduction records, and up to a year can be viewed by clicking on the firstor last month displayed to scroll the printout.

SalesThe vertical axis on this graph shows you what your income from car salesis for each month, compared to those of your competitors. The numbersshown are for total income over all models of cars being produced. Thevertical axis scale can be changed to range from tens to hundreds ofmillions of dollars in sales per month. Only those scales which areappropriate for the sales levels shown will be available.

As with profits, the horizontal axis displays seven months' worth of salesrecords, and up to a year can be viewed by clicking on the first or lastmonth displayed to scroll the printout.

Subsys LevelThis graph shows you what level of advancement your automobile subsystemshave achieved, relative to those of your competitors. The vertical axisshows the percentage of the level possible in the game that you havereached for each of the seven systems. There is a built in limit to therate at which you can acquire new technology through research, so youshould not expect to reach 100% quickly, even if you put maximum investmentinto your research department.

The horizontal bar shows each of the seven systems, abbreviated as follows:ENG = Engines, BRA = Brakes, SUS = Suspension, COO = Cooling, BOD = Bodies,SAF = Safety, and LUX = Luxury.

---Typed by SHARD - DTL

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DETROIT - THE OPEN ROAD =======================

INTRODUCTION

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------------

To the man on the street in the late nineteenth century, it was clear thatthe horse was in all ways superior to the automobile. The horse was almosta member of the family. It was friendly, hard working and reproduceditself, could survive on nothing more than grass and water and, if itsowner was drunk or ill could find its own way home without guidance. Theautomobile by compasirson was noisy, unreliable, smelly, dangerous, andconstantly in need of repair. It also required decent roads to run on,which were in short supply in the Unites States at the turn of the century.

Yet, despite its obvious shortcomings, within a hundred years of itsinvention the automobile totally replaced the horse as a means oftransportation in most Western nations. In the process, it caused majorchanges in society, changes unequaled by any other technological innovationof its time. It opened doors between deeply divided urban and agrariancommunities, single handedly created the suburb, brought about the demiseof the blacksmith and the coachmaker, greatly expanded the tourist industryby giving the average worker unprecedented freedom to travel, turnedpetroleum into a critical commodity, and spawned a host of serviceindustries devoted to automobile care and maintenance. In short, itredesigned the face of every nation to which it came, and no nation morethan the United States.

Although the automobile originated in Europe, it was in the United Statesthat it first reached its full potential. From the year that the USovertook France as the leading producer of automobiles to the time morethan seventy years later when it succumbed to the challenge of Japan,America was undisputed King of Cars, and the city of Detroit was the placewhere the king held court. By the fortunate accident of being the cityclosest to the homes of three of the most influential figures in thehistory of the American car - Ransom Eli Olds, Henry Ford and William CDurant - Detroit became the center of the new industry. The city`s historyis inextricably linked with that of the American automobile, sharing itsrise to glory and its fall from grace.

THE FIRST AUTOMOBILE--------------------

The coining of the word "automobile" preceded the development of thegenuine item. Frenchman Jean Joseph Etienne Lenoir built a two-cycleinternal combustion engine in 1860, and came up with the term (literally,"It moves by itself") to describe the vehicle he hoped to power with hisengine. The actual automobile ended up being built by a group of men fromanother country entirely, using an engine based on Lenoir`s design.

In 1876 a German engineer named Nikolaus August Otto made a criticalbreakthrough by successfully modifying Lenoir's two cycle noncompressionpower unit into the first modern type four cycle, compressed fuel internalcombustion engine. The four cycle "Silent Otto" as it quickly becameknown, was far more powerful and efficient than the two cycle engines builtpreviously, and had a higher thermodynamic efficiency than the popularsteam engine as well. It was rapidly adopted for small power plants. Thethought of using it to propel a vehicle seemed a natural extension, and twoof Otto's countrymen were soon captivated by the idea.

Benz and Daimler Go into Business

Credit for building the first gasoline engine automobile is generally givento Karl-Friedrich Benz of Karlsruhe, Germany. He constructed his first carin 1884 and christened it the Motorwagon. It was a three wheeled vehiclewith a top speed of 10 mph. Two years later Benz was granted a patent forthe world`s first practical automobile.

Only a few months after Benz put his car together, a pair of engineersworking for Nikolaus Otto also built a self-propelled vehicle using Otto`sengine. Their names were Gottlieb Daimler and William Maybach, and in thenext few years they would be responsible for many significant improvementson Otto`s basic design. It was Benz, engineering company, however, thatbecame the first to produce automobiles in the hope of selling them. Up tothat time any vehicles that were built were strictly experimental models,one of a kind items of interest onlt to their creators. By 1888 Benz hadbuilt a limited number of his cars, but found no buyers. A year later bothBenz and Daimler exhibited their cars at the Paris World Fair, where theautomobiles were received with a remarkable lack of interest. The autoindustry was off to a slow start.

Two years after the disappointing debut at the World Fair, Daimler andMaybach decided to start making automobiles for sale and formed DaimlerMotoren Gesellschaft together. By that time, Benz had started to find alimited number of customers for his cars, mostly rich men who regarded themas expensive toys and curiosities.

Meanwhile, in France, one of the few people who had been intrigued by thepossibilities of the automobile when he viewed it at the Paris World Fairwas a very successful bicycle manufacturer named Armand Peugeot. Peugeotwas an engineer by training, and was intrigued by the idea of a self

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propelled vehicle. His first attempt to create one took place in 1889 andresulted in a steam powered tricycle. Shortly thereafter, he wasapproached by a man named Emile Levassor, who was building Daimler enginesin France through a licensing agreement with Gottlieb Daimler. Levassortried to sell Peugeot on the overall superiority of the Daimler gasolineengine as a power unit, and Peugeot, who had been having trouble with hissteamer, was not difficult to convince. Workinhg together, the two menconstructed the first Peugeot gasoline-powered automobile in 1890.

The Automobile Gets Rolling

Peugeot was a good engineer and an even better salesman. To interest thediffident public in his cars, he entered one in the big Paris to Brestbicycle race in 1891. The car completed the race at an average speed of 10mph, and finished dead last. In spite of the late finish, however theevent was a stroke of advertising genius, for it was the firstlong-distance journey ever made be an automobile and no one had expectedthe vehicle to be able to finish at all. The number of orders for thePeugeot car soared. By 1893 there was sufficient traffic on the streets ofParis for the French police to institute the world`s first license plates.

In 1894 an event just for automobiles was held from Paris to Rouen, an 80mile course. It was more of a publicity stunt than a race; awards weregiven for nearly every conceivable category, and some went to cars thatdidn`t finish, or didn`t even start! The officials received over 100entries although only 26 vehicles showed up for the elimination trials.Seventeen of those qualified and an additional eight were added in later,making a field of 25. A steam tractor won with a speed of just over 11mph, but it was disqualified on the grounds that it wasn`t really anautomobile, so the prize went jointly to Peugeot and another carmaker namedPanhard.

The following year, the event became a true race, with the course extendedto 732 miles, and speed and stamina being the only qualities judged.Twenty cars started, of which nine finished Those entries employing themore durable gasoline engines badly outclassed the six steam powered carsentered, a sign of things to come. The winning time was 48 hours and 48minutes, or an average speed of about 15 mph.

The New Century

By the time of the turn of the century, the automotive industry was gainingmomentum. In 1902, France produced a total of 12,000 cars, a majorincrease over the few hundred built only seven years previous. At theParis motor Show that year, a car was exhibited that was capable of speedsup to 50 mph. The technology of the automobile was being rapidly improved,with old designs being perfected and new ones appearing yearly. One, two,four, and six cylinder engines were made, and the first V8 engine was builtfor the 1903 Paris-Madrid race.

Travel by car at the turn of the century, while it might have beenenjoyable to those with a sense of adventure, was far from a pleasure trip.The only matter of real concern to early car designers was that the vehiclehave a reliable propulsion system, and all other issues were secondary.Automobiles lacked even the most rudimentary safety features, and were allopen topped, offering no protection from the weather. European roads werein a sorry state of disrepair (though not by comparison to American roadsof the time, it must be admitted) and road maps were non-existent.

There were no service stations or garages. Motorists carried extragasoline in cans in the back of the car and, if the driver forgot to fillhis reserves, he might have to walk many miles to find a chemist carryingfuel fit for his vehicle. There were no schools that taught driving and nostandard rules of the road - learning to drive was a trial and errorprocess, mostly error. No set of standard controls existed; most cars hada steering wheel and a brake lever, and little else, and the location ofthose two obJects varied from car to car. To make matters worse most earlymotorists were rich men with next to no knowledge of mechanics. They hadlittle idea how to maintain or repair their cars when things went wrong,which they often did.

THE AUTO COMES TO AMERICA

The development of the automobile took a somewhat different path in theUnited States than it did in Europe. The largest single factor affectingthis was the condition of American roads, which was abominable. WhileEurope had a long standing coach trade, resulting in reasonably good roadsin most countries, the U.S. was largely agrarian at that time. At theturn of the century, only 171 miles of paved road existed in the entirenation.

Americas First Automakers

The Philadelphia Exposition of 1876 was a notable event for Americaninventors. Two devices were publicly displayed for the first time: onewas the telephone, by Mr. Alexander Bell, and the other was a two cyclegasoline engine built by Mr. George Brayton. A patent attorney named

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George B. Selden saw the device, conceived of the idea of using it topropel a vehicle, and submitted the first patent application for hisconcept in 1879. Selden`s car ran on liquid fuel and featured a clutch anda steering wheel. The patent was granted in 1895 after many revisions;Selden had delayed deliberatly hoping to keep the patent viable for as longas possible, but he became afraid to wait any longer because otherinventors were rapidly conceiving automobile designs of their own.Although he was granted the patent, there is no evidence that Selden builtany cars from his design until many years later.

If you lived in Lansing Michigan in 1886 and happened to be outside afterdark on a summer`s day, you might have caught a glimpse of a machinistnamed Ransom Eli Olds running his three wheeled steam car on the citystreets. Olds, fearing embarrassment, always tested his early steamers atnight when he hoped no one would be watching to see them break down. In1890 he built one with four wheels and sold it to a customer in India, butthe car was lost at sea and therefore never delivered.

An issue of Scientific American from the same year carried an article aboutanother new invention: an electric car built by William Morrison of DesMoines, Iowa that could carry up to seven people. The publicity from thearticle generated over 16,000 inquiries. It was an early indicator of thesize of the potential market for a practical car in America, but Morrisonwasn't interested in exploiting it - as late as 1907 he declared, "Iwouldn`t give ten cents for an automobile for my own use.

John W. Lamber of Ohio constructed and ran a three wheeled gasolinepowered vehicle in 1891. The inventor offered to build them for sale toanyone who wanted one, but he found no buyers. A year later GottfriedSchloemer from Milwaukee built another gasoline engine and installed it ina buggy; today, the car resides in a Milwaukee museum and is still inworking order. But since neither of these prototypes was entirelysuccessful, oficial credit for building Americas first gasoline poweredinternal combustion automobile is usually given to one of two parties:either Elwood Haynes with his partners, the Apperson brothers, or the teamof Charles and Frank Duryea, brothers from Springfield, Massachusetts.

Both sets of inventors built their cars in 1894, but the Duryeas tookthings a step further in the next year, setting up a company to buildautomobiles for sale. The vehicles were still more curiosities thananything else, however a year after the brothers founded their company, theBarnum & Bailey Circus put a Duryea Motor Wagon on display as part of theirFreak Show, where it drew large crowds.

The Duryea Motor Company, although the first automaker to be even a limitedsuccess, lasted only three years and built a total of thirteen cars. Threeyears after the founding of the company, the brothers quarreled, and thenclosed down their joint business. The rift between the Duryea brothersnever closed, and they carried their grudges against each other to theirgraves.

The First American Auto Races

H. H. Kohlsaat, publisher of the Chicago Times-Herald, was looking for apublicity stunt. Inspired by the Paris-Rouen and Paris-Brest races held inFrance, he decided to sponsor America`s first automobile race in his homecity in the year 1895. He hoped to give positive exposure to the newhorseless carriage and, not incidentally, to his paper. Kohlsaat stagedthe race on Thanksgiving day, with several inches of slushy snow on theground, over a course of 54 miles, and offered a prize of $5,000. Six carswere entered: the Duryea brothers buggy. powered by a one cylindergasoline engine; an Electrobat electric car; William Morrisons electriccarriage; and three cars based on the German Benz. The only entrants whofinished were the Duryea and one of the Benz cars. Although large crowdsturned out to watch the start of the race, it required eleven hours for thewinning Duryea to complete the distance - by which time nearly everyone hadgone home.

The second auto race in the States took place six months later, in May1896, and was also sponsored by a publication - this time, the New Yorkmagazine Cosmopolitan. The course traveled from New York City toIrvington, and of the six starters, only the Duryea finished. The Americanpublic was less than impressed with the automobile - the bicyclists wholeft at the same time as the cars arrived ahead of them.

Detroits First Automobile

Although the general public was not exactly enthusiastic about the"horseless carriage" in 1896 the men who were building them kept right ondoing so. In the same year as the disastrous New York - Irvinton race, aninventor named Charles Brady King drove his gasoline-powered buggy on thestreets of the midwestern city of Detroit, Michigan. Following behind himon a bicycle was a young electrical engineer formerly employed by theEdison company. His name was Henry Ford, and twenty years later his namewould be synonymous with the popular car.

Ford was already hard at work building an automobile of his own, and three

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months later he felt ready for a test drive. He then discovered that hehad made a small oversight when he assembled the machine - it was too largeto fit through the door of his basement workshop. With the hard headedpracticality and directness that were to become his trademarks, Fordgrabbed a pickaxe and attacked the door frame. After removing a dozenbricks or so (and reassuring his anxious landlord), Ford pushed hisQuadricycle out onto the street and took it for a successful spin aroundthe block. The Quadricycle had a top speed of 20 mph, four times that ofKings car. Ford sold the vehicle for $200 and used the money to financethe building of his second car. Many years later, nostalgic, he trackeddown the old Quadricycle and bought it back.

The Steamer Forges Ahead

Although Ford, King and Winton all built successful gasoline poweredautomobiles in the late 1890s, it seemed for a time that the steamer wouldbe the car of choice for the new century. Apart from Alexander Winton, noone was producing gasoline cars for sale between 1898 and 1900. The Duryeaautomobile company, never prolific, folded in 1899, clearing the field fora different pair of brothers: identical twins Freelan and Francis Stanley.

The Stanley twins were both brilliant inventors, and already wealthy fromthe sale of their dryplate photographic process to the Kodak film company.In 1888 they witnessed a steam powered car in action, and were so impressedthey tried to build one themselves. Their first attempt was a failure, andthey abandoned the project for eight years until they saw another steamerin 1896. This time they succeeded in reproducing the invention, completingtheir first car in 1897. It gave a winning performance in a Boston hillclimbing contest, and prospective buyers swamped the brothers with over 200orders for the vehicle - a volume they could not possibly fill. As withMorrisons electric car seven years earlier, the enthusiastic responseindicated that a market for a reliable automobile did exist, if onlysomeone could produce the right car to tap it.

The Stanley brothers gamely set about trying to acquire enough parts tobuild the first hundred of their cars. Before they had gotten seriouslyunderway, a man named John Walker approached them with a proposal. Walker,the publisher of Cosmopolitan and the sponsor of the unsuccessful NewYork-Irvington race, offered to buy out the Stanleys, business. Thebrothers were not eager to sell and so, to discourage Walker, theyrequested the ridiculous price of $250,000. To their astonishment, Walkeraccepted, and the delighted twins closed the deal. Walker and his partner, asphalt millionaire Amzi Barber, formed theLocomobile Company of America in 1899, and began producing Stanley-designedsteamers under the brand name Locomobile. Later that year, WilliamMcKinley became the first president to ride in an automobile, and thatautomobile was a Locomobile Steamer. By 1901, half of the 8,000 carsregistered in the U.S. were Locomobiles.

Five years after selling out to Walker, the Stanley brothers decided toreturn to the steamer business themselves and bought back their originalfactory from Locomobile to produce their new car. Since Locomobile was inthe process of switching over to gasoline engines, they were able to buyback for just $20,000 everything they had sold five years before for overten times that amount. After redesigning their original car just enough toavoid charges of patent infringement, they introduced the Stanley Steamer,perhaps the best car of its time for the price.

Francis Stanley was once driving an experimental model on a straight roadnear Boston when a policeman stopped him for speeding. When he came beforethe judge, Stanley pleaded "not guilty" to the charge of going nearly 60mph. The judge, incredulous, asked how he could say that in the face ofthe evidence, to which Stanley replied, "I plead not guilty to going 60mph.When I passed the officer my speedometer showed was going 87 mph". Thecourt fined him $5 and the story made all the papers, generating excellentpublicity. The Stanley Streamer racer that won the Dewar Cup in 1906 wasclocked at an astonishing 127 mph

Unfortunately for the Stanleys and their excellent car, the time of thesteamer was nearly over. Although the Stanley Steamer and another popularbrand, the White Steamer, still had a number of good years ahead of them,they were on their way out. The White Steamers moment of glory came in1906 when Teddy Roosevelt became the first American president to drive acar, and chose a White, and they were also the first official White Housecars, purchased during William Howard Tafts term in office. But, unlikeits presidents at the time, the American public was quickly learning thatit preferred gasoline

Steam, Electric, or Gasoline?

The biggest question for carmakers before 1900 in America was: which powersource was best? Although the gasoline engine would eventually defeat allothers, at the start it was not at all clear that such would be the case.Both the steam powered and the electric-driven car did very well in Americaat the beginning, and car manufacturers produced excellent makes of bothtypes of automobile around the turn of the century. Locomobile, maker of

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steamers, was the largest automobile producer in the country as of 1902,but just a year later the company dropped its steam engines in favour ofgasoline.

There were several reasons for the ascension of gasoline over steam andelectricity. The first was the discovery of America`s first oil "gusher"in Spindletop, Texas in 1901, which guaranteed that gasoline would be cheapand plentiful for many years to come. The second was that both steam andelectricity had problems as power sources which gasoline did not.

The electric automobiles shortcomimgs were the same then as they are today:limited range and speed, plus the great weight of the large batteriesneeded to provide sufficient power Electricity did well in the early yearsof motoring, from about 1906 to 1916, because its problems were not soapparent as they later became. Early cars were used only in the city,where the limited range they could travel between recharges was not asignificant problem, since the distances to be crossed were small. Themost successful producer of electric cars, Colonel Albert Popes ColombiaMotor Company, delivered a vehicle that could go fifty miles betweenrecharges and had a speed of 35 mph. The low top speed was no greatlimitation when no production model auto powered by gasoline or steam coulddo any better.

The electric motor was silent, vilbrationless, safe, odorless, and startedinstantly: no other automobile power source could say the same.Electricity also had the advantage of being very popular with the public,as the electric light was an invention of recent times, and new uses werebeing found for electric power every year. But even Thomas A Edisonhimself said, "The future of the automobile will be the the gasolineengine. The inventor of the electric light was well aware of electricitieslimitations. The electric car prospered until the later years of the firstdecade of the twentieth century and then, in response to improvements inroads that made longer distance driving feasible, and the advance of thegasoline car, it quietly faded away.

The steamers limitations were less obvious, and might have been overcomeeventually had not the gasoline engine gotten there first. Steam enginesused kerosene to heat water for steam pressure, and kerosene was moreexpensive than gasoline at the time. Early steamers required a long waitbefore the engines built up enough steam pressure to move the car - on acold day it could take up to forty five minutes to get one going. Thisproblem was later solved by the invention of the flash boiler, but by thetime it became standard the gasoline powered car had developed aninsurmountable lead. The steam engine was also inherently less efficientthan the gasoline engine - although since it was an external combustiondevice, it burned more cleanly than its counterpart and produced less inthe way of harmful exhaust gases. Consumers did not recognize this benefitas the asset it was, unfortunately, for air quality would not become aconcern for several decades yet.

The steamer lasted about as long as the electric car, although a highquality streamer, the Doble, was being produced as late as 1924. About 100different makes of steamer existed during its heyday, and 80% of them werebuilt in the New England states. Even by 1910, however, it was clear thatthe future belonged to the gasoline engine

The First Popular Car

In 1897, Ransom E Olds set up a car company called the Olds Motor Works inLansing, Michigan. His new cars would be gasoline powered, Olds havinggiven up on steam engines. In 1899 he moved the company to nearby Detroit,since he considered Lansing too small to support his business while Detroitwas already a large city and growing fast. Although he later moved back toLansing, Olds remains the first automaker to set up shop in what was tobecome the automobile capital of the world. A disastrous fire at the Oldsauto plant in 1901 nearly wiped out the fledgling automaker, but the eventwas something of a blessing in disguise. Of the several prototypes in thefactory, only one was saved, forcing Olds to concentrate his production andadvertising efforts on that one car. The automobile, the Curved Dash Olds,made its debut later that year and was a smashing success. It sold for$600, advertised as "a dollar a pound" as compared to the Locomobile whichcost around $1000. The Curved Dash Olds was the first quantity built carin America with over 16,000 being made between 1901 and 1907. In 1905 itbecame the subject of a popular song still sung by barbershop quartetstoday, "In My Merrie Oldsmobile". The car and the company both becameknown by the name "Oldsmobile" although it was never the official name ofthe car and did not become the name of the company until much later.

Oldsmobile overtook Locomobile as America`s leading car manufacturer in1903. Three years after that, though, the company`s sales droppeddramatically when it stopped making the Curved Dash Olds and turned tomaking more expensive cars. Ransom Olds objected to the change indirection, realizing, as Henry Ford did, that the biggest market lay in thecar for the average man. But by that time he had left the company and hadno say over it. He would later start up another car company, Reo, back inhis hometown of Lansing.

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The Century Turns in America

By 1900 the automobile was well established in Europe, at least among theupper classes. It still had a way to go in the United States, though hefirst automobile show in America was held in New York city in this year,and the press called it a triumph "almost equal" to that of the yearlyhorse show.

Electrics and Locomobiles were making the rounds of most major cities on aregular basis. Yet, on the farms that made up most of the country, almostno one had even seen an automobile. When they did see one, they generallyhated it on sight or if not on sight, shortly thereafter, the first time itspooked their horses or killed one of their farm animals. Farmers oftenwent out of their way to sabotage early motorists, spreading tacks andbroken glass on the roads (sure to cause at least one puncture of thosefragile early pneumatic tires)" or running rope or even barbed wire acrossthem. Automobiles and their drivers were sometimes stoned, by adults aswell as mischievous children, or even attacked with horsewhips.

To be fair, much of the farmers, anger at the automobile was legitimate,and fueled by the cavalier attitude taken by the early motorist toward thefarmer and his property. Drivers killed farm dogs and chickens with theircars and kept right on driving, and they sometimes deliberately attemptedto spook horses pulling carriages and carts (an easy thing to do, and mostamusing - except for the people in the buggy or wagon). The vast majorityof early drivers were rich city people and their disdain for their rusticcountrymen did not lead them to polite behaviour while in their cars or outof them.

In a distinctly unusual attempt to pacify horses and horse owners alike,one imaginative entrepreneur, Uriah Smith of Battle Creek, Michigan,proposed to build a type of car called the "Horsy Horseless Carriage." Thisvehicle sported a life-sized horse`s head and neck on the front of the car,designed to fool credulous equines into thinking that the automobile was astandard buggy. As an additional plus, the head could be made hollow andput into service as a fuel tank. Unfortunately the head did nothing todisguise the smell or the sound of the automobile, and its doubtful thatSmith succeeded in tricking even a single horse with his invention. He andhis car rapidly vanished from the motoring scene.

In the city, on the other hand, the car was accepted quickly because thehorse had made itself less than welcome through the accumulation of massivepiles of dung that had to be carted away (and often weren`t), leading toserious sanitation and disease problems. One often overlooked benefit ofthe automobile to cities was the elimination of this threat, and theconcurrent sharp reduction in the occurrence of diseases such as tetanus(lockjaw), which thrived in the horses by-products. An additional healthhazard resulted when the horses, often starved, ill treated, or simplyworked to death, dropped dead in the streets. Owners often abandoned thecarcasses, leaving them to rot in public for days at a time. This causedserious disease potential as well as an unbelievable stench. Even thesharp odor of car fumes could not begin to compare.

AMERICAN MOTORING GAINS SPEED

Early commercial production in the United States did not really getunderway until around 1900, but after that point it increased dramatically.At first, American cars compared poorly to European vehicles for quality,but as more companies entered the field and the competition for sales grewmore fierce, U.S. carmakers rapidly upgraded their wares until theyapproached a European level of reliability. The first commercial Americancars were "assembled", built from parts produced by many differentcompanies, while in Europe most carmakers produced the majority of theirown parts in their own companies, resulting in better workmanship in thecompleted car. Once American carmakers started to amass the knowledge andcapital to be able to the same, the European lead in quality narrowedswiftly.

Propelled by the sales of such popular vehicles as the Locomobile, theColumbia electric car, the Curved Dash Olds and the Stanley and WhiteSteamer, and aided by literally hundreds of small carmakers, U.S.automobile production hit 33,200 passenger vehicles in 1906, enough tounseat France from its position as leading car manufacturer. The Americanlead was no flash in the pan, either, but grew larger with every year thatpassed. It would take over seventy years and a drastic change in themotoring scene for any other country's carmakers to equal the American carindustries power. Evidence that the International motoring community was taking American carsseriously arrived in 1908 with the New York to Paris automobile race.Jointly sponsored by the New York City Times and Paris Le Matin newspapers,the course covered a total of 13,341 miles. Six cars left New York onFebruary 12 and crossed the continent to San Francisco. From there, theywere shipped to Alaska and thence to Japan and the Russian port ofVladivostok. The last leg of the race was on land from Vladivostok toParis. The winner was George Schuster driving a Thomas Flyer, who coveredthe distance in 169 days. All the contestants agreed that the roads of

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Eastern Europe, and even Siberia, were less of a problem than those ofupstate New York.

In the year 1903, a man named Horatio Nelson Jackson first crossed theAmerican continent in a car. In the same year, an automobile succeeded iocrossing the social rift between the city and farming country. The "highwheeler" car, basically a motor-powered horse buggy" had wheels tall enoughto cope with badly rutted country roads and deep mud pits. Several makesof highwheeler achieved limited success, and gave farmers the first tasteof what an automobile could do for them.

Sears Roebuck offered one make of high wheeler through its catalog from1908 to 1912, and a pleased farmer wrote in, "Iy beats a horse bad as itdon`t eat when I ain`t working it, and it stands without hitching, and bestof all it don`t get scared at automobiles". The tall cars lasted about sixyears, but fell victim to rising expectations. Their top speed was around25 mph, they offered little preotection from the weather, and they facedstiff competition from a new arrival on the car market that was the firsttrue automobile to deal fairly well with country roads: the Model T Ford.

Why Detroit?

Why, precisely, did the city of Detroit become the one and only true homeof the American automobile? Part of the reason had to do with simple luckin having several of the most prominent figures in the history of theautomobile industry living nearby, but there were more logical reasons aswell.

Although one of the earliest working automobiles, that of Charles BradyKing, ran on the streets of Detroit, it must be remembered that prototypecars were chugging along on the streets of many a Midwestern and NewEngland city at that time. Detroit was nothing special in that regard.More influential was the establishment of the Olds Motor Works in 1899 for,as the city where the first truly popular car was manufactured, Detroitnaturally became associated with automobiles in the public mind.

Still, as of 1899 several other carmakers had begun successful carcompanies in other locations Why didn`t their cities become "Motortown"?The reason was that they were making the wrong types of cars. The NewEngland carmakers were producing steamers and electrics for the big Easterncities, and did well with them for a while. But when the popularity of thesteamer and the electric declined, so did the image of New England as thecarmaker`s home.

The Midwest was, by comparison, a rough and ready place, requiringsomething less dainty than an electric and hardier than a finicky steamer.Settlements were further apart than in the developed East, calling for avehicle that could promise an extended range. The Midwest needed thegasoline automobile, and Detroit was one of only two places that weremaking them in quantity. Detroit`s only challenger was Cleveland, Ohio,home of the Winton.

Both Cleveland and Detroit had several advantages in common. Both were,vigorous cities located on what was still essentially a frontier, altlhoughsettlers were rapidly taming it. Their location midway between the settledEast and the boisterous West made them a natural way station foradventurous people, some of who decided to make their homes in the Mdwestrather than continue on. Both cities had abundant access to water and railtransportation, and a large amount of skilled labor for the workshops, muchof which came from the influx of Irish German, and Dutch inmmigrants thatstreamed into the United States between 1880 and 1920. Both Cleveland andDetroit had fostered one very successful gasoline-powered automobilecompany. Thus proving their suitability as a home for the industry.

However, there were three things - or, rather, three people - that Detroithad which Cleveland lacked. These three men, and the two companies theyfounded, cemented Detroits position as the Car City. First was Henry Ford,with his Ford Motor Company; second there was David Dunbar Buick, whoformed the Buick Motor Company; and third, there was William C. Durant,who built upon the keystone of Buick to create General Motors

Third Times the Charm for Ford...

Henry Ford was born July 30, 1863, on his family`s farm in Dearborn,Michigan. Young Henry was not cut out for farm work, as he disliked therural life and had a natural mechanical aptitude At age 15 he ran of toDetroit to train as a machinist, and later advanced to the position ofchief engineer of the Edison Illuminating Company. By the time he followedCharles King`s automobile through the streets of the city on a bicycle, hehad for the past six years been tinkering with the idea of building one ofhis own. Three months after Kings jaunt, he succeeded. His Quadricyclewas the sixth American built gasoline car to run.

Ford tries to found a company to build his cars for the first time in 1899,but the Detroit Automobile Company folded just over a year later. In whatwas a familiar pattern, Ford and his business partners could not manage toagree on what the aim of the company should be. The backers wanted to

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build cars to sell, while Ford was not yet satisfied with his designs andwished to keep tinkering. Ford, always stiff-necked and headstrong,refused to compromise and his backers pulled out.

Undaunted, Ford tried again later that year, forming the Henry Ford Companywith William Murphy as a partner. Once again, the company went under,brought low by personality differences between Ford and the man with themoney. Ford wanted to build race cars, feeling that his designs werentready for wholesale production yet. Murphy disagreed, and brought in HarryLeland as a production consultant. Ford, furious, walked out, taking hisname with him. Leland and Murphy put to use the parts and equipment Fordhad bought to build an improved Oldsmobile engine of Leland`s design.Since Detroit was celebrating the two-hundredth anniversary of its foundingby Frenchman Antoine de la Mothe Cadillac, Leland named his new car theCadillac.

Exasperated by having to deal with men who thought they had a right to tellhim what he should do with their money, Henry Ford gave up on businessbriefly. He turned instead to racing as a means to obtain money andpublicity, and to improve his engine designs. He did quite well at itsetting a number of records. The famous racer Barney Oldfield joined theFord team in 1902, and in the following year became the first nman totravel a mile a minute, driving Ford`s most famous racer, the "999". In1904, shortly before Ford gave up on racing entirely, he took the flyingmile record in the same car, traveling 91.37 mph.

Buoyed by his racing successes and his new popularity with the public, in1903 Ford took another stab at starting a business. His partner this timewas Alexander Malcomson, a coal dealer. The name was originally to be theFord & Malcomson Company, but shortly after its founding it was changed tothe Ford Motor Company. The reason for the change is not recorded, but itwas most likely done to pacify the temperamental Henry Ford. The newcompany began with $100,000 capital funds, $28,000 of that in cash.Malcomson, a canny businessman, assigned his talented and trustedbookkeeper, James Couzens, to the Ford Company to keep an eye on Malcomsonsmoney. Couzens, ability to do so, and to get along with Henry Ford, waslargely responsible for the survival and eventual success of the fledglingautomobile maker. In later years, James Couzens would turn hisadministrative talents to use for the public good, serving with distinctionin the U.S. Senate.

The Ford Motor Company baptized its first car the "Model A" a name that itwould later reuse for an entirely different car. A true "horselesscarriage" the Model A strongly resembled a horse buggy with a steeringwheel and no horse. The first one was sold a month after the companysfounding, to a dentist in Chicago. By 1904, the Ford Motor Company hadproduced 1,708 automobiles, a remarkable number for a new carmaker in itsfirst year. Two additional models, the Model B and the very expensiveModel C priced at $2000, had joined the Model A.

Alexander Malcomson wanted the company to build more expensive cars,believing in the prevailing wisdom that the market for automobiles lay withthe rich, whose tastes should be catered to if one wanted to make a profit.Ford disagreed, believing instead that a larger market lay with the averageman, if only a car could be made cheaply enough for him to afford it. Inthis case Ford`s instincts were correct, and fortunately for the Ford MotorCompany, his wishes prevailed. Henry stated his idea of production thus:"The way to make automobiles is to make one automobile like anotherautomobile - to make them all alike "He would later turn this philosophyinto a novel and wildly successful manufacturing method called the assemblyline.

...And also for Buick

In the year that Henry Ford was taking his second shot at becoming acarmaker, a Scottish born engineer named David Dunbar Buick was taking hisfirst. Buick had already made a major contribution to modern life byinventing a process to apply enamel to cast iron bathroom fixtures thusmaking them easy to clean and sanitize and making the indoor bathroom apossibility. Like many brilliant inventors, however, he bored easily, andby the turn of the century he had abandoned plumbing and instead seized onthe motorcar as an interesting device with which to experiment. His firstautomobile business endeavor went by the rather ponderous name of the BuickAuto Vim and Power Company of Detroit.

Buick, although a much more pleasant personality than Henry Ford, was ifanything a poorer businessman, and his first effort rapidly went broke. Hetried again a year later, founding the Buick Manufacturing Company with theengineer Walter Marr, and this time he actually managed to get some cars onthe road before the company foundered. In 1903 one month before the FordMotor Company came into being, Buick`s business was reorganized as theBuick Motor Company. It, too, seemed destined to fail within a few years -until fate, in the person of William C. Durant, stepped in.

Billy Durant was one of the partners of the successful Dort & DurantCarriage Company in Flint, Michigan when in 1904, he saw a Buick automobilepassing by on the street and became intrigued by it. Expansive, charming,

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and personable. Durant was a salesman and businessman, not an engineer orinventor. Unlike Buick and Ford, he enjoyed playing the money game perhapsa bit too much. Durant bought a controlling interest in the falteringBuick Motor Company, and set about making the business profitable.

Durant reorganized Buick Motors in the same way he had run his carriagebusiness. His first move was to go out and buy up all the companies thatprovided components for the Buick cars to ensure a cheap and continuoussupply of parts for the automobiles. During a brief but intense financialpanic in 1907 (deliberately caused by financier, Pierpont Morgan as acynical demonstration of his power). Durant kept the Buick factoriesrunning at full speed while all other manufacturers slowed down in responseto the crisis. When the panic ended suddenly, Buick was the only carmakerwith cars on hand to sell: and its future was assured. It was duringthese years that Durant first began to envision building a "holdingcompany" a corporation uniting all automakers and their suppliers in oneorganization. In the next year, his dream would start to take shape.

THE START OF SOMETHING BIG

If any single year can be said to have determined the shape of the AmericanAutomobile industry, it would be 1908. This year saw the premier of theModel T Ford, the car that would put a nation on wheels, and the formationof the company that would one day be the world`s largest, General Motors.It was in this year that William Durant hired a French race car drivernamed Louis Chevrolet to race Buicks for him. And, as fate would have it,it was also the year that a man named Walter Chrysler bought his firstautomobile (a Locomobile steamer) and took it apart in his garage to seewhat made it work

The Model T

The Ford Motor Company produced two new car designs in 1905, the Model Kand the Model N. The Modrel K was an experimental six cylinder car thatdid not stay in production long. Priced at $2,800, it was anything but the"average man`s car". that Ford envisioned - in fact, it was more expensivethan the highest priced Cadillac of the same period. Ford was also lessthan happy with the six cylinder engine, which had problems with persistentvibrations that he could never eliminate, and in his disgust with theengine refused to allow his company to manufacture any more six cylindersfor over thirty years. The Model K was marketed as a cutting edge vehicleand advertisements warned buyers, "Don`t Be a Year Behind-er." This was oneof the first times the idea of a "yearly model" appeared in America.Ironically enough, in later years Henry Ford was to scorn the idea ofturning out a new model every year to catch the fancy of the fickle public.

The Model N car was more successful. A four cylinder vehicle selling forless than $500, it was a direct precursor to the Model T, and it sold wellenough to move Ford from fourth place to first by 1906. At about the sametime, Ford decided that buying all Ford automobile parts from othercompanies was an unreasonable expense, and formed the Ford ManufacturingCompany in order to be able to build his own components. He deliberatelyset up the company without including Alex Malcomson, as he felt (perhapsrightly) that Malcomson`s ideas would eventually lead to the ruin of thecompany if unchecked.

Malcomson, furious at Ford`s underhanded maneuvering, left to start his ownbusiness making automobiles, the Aerocar Company. He kept his Ford stock,however. Henry Ford felt that it was unjust for Malcomson to use profitsmade from Ford`s cars to manufacture a competing make and took Malcomson tocourt over it. The judge agreed with Ford, and forced Malcomson to divesthimself of his Ford stock. Despite the breach between Ford and Malcomson,James Couzens and another Malcomson employee, a brilliant young engineernamed Childe Harold Wills, decided to stay with Henry Ford.

Ford brought out the Model R and S cars in 1907, which kept his company asthe top manufacturer. His nearest competitor was Buick, which wasproducing about two thirds the number of cars Ford was. In the fall of1908, Ford introduced the car that was to make his name a household word,the Model T. It was popular right from the start, but it would not becomeomnipresent on American roadways until five years after its introduction.Few other cars generated the level of affection - and exasperation in theirowners as did the "Flivver" also known as the "Tin Lizzie"

The Model T was designed by Ford, Wills, and Joseph Galamb. In 1906, Willshad discovered a process for machining vanadium steel into automobilecomponents. Vanadium steel components required less metal, and so werelighter but at the same time stronger than contemporary parts. Thestrength of vanadium steel was in a great part responsible for one of theModel Ts greatest selling points, its durability. Its sole other virtuewas its economy of operation. It did not possess the advantages of eitherbeauty or style, but it was not hampered much by its lack of looks. Thepeople for whom it was intended and who bought it were looking fordependable, affordable transportation, not a status symbol, and that wasprecisely what Ford gave them.

The car was a simple design, borrowing elements from the Model R and S and

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adding a few innovations of its own, including the vanadium steelcrankshaft and an engine designed to be easily serviceable. It had a fourcylinder, 20 horsepower gasoline engine and a simple planetary transmissionoperated by pedals on the floor. It also had a steering wheel set on theleft to make driving on the right easier. Although driving on the righthad been the American standard for some time, carmakers had not yet gottenaround to standardizing the position of the steering wheel and in numerousmodels of the time it was still placed on the right. The popularity of theModel T with its left set wheel, helped determine what the standard wouldbecome in the years that followed.

The Model T was offered in five body styles, at prices ranging from $825 to$ 1,000 at its introduction. The price dropped rapidly as Ford found waysto economize on production. The transmission and steering were very cheap(which is why the car could be made inexpensively) and somewhat outmodedeven in the year he car was introduced. Nevertheless, the sametransmission and steering remained on the car until it ended productionafter nearly twenty years. All components were Ford made except for thetires, made by Harvey Firestone, and the bodies, provided by a variety ofsuppliers.

Production began fairly slowly, but by the summer of 1909 the Ford MotorCompany was building cars at the rate of one hundred a day. Back in 1906,Henry Ford had predicted that he would one day reach that figure, and beenuniversally mocked for his statement. He must have felt enormoussatisfaction on the day he first proved the mockers wrong. In its firstyear on the market nearly six thousand Model Ts were sold.

The Founding of General Motors

Billy Durant was a man with large dreams. Once he had Buick Motors up andrunning, he wasted little time in pursuing bigger fish. His grand plan wasto unite as many car companies and their suppliers as possible under onename. This would guarantee financial security for all of them in a badyear, and enable the resulting conglomerate to be able to offer a widerange of automobiles priced to suit any pocketbook. In 1908 he set out toconvince America`s other carmakers to join him in his new venture, acompany called General Motors. He first approached Ford with his idea, butFord, realizing that the company would be Durant`s and not his, was not atall willing to relinquish control of Ford and refused.

Most other carmakers Durant approached at first felt similarly, distrustingthe smoothtalking Durant, and therefore declined his inivitation. As aresult, GM was formed in deep secrecy on September 16, 1908, with only$2,000 in capital funds. With that small base to work from, Durant boughthis considerable talents as a salesman to bear and within two weeks hadparlayed his tiny starting sum into $12.5 million. His first move was to"buy" Buick Motors. A month later, he added Oldsmobile to his group -Olds, company had been faultering since the departure of its founder in1904 and the ensuing mishandling of the company by its primarystockholders, the Smith family. In the following year, Durant addedOakland (which would become Pontiac) and Harry Leland`s Cadillac cars tohis line. By the end of 1910, he had bought seventeen car companies and alarge number of component makers as well, and set the foundations for acommercial empire.

One sad casualty of Durant`s empire building was David Buick. Buick wasnever very interested in the business end of his company, preferringtinkering with his engines to engaging in the wheeling-dealing financialenterprises of which Durant was so fond. After Buick and Durant quarreledover the question of whether Buick was going to sell his engines to otherfirms - Buick said yes, Durant said no. David Buick bowed out of thecompany he had founded leaving it in Durant`s hands. Durant saw to it thatBuick left with a handsome parting gift of $100,000 of Durant`s own moneyand a large chunk of Buick stock, but unfortunatly it did David Buicklittle good. He invested unwisely in a number of shaky businesses and losteverything, ending his life in poverty and obscurity as cars bearing hisname rolled by in the streets outside.

Durant meanwhile proved to be over eager in the pursuit of his dream. Hespent a great deal of money in a very short time (his purchase of Cadillacfor $5.75 million was the largest single financial transaction ever at thetime it was made), and much of it went for companys of dubious quality.Durant bought many businesses on the off chance that the patents they heldmight come in useful someday, and most of them didn`t. Only two yearsafter its founding it appeared that General Motors was about to go underbefore it had really gotten off the ground.

Durant and the other heads of GM appealed to a banker`s consortium to bailout the company. The bankers agreed to do so, but as a condition theyrequired that Billy Durant step down as president of Buick and vicepresident of GM. Durant bowed to the inevitable and resigned his posts,although he kept his seat on the Board of Directors of General Motors. Hisplace at Buick was taken by Charles Nash, who would go on in future yearsto found a car company of his own. But General Motors had not heard thelast from Billy Durant.

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The Selden Patent

Back in 1895, a lawyer named George Selden had obtained a patent for aprimitive automobile. Four years later he sold the patent to a group ofelectric carmakers, the Association of Licensed Automobile Manufacturers(ALAM), headed by Colonel Pope of Colombia Electric. The electricautomobile manufacturers had little use for the patent, which was for agasoline engine, but they may have been hoping to discourage thedevelopment of gasoline cars until they could work out the problems withthe electric, or perhaps they were just hedging their bets, as no one thencould tell which type of car would eventually dominate the market.

Most gasoline engine automobile makers of the period paid royalties to ALAMthanks to the Selden patent, or got around it by joining ALAM itself.Winton, Knox, Locomobile, Oldsmobile, Packard, amnd the Pierce Arrow hadall become members rather than pay royalties. As of 1903, Selden had notbuilt a single car in that year, to defend his patent from a challenge, hebuilt two of them, but neither of them ran more than a few yards. Thejudge did not consider the failure of the vehicles to be an issue, though,and upheld the patent. The verdict caused a stampede as thirty moreautomakers rushed to join up with ALAM.

In the same year, Henry Ford made inquiries about obtaining membership, butwas brushed off by F.L.Smith of Oldsmobile because he was "only anassembler." Ford, his combative nature aroused by the insult wore that ALAMcould take its patent and go to Hell, for they would never get a cent ofroyalties out of him.

During the first year of full scale Model T production, in 1909, ALAMbrought suit against Henry Ford to force him to pay up. Ford challengedthe patent on the grounds that Selden`s car ran on a two cycle engine whilehis ran on a four. He also founded his own group, the Motor CarManufacturers Association, as support for the fight. Ford`s organizationincluded himself Marmon, Reo, Maxwell-Briscoe, Mitchell, and the truckmanufacturer Mack. After two years of court battles Ford won the case onappeal.

The effect of his struggle with ALAM and his victory over them on thepublic was enormous. Ford came to be viewed as the representative of theCommon Man contending with the over whelming forces of Big Business andsucceeding against high odds. This view was not entirely justified; theFord Motor Company was already well established as a Big Business in itsown right, and in fact Ford had more money than any of the carmanufacturers that comprised ALAM. Nevertheless, the court case made Forda folk hero of sorts, and he came to be viewed as the champion of theunderdog Midwest against the establishments of the East. In any case,there is no question that all the furor helped his car sales tremendously.

Durant Finds a New Partner

In 1911, Billy Durant found himself in the frustrating position of being onthe Board of Directors of GM, but being essentially powerless. This didnot sit well with him at all, and he set out, in his own inimitable style,to do something about it.

Durant realized, as Olds and Ford had before him, that a tremendous marketexisted for a cheap car of reasonable quality. He also realized thatGeneral Motors had no plans to build any car fitting that description.Never one to miss an opportunity (good or bad), Durant approached LouisChevrolet, a well known race driver who had worked for Durant at Buick.Durant resoned that a race car driver must have some idea what makes a goodcar, and when he proposed to Chevrolet that Chevrolet should design thekind of car Durant had in mind and Durant would provide the financing,Chevrolet was agreeable.

At the end of the year, the company was formed. Chevrolet designed thecar, and Durant set up the company and did the marketing. Nothing but thedesign and the name were Chevrolets. The company belonged to Durant, andChevrolet was not even on the board of directors. The earliest carsChevrolet designed were less than successful, but in 1914 he produced the Hseries 490. It became a significant success, and the new company`sfortunes began to rise. Durant, with a sucessful company to work with,began to scheme to achieve greater things once again, but the Directors ofGeneral Motors failed to catch the scent of trouble on the wind.

THE CLASSIC YEARS

Woodrow Wilson while still president of Princeton, condemned the automobileas a spreader of social envey amoungst the lower classes, since it was aluxury only the idle rich could afford. Little did he know that within avery few years, the automobile would become available to nearly everyone.The man who made that possible was Henry Ford, and he did it by inventing amanufacturing process that would revolutionize the automobile industry andmany other industries as well. Up until 1906, the U.S. lagged behindEurope in auto development, but by 1915 that situation had completelyturned around, thanks almost solely to Ford.

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AN AUTOMOBILE FOR THE AVERAGE MAN: 1913-1919

Henry Ford had a dream: he wanted to build an automobile that the commonman could afford. With current production methods, however, it wasimpossible to produce a car cheaply enough so that it could be sold tosomeone of modest means and still make a profit for the manufacturer. Thecost for parts, and more importantly for labor, were just too high. Theonly way to get around these problems was to create a new method ofmanufacturing.

Flivvers for Everyone

The concepts that led to the inspiration of the assembly line had beenaround for a while before Henry Ford put them to work. In Delaware in1784, Oliver Evans set up a system of conveyor belts and chutes thatallowed him to grind flour in a continuous process, and keep his millrunning day and night. The basic technique was adopted by the rest of themilling community, and came to be used in the textile, iron, canning,hardware, and meat-packing industries. It may have been the last thatinspired Ford; one story holds that inspiration struck when he sawcarcasses being moved through a meat packing plant on a chain conveyorbelt, each worker taking off the appropriate cut as it passed his station.

Automobiles were not carcasses, though - they had to be put together, nottaken apart. In order to make Fords idea really work, another element wasrequired; interchangeable, standardized parts. The first standardizedparts were made in 1800 by Eli Whitney, inventor of the cotton gin, whodevised a system for precision machining of parts in order to make largenumbers of rifles for the U.S. Militia. It was Ford`s particular geniusto see that the two ideas - a belt that carried parts past workers insteadof the workers carting parts to a central location, and standardized partsthat eliminated the need for individual hand fitting and adjustment ofassembled components - could be combined to produce complex manufacturedgoods in an efficient manner.

Ford first instituted his new process in the manufacture of magnetos forignition systems. The trial was a huge success. What used to take one maneighteen minutes to accomplish could be done in only five - less thanone-third the time. Encouraged, Ford soon expanded the system to themanufacture of entire automobiles. It worked as well there as it had forthe magnetos, reducing the time needed to assemble a chassis from twelveand a half hours to only one and a half. One disadvantage to the newtechnique was that only black paint would dry fast enough to make thefaster assembly practical, so from 1914 on a customer could have his ModelT In any color, as long as it`s black.

The main effect of the assembly line, from Ford`s point of view, was thathe could now afford to make the "car for the average man" that he`d dreamedof since his company was founded. He put his new assemblers to workproducing Model T Fords in numbers previously undreamed of. In 1914, Fordalone produced 202,667 cars, more than the rest of the worlds manufacturerscombined, and by 1923 the manufacturing rate was such that 1,817,891 Fordswere built in a single year, more than four times the number of Ford`sclosest rival at the time, Chevrolet.

The price of the Model T Ford plummeted in response to the new economicalmanufaturing method. By 1916 it was down to $360, and by 1924 one could behad for $260. With prices like that, the customers didn`t care that theFlivver was fairly ugly and not exactly the most modern car on the road.They bought in droves. By 1920 two thirds of all vehicles on the Americanroad and one half of those in the world were Fords. For the next fifteenyears, Henry Ford was the undisputed automobile king. Ford, born of farmstock, was particularly pleased when Model T became the first trueautomobile to be a hit with farmers, replacing the vanishing high wheelerin their hearts. Like the high-wheeler and unlike its contemporaries, itwas not bothered by the rough back-country roads. IT was a plain andsimple car for a plain and simple people.

Henry Ford Objects to Dodge

For many years Ford had been having its engines and a few other parts madeby the Dodge brothers in their family`s machine shop. They had begunbuilding engines for Olds in 1901, but in 1903 Ford offered them $5,000 amonth and 50 shares of Ford stock each to work for him instead. The stockalone was more than enough to make them millionaires when the Model T tookoff.

By 1910 the Dodge brothers, who had some good ideas for automobileinnovations, were growing frustrated with Henry Ford`s single mindedconcentration on his Model T and his refusal to make any improvements onthe car. Without telling Ford, they began to design a car of their own,planning for it to be of better quality than the Model T but priced in thesame moderate range, and in 1914 they incorporated the Dodge BrothersCompany. Their premier car, the Dodge Four came out the following yearwith the first all steel body, as well as many other lesser innovations,and a price tag of $785.

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Though derided by some as a "tin can" the car, supported by the DodgeBrothers, sterling reputation as engine makers, was an instant success.Some 22,OOO firms applied for Dodge dealerships before the car was evenofficially launched. In its first year, the firm went from non existenceto third place behind Ford and Willys Overland.

Henry Ford found the Dodge Brothers, instant success a difficult pill toswallow. He felt that the Dodge engine had risen to fame on the back ofthe Model T, not the other way around, and for the Dodge Brothers now gointo business using that reputation to make a competing car was basetreachery. To add insult to injury, they owned 10% of his company andsupported their business with profits from his cars! The Auto King vowedto rectify the situation. In 1916 he announced that instead of payingdividends to his stockholders, he planned to plow the companys entireprofits into expansion and development of the Ford facilities. Thestockholders naturally objected, and when Ford refused to yield, they filedsuit to force him to pay. Three years later a judge decided in favor ofthe stockholders, much to Ford`s annoyance.

These events convinced Henry Ford that letting other people have any saywhatsoever in the doings of his company was insupportable. Therefore, heset about immediately buying up all the shares of Ford that he did notpersonally own. The stock, which had sold at $100 a share when firstoffered cost Ford $12,500 a share to buy back. The total cost of thepurchase was an astounding $100 million, but Henry could afford it. It wasalmost forty years before anyone other than a member of the Ford familywould hold even a single share of Ford stock again. Today, the familystill holds 40% of all shares

The Prodigal Returns

Billy Durant and Louis Chevrolet were having trouble agreeing on companypolicy for Chevrolet, or even what type of cars they were going to build.Chevrolet wanted to build big, expensive cars but Durant controlled thebusiness and directed him toward lighter, cheaper automobiles instead.Their differences of opinion reached a critical level in 1913 when Durantsuggested to Chevrolet that he adopt a more polished image appropriate tohis new status as a successful manufacturer - for example, Billy said,Chevrolet should abandon his beloved lower class cigarettes for the moreprestigious cigar. Chevrolet, pushed too far, blew up and walked out,leaving Durant sole control of Chevrolet.

Chevrolet continued to prosper under Durant`s adept management, garnering anice slice of the economy car market. In 1915 Durant decided it was timeto implement the strategy he`d been working on all along: the takeover ofhis beloved GM, stolen from him five years before. Durant used his profitsfrom Chevrolet and bank loans against the company to buy up some GM stock.Then, by arranging a stock swap between Chevrolet and GM shares favorableto the GM stockholders, he expanded his total past the critical 50%. Atthe next meeting of the Board of Directors of GM Durant sauntered in andannounced that he was back in charge.

His Time of triumph was destined to last only a few years, however. It wasBilly Durants personal tragedy that, for all his skill at running a singlecompany, he did not seem able to get the hang of how to successfully managea large, diversified corporation. Failing to learn from his earlierexperiences, Durant returned to his old policy of spend, spend, spend.This time he went for a so called "vertical" expansion, buying up partssuppliers such as Fisher Body, Frigidaire, and Hyatt Roller Bearing. WithHyatt Roller Bearing came a talented young manager named Alfred P. Sloanwho would one day become Durant`s successor. But it would take some timefor the effects of Durant`s spending binges to become apparent, so for themoment, Billy Durant was riding high.

In 1917 with World War I raging in Europe and America`s involvementbecoming more and more likely with each passing day, Harry Leland ofCadillac, a staunch patriot, asked Durant if he could use Cadillacfacilities to manufacture Liberty airplane engines. Durant, a pacifist,refused. To his surprise, Leland`s determination to add to the war effortwas so strong that the founder of Cadillac resigned in order to start a newcompany devoted to building the Liberty. When the war ended two yearslater, Leland`s new company, Lincoln, went over to doing what Leland didbest, and within a short time Lincoln cars were competing with Lelands oldcompany, Cadillac.

FROM DEPRESSION TO DEPRESSION : 1920-1929

It was during the Roaring Twenties that America`s "love affair with theautomobile" became passionate. Between the years of 1920 and 1929 annualcar production in the U.S. jumped from two million to four million, andtotal car registrations went from eight million to twenty three million.By 1930 there was one car for every 13 households. Twenty years before,the figure had been one per forty four. Owning a car became a symbol thatthe buyer could afford "the good life" and everyone wanted one.

All other purchases were set aside in favor of the automobile - sometimes

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even basic necessities. We`d rather do without clothes than give up thecar, said one mother of nine in 1923, while a 1925 survey in Muncie,Indiana showed that twenty-one out of twenty six car owning households hadno bathtubs with running water. When asked why they chose a car over abathtub one farmers wife replied simply, "You can`t ride to town in abathtub"

Many improvements were made in the automobile during this period. Amongthe features that became commonplace were balloon tires, enclosed hydraulicbrakes, standardized gearshift, noclash shifting, windshield wipers,taillights, hydraulic shock absorbers, and the mechanical fuel pump.Automobile designs started to conform to a few standard looks, and muchvariety disappeared as carmakers grew unwilling to seem "unconventional".After 1929 obvious ostentation went out of vougue with a desire not toflaunt wealth, if you were fortunate enough to still have it.

One clear trend that developed through the 1920s was the ascendance of thebusinessman over the inventor in the American auto industry. Earlyautomobile producers were in general engineers and machinists notsalespeople or administrators. They brought their ingenrity and technicalknow how to their companies, while other men brought the money and thebusiness savvy The few inventors who managed to start their own companieswithout the help of a businessman such as the Stanleys and David Buick, didso by selling off their previous assets for capital. But eventually theywere forced to turn to others to handle the problems of managing the newindustry.

By the mid 1920s nearly all of the original auto pioneers were no longerassociated with their companies, the notable exception being iron willedHenry Ford. Ransom Olds had been forced to leave his company in 1904 whenthe Smith family, his backers, refused to let him build the kind of car hewanted, David Buick had abandoned his to Billy Durant, as did LouisChevrolet, and the Dodge Brothers had passed away.

The End of Billy Durant

The American economy nose dived in 1920, slumping into a temporarydepression. It was a foreshadowing of events to come, and it spelledtrouble for Billy Durant`s overextended General Motor Corporation. Duranttook heavy losses in the stock market, in both his personal fortunes andthose of GM. Many of Durant`s friends who had purchased stocks on hisadvice experienced severe financial difficulty, and Durant`s sense ofpersonal honor led him to bail each and every one of them out at disastrouscost to himself. By the end of the year, his personal debts totaled over$800,000, and the only asset he held was his GM stock.

The bankers backing GM, long unhappy with Durants free handed moneypolicies stepped in again as they had in 1910, offering to write offDurant`s debt in exchange for shares in General Motors. Durant had littlechoice but to accept, and he once again lost control of the company thathad been his brainchild. This time his departure was to be permanent forthe bankers, having been fooled once, demanded that Durant relinquish hisseat on the Board of Directors as part of the settlement.

Durant re entered the automotive field almost immediately, founding DurantMotors in 1921 with a new set of backers. He had not lost his touch, andDurant Motors did quite well for a number of years. At long last, carsbearing Billy Durant`s name were rolling through the streets.Unfortunately, like so many other carmakers, Durant Motors did not have thewherewithal to survive the Great Depression, and it folded in 1933.

Like David Buick, Durant ended his life in poverty and obscurity, workingin a small restaurant. An unpleasant auto dealer in the area enjoyedbringing in customers so that he could impress them by ordering a hamburgerfrom the man who founded General Motors. Durant died a broken man, but thecompany he founded thrived. Even today, although its fortunes are nolonger at their height, it remains the largest single company in the entireworld.

From Dirt Roads to Concrete Highways

In addition to opening up the European automobile market, the ending of WWIbrought another benefit to the American automobile industry in the form ofbetter roads. Until the advent of the automobile, macadam roads made oflayers of pressed stones had been the standard. But automobile traffic washard on macadam, as the high speed of the automobile loosened the stonesand raised huge clouds of dust. This problem was solved by the addition ofasphalt to the base matrix, resulting in a serviceable (if not terriblydurable) road surface. In 1909, the first concrete road was laid - inDetroit, naturally. But the road network was slow to spread, especiallyoutside of the cities.

The coming of the popular car led to a public outcry against the state ofthe nations roads. People who had vehicles to travel with now wantedsomething decent to drive them on. The governnment responded by passingthe Federal Road Act in 1916 to authorize and provide funding for theestablishment of a nationwide system of interstate highways. The Federal

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Highway Act of 1921 expanded on this earlier legislation, and the ingeniousKahn-Wadsworth Bill killed two birds with one law by offering thegovernment`s large supply of surplus trucks (left over from the war effort)at rock bottom prices to states and cities that provided for the buildingof new roads and the improvement of the ones that already existed. Underthis impetus, Americas road network rapidly expanded.

The improved roads had an immediate effect on the public. In addition toallowing city folk to travel to the Great Outdoors and making intercitybusiness easier to conduct, it had more subtle effects on the car industryitself. For one thing, the open road made a great testing area forautomobiles and the word quickly spread of which vehicles were durableenough to cope with the increased wear and which ones weren`t. Numeroussmall carmakers went out of business because their automobiles failed tooperate to an acceptable standard on longer drives. Since gas stations hadnot been invented yet, gasoline was purchased at the general store andcarried in cans in the back of the car for long trips.

People also started wanting faster and faster cars to enable them to crossthe distance between their starting point and their destination in theleast amount of time, so lower performance cars tended to suffer. One suchcar was the venerable Model T; with a top speed of 40-45 mph, which droppedto 35 mph if the extra weight of a weather resistant top was added, itsteadily lost ground to the swifter more modern vehicles.

And as if that weren`t more than enough to cause difficulties for smallmanufacturers, another side effect of the expanding road network was anincreased access to formerly isolated areas by the big car companies.Several makes which were successful on a local basis folded when Ford andGM came to town. If you drove a well known type of car on a long trip, youimproved your chances of finding a mechanic in a distant location who knewhow to repair it, and a source for repair parts was likely to be closer.The carmakers that had reached a certain critical size in the 1920sflourished, while those that were not large enough to support the requiredexpansion withered and eventually died.

The "Big Three" Are Complete

The year saw the arrival of the last of what were to become the ruling trioof the American auto industry - Ford, General Motors, and Chrysler.Compared to the other two members of the "Big Three" Chrysler was arelative latecomer. Ford began in 1903 and GM in 1908, but Chrysler wasnot officially formed until 1928. It had its foundations much earlier,however

The Maxwell-Briscoe company was a venerable organization which had beenaround since the early days of the automobile. It was reasonablysuccessful until one of its founders, Benjamin Briscoe, made a major errorin judgment. Briscoe had been approached by Billy Durant in 1908 and askedGeneral Motors. Briscoe, deciding that he liked the idea but didn't likeDurant, declined, and in 1910 set up a rival group called the United StatesMotor Corporation. It included Maxwell Briscoe, Brush, Columbia, Courier,and Stoddard Dayton. The USMC experienced financial difficulties verysimilar to those GM had in its early years, and by 1912 it was inbankruptcy. Durant managed to convince a finance group to save GeneralMotors, although it cost him his control of the company, but Briscoe,lacking Durant`s connections (and perhaps Durants renowned charm) could notpull off a similar trick, and United States Motors collapsed and vanished.

The failure of the corporation nearly dragged Maxwell Briscoe down with it,until the company was bought by a man named Walter Flanders, who unitedwith Chalmers after WWI to form Maxwell-Chalmers. The company never reallyrecovered completely, though, and in 1921 the experienced automobileexecutive Walter P Chrysler, the former head of Buick who had recentlygiven his walking papers to Billy Durant, was brought in to reorganize it.Chrysler had some ideas, which he quickly put Maxwell`s engineers to workon. The result in 1923 was the Chrysler Six, a car with a six-cylinderhigh performance engine that could give a top speed of 75 mph. It was aninstant hit.

In 1926, deciding that he was tired of producing cars with other mens'names on them, Walter Chrysler renamed the entire company after himself.Two years later he bought Dodge, which had gone into decline after theunfortunate and untimely deaths of both Dodge brothers in 1920 Chryslercontinued to make design improvements on his cars and also released a newline in 1929, which he called Plymouth (after a popular brand of twine usedby farmers, whom Chrysler hoped would purchase the Plymouth car byassociation) Now, with three different makes of automobile, all successful,Chrysler was well on its way to becoming a major force in the autoindustry.

A Crackerbox Rainbow

Automobiles of early years were "Touring cars" open models that provided noprotection from the wind or inclement weather. It was not long before thesoft top cars arrived, copied from horse buggies, with snap on windows touse in case of rain. The extra protection of the hardtop was not available

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at all until the late 1910s, and then only to the wealthy. The 1920s saw amajor style change arrive in the form of the first affordable hardtop, or"crackerbox" so-called because of its boxy shape.

The first enclosed hardtop car priced for the average consumer was theEssex, produced by the Hudson Motor Company in 1919. It sold for onlyabout $100 more than the open touring car, and many buyers were more thanhappy to pay extra to be safe from the weather. The Essex sparked a swiftrollover in the type of car on the road. As of 1920, only 10% of Americancars were hardtops, while by 1925 the Essex had brought that percentage upto 50%, and in 1929 the changeover was complete, with 90% of cars being"crackerboxes".

The other major technological innovation that would drastically change thelook of the American car arrived in the 1920s as well. As Henry Ford hadfound out when he began producing his Model Ts on the assenmbly line, theslowest part of the process was the painting of the cars. The paint had tobe brushed on hy hand, dried, sanded to remove brush marks, painted againand the whole process repeated three or four times for primer, paint, andvarnish. The cars also had to be stored inside while this went on, to keepgrit and dust from sticking to the drying paint, and that wasted a greatdeal of space. Ford dealt with this by sticking with the one color thatdried fast enough to suit him, namely black, while other carmakers,although they didn`t go as far as Henry did, also found themselvesrestricted to using a limited range of colors if they wanted to stayprofitable.

This all changed in 1920, when a chemist working at DuPont invented a quickdrying lacquer, and soon realized that it could revolutionize thecar-painting process. He took his idea to Charles Kettering, founder ofthe Dayton Electronics Laboratory (DELCO) and head of research at GM.Kettering an inventive genius in his own right who designed the firstmodern automobile ignition system, easily saw the value in the new paint,and agreed to have GM start using it if a paint producer could be found tomanufacture it in quantity. The plan hit a snag when the big paintcompanies balked, protesting that the new lacquer would force them toretrain all their workmen and junk their current varnishing equipment.

Kettering decided that extreme measures were called for. He invited a bigpaint company executive for a grand tour of GM, and when the man firstarrived, spoke to him about the range of colors possible with the newpaint, called Duco (from "DUpont COmpany"). Presenting the representativewith samples of the various hues, he asked the man which color he wouldmost like to see on his car if he had the option. The executive playedalong and selected one. Kettering then commenced the tour, making sure totake his guest through every part of the factory and explain its workingsto him in detail, and also treating the visitor to a lengthy gourmet lunch.It was 4:3O pm in the afternoon before Kettering wrapped up the tour, andwhen the executive got back to his car he realized instantly that somethinghad changed. Kettering had had it completely repainted in his guests colorof choice while the tour was underway.

The executive left convinced, and Kettering got his new paint. The firstcar to be mass produced in a rainbow of colors was the 1924 Oakland, butwithin two years virtually every other car manufacturer had adopted the newprocess. Henry Ford, ever distrustful of change, was one of the last to doso, waiting until the end of 1926 before making the Flivver available incolor again.

GMs New Management

While Durant can scarcely have been happy about being ousted from his owncompany, he at least left it in good hands. Alfred P. Sloan, who becameGM`s president in 1923, was a genius of management who took a debt-burdenedcorporation swiftly back to prosperity and then on to an industry lead thatlasted nearly sixty years.

Sloan realized that GM`s biggest advantage over Ford lay in the widevariety of models and styles it produced, enough to satisfy nearly everytaste and pocketbook. To shore up his company`s relatively weak economycar line, he premiered the affordable Pontiac in the early 1920s. He alsoinstituted the idea of making new models yearly and using advertising tosow discontent with the older ones, introducing the concept of plannedobsolescence to ensure a market that would always be hungry for new cars.

Henry Ford disdained this idea, claiming that, "The man who buys one of ourproducts should never have to buy another. It was a rather naive statementfrom a man producing 1.8 million new cars each year, but perhapsunderstandable given his long success with a singlew car model. ButSloan`s strategy would prove to be more viable than Ford`s within a veryfew years, as rapidly declining sales of the Model T in favor of GM carsattested. By 1927 GM had overtaken Ford as the industry leader.

Although a good thing for the automobile industry, this new attitudetowards cars which viewed them as a disposable commodity was perhaps not sobeneficial to the American consumer in the long run. By the time thedecade ended, emphasis in the car companies had shifted away from

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long-cherished values of durability and economy to the newer ones of styleand short term salability. In terms of mechanical endurance, the carsprodced in 1929 were often inferior to ones produced fifteen years earlier,but the public didn`t mind. When credit buying allowed the average familyto get a new car every year if they wanted it, who cared if the car wouldbe worn out in five? In the immediate future, the new attitudes of the carmanufacturers would contribute to the Stock Market Crash in 1929. In muchlater years, the emphasis on style over quality and practicality would giveJapan the opening it needed to bring down the American Auto King.

Ford Takes Over Lincoln

The depression of 1920 was as hard on Ford as it had been on GM, forcingHenry Ford to resort to drastic measures. He started by slashing prices onthe Model T until they were being built at a loss and making up thedifference on spares, but even that didn`t keep him from having to shutdown factories. He then devised a policy of requiring his dealers to payfor each load of cars in cash, up front, which was a tremendous hardship ontbe dealers. Any that dared to complain were threatened with the loss oftheir dealership if they did not do as ordered, and most found a way tostick it out until things improved.

Harry Lelands Lincoln Motors was not so fortunate. Although his luxuryautomobile was a good car, it was not particularly innovative, and 1920 wasa terrible year to try to launch a new automobile make. By 1921 thecompany was struggling to stay afloat, and the final blow came in the formof a botched tax assessment requiring his company to pay $4,500,000, a fullnine times the correct amount. Before the error was rectified, LincolnMotors sank into receivership.

Henry Fords wife was a dear friend of Harry Leland`s wife, and she resolvednot to let the Lelands go under. She brought tremendous pressure to bearon her husband in an effort to convince him to bail out Lincoln. Fordeventually did as she asked, but he waited until Lincoln went intoreceivership so that he could buy the company outright. Earlier, Lelandhad approached Ford for a loan which could have saved the company fromreceivership, but Ford refused, knowing full well that a loan would notgive him full control over the business the way that buying it would.

Late in 1921 the deal was closed and Lincoln became a Ford property. Atthe time the Deal was made, Henry Ford promised that he would keep HarryLeland and his son Wilfred in charge of their company, but nothing was putdown in writing and Henry reneged on his promise in a shameful manner. Herefused to allow either of the Lelands a voice in Lincoln, instead ignoringthem completely. The Lelands, deeply regretting their decision to sell,tried to buy the company back from Ford for the purchase price plusinterest only a few months after Ford bought it, but Ford wasn`t in theleast interested in selling.

When a messemger came from Henry Ford`s office in 1922 saying that WilfredLeland`s services were no longer required at Ford, Harry Leland walked outthe same day, as Ford no doubt expected. Ford had absolute and uncontestedcontrol over Lincoln. Henry Ford`s motivation for his treatment of theLelands can only he guessed at. It may have been that he was growing morepower obsessed as he aged, or perhaps it was some long delayed revenge onHarry Leland for working with William Murphy to build Cadillac from theremains of Henry Ford`s second company back in 1901. Fore whatever reason,it was the end of the Lelands, who were deserving of a better fate.

Farewell to the Flivver

For the first fifteen years after it appeared, the Model T Ford ruled theAmerican road. But fifteen years is a very long time in an industryadvancing as quickly as the American auto industry was doing, and it wasinevitable that the Flivver would eventually fall. If Henry Ford hadpossessed more foresight, he would have been better prepared when theAmerican public began to reject his car; but out of what seemed to bewillful blindness on his part, the Automobile King stubbornly refused toadmit that times were changing. He continued to produce the Model T longpast the time when any other manufacturer would have seen that itspopularity was waning.

The Model T, unchanged in all but the smallest details, was produced foralmost twenty years, The last car, number 15,007,003, officially rolled offthe line at the Highland Park factory on May 27, 1927 (although in factproduction continued until June), and it was possible to buy brand newModel T engines from Ford as late as 1941! Back in 1909, Henry Ford hadlost a minor parent suit to one Frederick W Ball, who invented a small partthat Ford used in his Model T transmissions. To settle the suit, Fordagreed to pay $1 to Mr Ball for each Model T built, neither Ford nor Ballcould ever have predicted that over 15 million of the cars would be built,and that Ball would thus be made a millionaire many times over.

One factor not already mentioned that contributed to the decline of theModel T was the emergence of the used car market. By the early 1920s, abuyer could get a secondhand vehicle of better quality and style for thesame price as a brand new Flivver. Other companies fought back against

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this problem by introducing the yearly model, but Ford disdained thisstrategy and refused to employ it, to his company`s detriment. MoreChevrolets were produced than Fords for the first time in 1925. Ford`srefusal to make an enclosed car or update it in other ways (such as usingthe new color paints) gave GM an opening that it pursued eagerly, learningand profiting from Ford`s mistakes.

When Henry Ford finally gave in and admitted that the day of the Flivverwas past, he did so with poor grace and a marked lack of good sense. Inwhat might best be described as a fit of pique, he held off on launchinghis new car, the Model A, until six months after his factories had shutdown Model T production. His actions caused 23 assembly plants across thenation to close, throwing an estimated 60,000 men out of work, and forcinghis dealers to survive by selling nothing but spare parts! The unnecessarydiscontinuity in production cost the Ford Motor Company an estimated $250million and its claim to the mantle of industry leadership which GeneralMotors gladly assumed.

By the time the Model A emerged in December of 1927, people were so eagerto see the first new Ford since the Model T that huge crowds gatheredaround the showrooms for a glimpse. Although the Model A was not terriblyinnovative by the standards of the day, it was a vast improvement on theModel T, and its status as the Flivver`s successor practically guaranteedthat it would be bought in large numbers. It was sufficiently popular thatwhen the new U.S. currency was designed in 1928, the picture of theTreasury Building that was created for the back of the ten dollar bill wasengraved complete with a Model A Ford parked in front.

FROM DEPRESSION TO WAR : 1930 - 1941

Much of the potential car market in America was still unsaturated by theend of the 1920s. The average man had managed to get a taste of thefreedom of the open road, but he still often had to contend with poorroads, undependable vehicles, lack of mechanics to repair them, and ascarcity of replacement parts. The top speed of an average automobile wasaround 35 mph. Clearly there was room for improvement but advances wouldhave to wait, as there were bigger problems ahead for the auto industry,and the rest of the United States as well.

The Great Depression Strikes

In October of 1929 the United States finally paid the price for the wildoverindulgence of the American public in credit buying and the uninhibitedrise of stock market speculation. On Black Tuesday the New York StockExchange crashed and the Great Depression was underway. In the year of thecrash Detroit produced five million new automobiles, and one out of everyfive people in the United States owned his or her own car. A year laterproduction had sunk to three million, and by the depths of the GreatDepression in 1932 it was down to just over one million, the lowest it hadbeen in ten years. Many car companies that managed to survive the twentiesfound the rug pulled out from under them.

Although the ruined economy caused new car production to plummet, thenumber of cars actually in use stayed remarkably constant throughout theworst years of the Depression. For many families the car was the lastpossession to be sold, as it could be used to travel long distances insearch of work. In a pinch, it could even be lived in.

Once the worst was over recovery for the auto industry came slowly butsteadily. By 1937 production had risen to four million and in 1941, theyear before America entered World War II, it was almost back up topre-crash levels. 1941 saw several production milestones passed, such asthe production of the four millionth Plymouth, the five millionth Dodge,and the twenty nine millionth Ford. Chrysler somehow managed to maintain astrong research and development department throughout the Depression andpioneered several innovations such as overdrive and a novel type of enginesuspension. In 1933 Chrysler`s sales surpassed Ford`s.

Perhaps as a response to the harshness and lack of amenities in theDepression, the biggest changes on the automobiles of this time came in thearea of driver and passenger comfort and conveinience. Heaters,air-conditioning, powered windshield washers and wipers, and defrosters alldebuted during the thirties. Car radios were first offered by thePhiladelphia Storage Battery Corporation in 1927 and by 1935 it wasestimated that there were more than one million radio equipped cars in theUnited States. Several early versions of the automatic transmission becameavailable to car buyers, although the prototypes were prone to breakdowns.The technology was greatly improved during World War II, and by the 1940sthe first modern style automatic transmission, virtually trouble free, hadappeared.

Changing Styles

Right in the middle of the decade as the nation was starting to climb,however painfully, out of the Depression, two cars appeared on the marketthat would greatly influence modern styles and forever change the way thatcar bodies were designed. As has been the case with automobiles almost

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since their inception, being ahead of their time resulted in both carsbecoming commercial failures.

In the early 1930s a Chrysler engineer and designer named Carl Breerpioneered the idea of wind Tunnel testing. His earliest trials withtypical cars of the day revealed that they were more aerodynamic goingbackwards than forwards, and Breer resolved to change this by designing a"back to front" car. The result, in 1934, was the Chrysler Airflow, thefirst automobile to employ streamlining. The Airflow had, in addition toits dynamic styling, all-steel construction and the first automaticoverdrive ever featured on an American car.

Unfortunately for Chrysler, the car was late to arrive in the showrooms,giving its competitors time to spread disparaging rumors about it and, asluck would have it, the first deveral thousand Airflows to be produced didin fact have some serious construction problems. Although themanufacturing errors were quickly eliminated, the car developed areputation for unreliability that, when combined with its drasticallydifferent look, was enough to assure poor sales. The car never earned acent for Chrysler.

The other revolutionary car of the period was the Cord 810 produced in1935. Designed by the maker of the Duesenberg, it was intended as a cheapversion of the famous luxury car. The style was radically different fromanything seen before. It included a "coffin nose" hood, horizontallouvers, headlights that disappeared into the fenders, no running boards,and a fastback sedan body. It was voted the best looking car at the NewYork Auto show in the yeat it premiered, and in 1951 the New York Museum ofModern Art recognized the design as one of the finest examples ofindustrial styling of all time.

One other style of car which arrived in the 1930s was the station wagon,often called a "woody" because its body was made of wood. The stationwagon did not become a passenger car until the 1940s, being considered atfirst a utility vehicle like a truck or van. It gained popularity firstwith farmers, explorers, film studios, and hotels, until by the late 1940sordinary consumers had adopted it as the perfect family car.

Fords New Engine

In 1932 the presidency of the Ford Motor Company was taken over by HenryFord`s son, Edsel. The transfer of power was in name only; in mostrespects, Henry Ford still ran the company as he always had. Edselstruggled against his father`s control during all his years as president,but only rarely succeeded in bucking the wishes of iron willed Henry.

In the same year Ford introduced the first V8 engine available in aneconomy car. V8 engines had first been introduced in 1914 by Cadillac, buthad remained an option only for the wealthy until Ford began to build them.The reasoning Henry used to arrive at this decision was typical of him:"We`re going from a four to an eight because Chevrolet is going to a six."Henry's business strategy could often be summed up as one of not doing whatanyone else was doing. He avoided such worthwhile innovations as hydraulicbraking and longitudinal springs solely because the competition all hadthem.

The Ford V8 gave excellent performance for the price range, and the othermanufacturers took a while to catch up. In spite of Ford`s image andperformance advantages, however, sales continued to slip - Chevrolet salestopped Ford`s in every year of the decade except 1935, and from 1936 onFord ranked third behind GM and Chrysler in overall sales. The main reasonfor this was that Ford only produced two makes, as compared to six for GMand four for Chrysler. The cheap Ford and the expensive Lincoln left ahuge gap in the middle of the market, and the other companies prospered byfilling it. In the hopes of regaining pre eminence in the field, Fordintroduced a third make in 1938 to bridge its price gap, and called itMercury.

Part of Fords difficulty in profiting from the V8 lay in the fact that thecars were valued for their performance by high schoolers and college kids,but as consumers these groups could rarely afford to buy new. Anothercustomer base that appreciated the V8 for its performance, but which Fordcould not depend on for income, was the criminal underclass - Bonnie andClyde drove a V8 Ford, as did John Dillinger. After becoming Public EnemyNumber One, Dillinger wrote to Ford, saying. "Hello Old Pal, you have awonderful car. It`s a treat to drive one." Of course, Ford had its betterclass customers as well; the President drove a Ford V8, as did famousaviator Charles Lindenburg.

There were a few other factors that may have contributed to the decline ofFord in the thirties. For one thing, Henry Ford`s public image becametarnished by his vicious anti-union actions, and also his outspoken antiSemitism. For another, in spite of their excellent engines, his cars werein other ways behind the times technologically, with outmoded suspensionand brake systems.

Ford`s other notable product in this period was a new model for its luxury

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line, Lincoln. In 1939 Edsel Ford took a standard Lincoln Zephyrautomobile and instructed a friend of his to redesign it according to someideas Edsel had in mind. The car was originally intended to be for Edsel`spersonal use only, but a number of his friends saw it and were delightedwith the new styling. Over two hundred orders were placed for the carbefore anyone even had any idea that it would ever be produced! Respondingto the enthusiasm for the car, Ford instituted a limited production run andthe Lincoln Continental was born. The car sold on styling and image alone,since otherwise it was identical to the Zephyr.

WORLD WAR II AND AFTER : 1941 - 1950

By 1939, the "Big Three" had consolidated their hold on the American autoindustry had accounted for 90% of auto sales. Five smaller makes foughtover the remaining 10% of the market And then for three and a half years,all American car manufacturers abandoned their rivalry and joined togetherin a huge effort to supply their country`s needs for war.

Detroit Goes to War

On December 7, 1941 the United States entered World War II. Two monthslater all automobile production except for military vehicles ended asDetroit shifted over to war production. The impact of the Americanautomobile industry on the United States war effort was enormous. Over $29billion worth of military materials, including planes, jeeps, tanks,ammunition, and parts and supplies of all types were produced in Detroit -one-fifth the total American output for the entire war.

By the time passenger car production was again sanctioned, on July 1, 1945,the pent up demand for new automobiles was tremendous. But before thecarmakers could start supplying automobiles to answer that demand they hada few hurdles to cross. For one thing raw materials, especially sheetsteel, were hard to come by. For another, the forces of labor had startedto become organized and were readying themselves for a big battle with theauto industry.

Ford started its produclion lines again only two days after therestrictions were lifted. GM waited until October 1945, but in Novemberthe company was hit with a nationwide strike called by the United AutoWorkers, who had organized ten years previous but were still strugglingunsuccessfully to gain official recognition. Chrysler, out of fear ofsimilar strikes, put off restarting its lines for even longer. Throughout1946 strikes at auto plants and parts manufacturers made production highlyundependable. By the time the year was up, however, the guaranteed minimumwage and forty hour work week had been agreed upon and the worst of thelabor strife was over.

The final thing the carmakers had to contend with was the postwar Trumanadministration. Thanks to the shortage of such vital materials as sheetsteel, car production costs were sky high in 1945. The Office of PriceAdministration however, handed down a decree stating that new car pricesshould be based on 1942 costs "It costs us $1,O41 to make a car",complained Henry Ford II, new president of Ford Motors, "but we arerestricted to selling it at a maximum of $780." In 1947 the price controlswere lifted and the auto industry could at last get back to seriousbusiness.

Postwar Boom and Bust The demand for new automobiles was so high in postwar America thatpractically anything on wheels could and did sell. Numerous new carmakersappeared on the market flourished briefly, then sank when the boom easedoff a few years later. The bust following the boom also killed off severalvenerable luxury carmakers such as Packard and Studebaker, as theircustomers deserted for Cadillacs and the Lincoln Continental.

The first cars produced immediately after the war were built from prewardesigns. Truly new car models did not appear until the years of 1946 to1948. Several of the new features of the postwar designs becametrademarks: the portholes just ahead of the front door on the Buicks werestandards of the make from 1948 to the 1970s, and Cadillac acquired itsfamous fins. Chrysler lost ground to Ford steadily in this period,dropping to third in 1950 as Ford surged up to second. The lost sales canbe attributed to a combination of Chrysler`s failure to bring out a newmodel until 1953 and the revitalization of Ford that occurred during thisperiod with the advent of Henry Ford II as the company`s new President.

Edsel Ford passed away prematurely at the age of 50 in 1945. His son,Henry Ford II, then a 28 year old ensign in the U.S. Navy, was releasedfrom his duties to assume the presidency of Ford in his fathers place.Henry II, unlike his father, had been allowed to attend college and hadgraduated from Yale before joining up. When he arrived at Ford he foundthe companys management moribund and extremely inefficient, and at once setabout cleaning house. Unlike Edsel, Henry II had little to fear from hisgrandfather who was by that time old and growing infirm.

One of the first things Henry II did was fire Harry Bennet, the first

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Henry`s much feared and disliked security chief. Then in 1946 he broughtin a group of ten young outsiders, known collectively as "The Wizz Kids" torevamp the company from the ground up. The group included prominentacademics from Princeton and Harvard, as well as future U.S. DefenseSecretary Robert McNamara. The whiz Kids, led by Henry II, made a sweepingreorganization, adopteD GM`s decentralized management svstem, improvedlabor relations, ad stabilized the company`s shaky finances. In 1949 Fordsold over a million cars, the first time that mark had been passed since1930. The following year, Ford recaptured second place from Chrysler,although the Whiz Kids never did quite succeed in their aim of beating GM.

THE COMING OF THE CAR CULTURE : 1951 - 1958

An average 1949 car in the U.S. cost $1,800, had an eight cylinder engine,a heater, and a radio. Many had automatic transmissions. Around 1950 thefirst of what we would now consider "economy cars" small in size, durable,and fuel efficient started to appear in Europe. In America by contrast,cars were approaching their peak in size, were often covered with two tonepaint schemes and gleaming chrome on every surface, and were generallynotorious gas guzzlers.

Americas roads received another boost from the government in 1956 with thepassing of the Interstate Highway Act, which provided federal money for anationwide system of four lane superhighways. The nation`s road network atthe time topped out at approximately three million miles. The Americanconsumer wanted big, powerful cars, to travel long distances in speed andconfort. Conspicous consumption, particularly with respect to one`sautomobile, was the rage. Gadgets of all sorts proliferated, power andprestige became emphasized over utility and real performance, engines gotlarger, and body styling became more than a little outrageous.

The idea of the "dream car" or "concept car" made its first appearance inthese years. These were vehicles never intended to go into massproduction. Some of them were even missing such details as a workingengine. The purpose in building such a car was to test a new engineconcept or sample the public`s reaction to a new body styling, or sometimesjust to suit the fanciful whim of a chief executive

Americas First Compact

Until 1950 all American cars came in basically a single size, and that sizewas "Big". The wide variety in body size that can be found today wascompletely unknown. The first relatively small American car to find amarket was the Nash Rambler, launched in 1950.

George Mason, president of Nash car company (one of the few independents tosurvive past the end of the postwar boom)" knew that small cars had neverbeen successful on the American market He reasoned that his failure was dueto the marketing of such cars as cheap vehicles, which thereforevmarked thebuyer as someone of limited means. The key to selling small cars, Masonthought was to build a small car that people would buy because they likedit, not because it was inexpensive - and thus was the Nash Rambler born.

The Rambler wasn`t an expensive car but it did cost more than the bottomline Fords and Chevrolets and so did not appear "cheap". It sold very wellfor Nash in 1950 and 1951, but by then the other independents had learnedfrom Nash's success and brought out compacts of their own, cutting intoNash`s market. In 1955 the Rambler was discontinued, just after Nashmerged with Hudson to form American Motors. Three years later the Ramblerwas reintroduced and did even better in its second outing than it had inits first, selling briskly from 1959 - 1961. Its success, coupled with thesuccess of a diminutive German invader called the Volkswagen Beetle,prompted the Big Three to launch their own compacts in 1959.

The Sports Car and the Youth Movement

The heart of the Car Culture in the United States was the growingindependence and freedom of movement that American youth found with thewheels of their choice. The car and its care and feeding became thecenterpiece of an entire way of life for millions of Americans between theages of fifteen and twenty-five.

High-schoolers and college age kids found happiness in one of two types ofcars: either the big boat like vehicle into which six to eight peoplecould be packed along with supplies for a trip to the beach or to themovies, or the speedy two-passenger sports cars which appeared late in thedecade. The Ford Galaxie was a good example of the first type of car,while the two sports cars of choice were the Chevrolet Corvette and theFord Thunderbird, both of which premiered in 1954.

The Corvette was designed by GM style chief Harley Earl, who was hoping todesign a low priced sports car suitable for his college aged son and hisfriends. His initial design was exhibited as a concept car in 1952 and wassuch a hit that Chevrolet went into production the next year. To saveweight and cost, the Corvette had the first all fiberglass body.

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The new car was priced at $3,440, a disappointment to Harvey Earl who hadhoped for some thing closer to $1,000. The early "Vettes" though prized bycollectors, were not considered very good cars by the people who made them.But the 1956 Corvette had a V8 engine gave the magic advertising figure ofone horsepower per cubic inch, and sales took off. The 1957 model featuredmore improvements including better suspension, fuel injection, and a fourspeed transmission. It could go from zero to sixty miles per hour in 5.7seconds, a respectable figure even by today`s standards. In 1962 theCorvette engine was placed in an all new body and released as the StingRay, which became the single word Stingray by 1969. The Stingray stayed inproduction, almost unchanged, until 1983.

The Thunderbird, which debuted in the same year as the Corvette, had aregular steel body but a bigger and better performance engine than theoriginal "Vette. It also cost about $500 less, a significant difference toa young person with a limited income. The Thunderbird only stayed a sportscar for the first three years of its life, and then it became a fourpassenger convertable.

The Car Culture even had its own sacred hymns, sung by the likes of theBeach Boys and Jan & Dean: "Little Deuce Coupe", "Shutdown" "Fun Fun Fun""409" "Dead Mans Curve", and "Little GTO". The latter was a tribute to aPontiac car that owed its name to a stroke of advertising genius by thenPontiac General Manager John Z DeLorean.

The initials "GTO" were originally used by the Italian carmaker Ferrari.The acronym stood for "Gran Turismo Omologato" or homologated GrandTouring, and was a designation used on Ferrari racing cars that made itinto general production. The car was DeLoreans special baby and he snuckthe design through when his superiors weren`t looking. By the time theylearned of it, it was already in production and much too late to stop.Sports car enthusiasts raised an enormous row about Pontiacs usurpation oftheir beloved letters, but as "Car & Driver" magazine pointed out, thePontiac GTO could beat a Ferrari on a straightaway and the Ferrari costfive times as much. The letter stayed

Fords Infamous Edsel

The Ford Motor Company was doing much better in 1954 than it had been in along time, thanks to Henry Ford II and his Whiz Kids. But it still had notcaught up with GM. It was decided that ford needed a second middle pricedcar to accompany the Mercury, as GM had three cars in that range (Pontiac,Oldsmobile, and Buick).

Great effort was expended in selecting a fitting name for a brand-new Fordmarque. Ford`s advertising agency supplied a list of 6,000 to choose from,including several names that were eventually used elsewhere, such asCitation, Pacer, and Ranger. Market research manager David Wallacecontacted poet Marianne Moore to ask for suggestions and received back oflist of possible names including "Intelligent Whale", "Resilient Bullet","Mongoose Civique", "Taper Racer", and finally in a burst of inspiration,"Utopian Turtletop". Miss Moore had declined any fee for her help, sayingit would inhibit her creativity. Although none of her suggestions wereeven remotely usable, there seemed to be no hard feelings either way for atChristmastime the poet received a large bouquet of red roses with a cardattached saying "Merry Christmas to our favorite Turtletopper".Eventually, despite objections from the Ford family, the name Edsel waschosen in honor of Henry II`s father.

Unfortunatly Ford did not put nearly as much effort into the actual car asit did into the name. To economize, bodies and engines were mostly fromother Ford and Mercury cars. The distinctive horse collar grille wasintended to be the car`s mark of distinction, but it was not a particulargood choice. Edsel production was mostly done hastily at the end of theday and as a result often suffered from poor quality workmanship. Itquickly acquired a reputation for unreliability.

The car was widely hyped, but it was not really an innovative car in anytrue sense of the word, being made as it was from parts of other ordinarycars. Ford`s timing was nothing short of terrible - the Edsel was a bigcar, and the day of the compact was just around the corner. At the timethe Edsel was being developed, the midsize car accounted for 40% of themarket; by the time it debuted, that had dropped to 25%. The Edsel did notsell and stayed in production only until 1960. The failure of the newmarque may have cost Ford as much as $250 million.

THE MODERN AGE

The demise of the outmoded Edsel in 1958 heralded the beginning of the newage for the automobile. American cars had become nearly too big to drive,too clumsy to operate, and too expensive to maintain. Consumers began tolook for something different. It was during this period that European carsreappeared on the American automobile scene, in small numbers at first, andthen in waves of increasing size.

At the beginning the American auto companies seemed to be up to thechallenge presented by the new preference for compact cars, but their early

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triumph was not destined to last. This decade was the time when theconfidence of the US automakers began a dangerous downward slide intocomplacency. The emphasis on year-end profits and the tyranny of costaccounting management led to a distinct short-sightedness. Capitalinvestment was discouraged, no new machine tools were designed orpurchased, and research and development departments went begging for funds.By the time the 1970s rolled around, the Big Three were long overdue for anunpleasant wake up call.

THINKING SMALL : 1959 - 1964

The Compact Revolution in the U.S. auto industry came ahout as a responseto the success of the Nash Rambler, combined with the disturbing appearanceof small European economy cars on the American market in increasingnumbers. Until WWII the only imports sold in the U.S. were large luxurycars such as Mercedes, Minerva, Renault, and Rolls Royce. After the warthe import market focused on sporty cars such as the MG Midget and theJaguar XK120. The first imported economy car to make an impact on theAmerican market was the tiny Volkswagen Beetle - and that impact, small atfirst, soon mushroomed to enormous proportions.

The Little Car That Could

The Volkswagen car got its start in 1930s Germany, when Adolf Hitlercommissioned Dr. Federnand Porsche to develop a cheap "people`s car" (theliteral translation of Volkswagen) in order to keep automobile money insideGermany. The cars were first built in 1938, but only about 100,000 VWswere made before WWII arrived, halting production.

After the German defeat the Volkswagen plant was offered up as part ofpayments for war damages, but the American and British experts scorned theoffer, declaring the little car to be worthless. Shortly thereafter, in1945, a handful of people who had been employed by VW before the warrequested permission to go back to producing cars, and were granted it.The VW factory had been bombed during the fighting, so when the workersreturned they found the plant barely usable with blown out windows and adamaged, leaky roof. Nevertheless, they set to work. Due to the severematerials shortages, their first handful of cars were built entirely fromsalvage parts. This lack of supplies forced them to concentrate on asingle model, and they chose the one that had been the most popular beforethe war, the little VW 1200 Beetle.

By the end of 1946 they had somehow managed to raise production to 10,000cars. The next year the Allied Government stepped in and put HeinrichNordhoff, former head of GM`s German line, Opel in charge. Nordhoff openedmarkets throughout Europe to bring in foreign money to stabilize Volkswagenand the company never looked back.

The Volkswagen was the first car built to create a market, not to fill aneed. Like the Model T before it, the Beetle was simple in design, plainto look at, and economical to operate. It was introduced in America in1949 and its sales were slow for several years thereafter. Volkswagenpersevered however and in 1960 half a million Beetles were sold in theUnited States. The "Bug" became a huge favorite on college campuses, andby the time the decade wore out five million of the funny little cars hadbeen purchased by American consumers. Then in 1972 the Beetle did theunthinkable, stealing the title of most popular car ever by exceeding theModel T`s record of fifteen million cars sold. By the time the series wasdiscontinued in 1978, 19,200,000 Beetles had been produced

The "Big Three" Respond

The success of the Nash Rambler and the VW Beetle combined with theencroachment of other European compact cars on the American auto industriesterritory convinced General Motors, Ford, and Chrysler that some sort ofresponse was called for. It came in 1959 as all three companies, actingalmost in unison, each introduced a new compact car for the 1960 season GMproduced the Chevrolet Corvair; Ford, the Ford Falcon; and Chrysler, theChrysler Valiant.

The Valient was a standard Chrysler car engine and chassis with new stylingand construction. The Chevrolet Corvair was more unorthodox, with a newbody and a novel rear mounted flat six air cooled engine. The Ford Falconwas the most conventional in design, but even with that it was a full twofeet shorter than the Ford Fairlane. The Falcon was the dullest, but soldthe best of the three; in its first year it represented nearly half of Fordsales. In later years, new Ford vicepresident Lee Laccoca spruced up theFalcon`s look to make it more exciting and sales went up still further.

All Three cars were an unqualified success, proving that the time of thecompact had arrived. The European competitors quickly faded from thescene, with the singular exception of the hardy little Beetle whichactually increased its market share during this period.

The success of the compact cars, which later evolved into the so calledintermediates, led to an expansion in available automobile types. In theearly 1950s, a car generally had one body shell which could be made in four

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door sedan, two door coupe, topless convertable, and station wagon, allfitted on top of one engine and chassis. When a range of engines becameavailable at the start of the Sixties, two new classes of cars appeared,categorized more by engine type than body type. The "pony car" was apowerful engine fitted into an intermediate coupe or compact body shell,while a "muscle car" was a powerful engine fitted into a sedan body.

The first "pony car", was, of course, the Ford Mustang, from which theclass derived its name. Some historians have called the Mustang the mostsignificant American car of the 1960s, for it did what the designers of theEdsel had tried (and miserably failed) to do: it captured the spirit ofthe times.

The Mustang was the baby of vice-president Lee Lacocca. Laccoca started asa Ford salesman in Allentown Pennsylvania, and made a vow to himself thathe would be a Ford vice president by his thirty fifth birthday. He missedthe mark, but not by much - his promotion to VP can through just eighteendays late. Lacocca, young himself, was devoted to the concept of "thinkingyoung" and realized the the Baby Boomer children born in the post war yearswere nearing driving age and would want something different from theirparents. At the same time women were becoming professionals in largernumbers than ever before and acquiring buying power and they too would belooking for a car of their own. Lacocca reasoned that a small,individually styled car without the family sedan image of existing compactsmight fit the bill for these consumers.

The original Mustang design was tested by racing drivers, who loved it.But Lacocca reasoned that a car beloved by racing drivers might not bequite right for the average American, so the Mustang went back into design,re emerging in 1964 to instant runaway success. It was available in anenormous variety of options, so that each car could be customized to thebuyer's personal tastes and requirements. Five engines were offered, plussix transmissions, three suspension packages, three brake systems, threewheel sizes, and many other comfort and performance option. The simplestunenhanced Mustang sold for $2,368, while a souped up version could cost asmuch as $3,850. More than 100,000 Mustangs were sold in the first fourmonths of production, and more than a million in the first year. Chryslerand GM rushed to jump on the bandwagon, launching the Chrysler Camaro andthe Pontiac Firebird as competitors.

WASHINGTON STEPS IN : 1965 - 1970

By the early 1960s, cars had been in common use in America long enough forsome of the difficulties associated with their operation to becomeapparent. Traffic congestion became a problem, causing road surfaces todegrade and eroding the automobile's great advantage door to doortransportation. For example, according to New York City`s Department ofTransportation, the average speed of horse and buggy in downtown Manhattanin 1907 was 11.5 mph. Today, the average speed by car in Manhattan`sovercrowded streets is 9.8 mph, while the average for horses remains thesame. And elsewhere in the country, Southern California discovered to itsdismay that its reliance on the automobile combined with its local airpatterns was rapidly depriving the people who lived there of theopportunity to breathe.

Automakers, concerned as always with sales and little else, steadfastlyignored any problems associated with their cars or the use thereof,considering it the consumer`s business to look out for himself "Caveatemptor" were the watchwords for the Big Three and the smaller manufacturersas well. But the 1960s were a time of great social activity in the UnitedStates, and it was inevitable that eventually the eye of the activist wouldfall upon the American auto industry. When it did, it did not like what itsaw. Before the decade was out, the Big Three would discover themselveswrestling with new legislation designed to force them to pay more attentionto issues they had rarely considered in the past, such as automobile safetyfor both passengers and pedestrians, and engine exhaust emissions.

The new legislation caused significant changes in the way new cars would bedesigned in the future. Until the mid 60s, car design was dictated byconsumers and accountants, with engineers and stylists balancing betweenwhat the public wanted and what the carmakers could afford to produce forthem. With the advent of the new laws, car manufacturers were suddenlypresented with a third factor to figure into their designs. By settingmandatory standards for safety and pollution, Washington spurred newdevelopments in the fields of engine design, body design, and safetydevices such as seat belts and air bags. Without this impetus, suchadvances might have arrived decades later or not at all.

Nader the Raider

For many years, the prevailing wisdom in Detroit was "safety doesn`t sellcars". As far back as the 1930s the Airflow had touted its all steel bodyas a safety feature and by 1952 Nash and Muntz had installed passive seatbelts in their automobiles, but neither advance helped the cars sell.Things would change radically in the midsixties, starting in 1965 when acrusading young lawyer named Ralph Nader researched the automobileindustry`s history on safety and wrote a book, Unsafe at Any Speed,

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detailing his findings.

Nader concluded that although the big companies had the technology, money,and personnel available to make their cars significantly safer, they hadrefused to do so even when their designs were close to negligentlyhazardous. Specific targets of Nader`s book included Buicks undependablepower braking system, the famous Cadillac fins which impaled bicyclists andpedestrians, and the rear swing axle on the Chevrolet Corvair. This lastproblem was one of Nader`s paRticular demons, as the design flaw had beenpointed out to Chevrolet by one of its own engineers before The car wentintO production and the big carmaker had ignored the warning. The rearswing axle had been used successfully in cars before, but the Corvair hadrear mounted engine and a body design that put most of the car`s weight atthe back of the vehicle; on a turn, the extra weight caused the insidewheel to lean at a sharp enough angle that it could fold completely andcause a deadly rollover. Nader`s attack, combined with the Corvair`shigher production costs, drove the car off the market within a few years

After publishing his book, Nader testified before the U.S. Congress onautomobile safety and was influential in getting the National Traffic andMotor Vehicle Safety Act passed later in the year. This law gave thefederal government the right to regulate the design of automobiles, trucks,and motorcycles so as to protect the public safety. Since its passage morethan fifty safety standards have been imposed regulating safetywindshields, seat belts, head restraints, brakes, tires, lighting, doorstrength, and roof strength.

Sadly, the new safety legislation wasn`t enough to prevent the tragediesassociated with the Ford Pinto. The Pinto, Ford`s entry into the newsubcompact field, made its debut in 1970. To save weight on the design,Ford`s engineers had eliminated a number of rear subframe members from thecar`s body. This left the gas tank more vulnerable to compression andrupture in a collision than it was on heavier cars. The gas tank also hada filler neck that could easily tear loose in a crash and fill thepassenger compartment with highly flammable gasoline fumes. In the case ofa rear end collision, the Pinto could - and sometimes did - go up in anexplosive fireball.

One victim of a Pinto explosion sued Ford for negligence and won an awardtotalling $128.5 million. On appeal the amount was reduced, but it stillcost Ford $6.5 million and an enormous amount of bad publicity. The badpress got worse once Henry Ford II`s contemptuous views on automobilesafety became public knowledge, and The Ford company was a long timerecovering

Fumes and Furor

Safety considerations were not the only automobile issue to capture theinterest of the American public in the late 1960s. Driven by tales ofSouthern California cities such as Los Angeles, where old people andchildren could not walk outside on some days during the summer due to thepoisonous air, the federal government passed the Clean Air Act in 1970establishing acceptable levels of exhaust emissions such as carbonmonoxide, nitrogen oxides, and hydrocarbons.

The Clean Air Act also set restrictions on leaded gasoline, the use ofwhich originated in 1933 when Charles Kettering of GM discovered thatadding tetraethyl lead to gasoline cured engine knock. Burning leadedgasoline, however, spreads airborne lead into the atmosphere where it canbe taken up and absorbed into the body through the lungs. High levels oflead are toxic, especially to small children, and lead from leaded gasolinewas a major contributor to the number of cases of lead poisoning in urbanchildren in America during the 1960s and 1970s.

The two easiest ways to lower levels of unacceptable auto emissions are bylowering engine temperatures and by use of a device called a catalyticconverter, now standard equipment on American cars, which converts exhaustfumes to water and carbon dioxide. The use of the catalytic converterprovided the other nmajor impetus for the abandonment of leaded gasoline,as the lead in the fuel coats the active catalyst in the converter anddestroys the devices function.

In spite of two decades of air pollution legislation and the subsequentimprovement of air quality in many cities in the United States, the problemis far from solved. Several Southern California cities, unable to findanother solution, are considering completely banning gasoline burningvehicles from the city limits by the year 2010, which may lead to a revivalin the use of the electric car. Increased use of mass transport andalternative, cleaner burning fuels may be other answers, as may be thedevelopment of engines other than the standard internal combustion typewhich run more cleanly, such as the Diesel and the external-combustionStirling engine.

To complicate matters even further, studies have shown that current methodsof emissions control may be drastically insufficient to solve the problem.Catalytic Converters, though very beneficial, have a limited life span andif not replaced, become useless and allow exhaust to pass through

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unchanged. There is also concern that one of the by products of ctalyticconverters, carbon dioxide, may lead to global warming if production isunchecked. Furthur research has indicated that problems may exist withexhaust gases previously thought to be harmless: ozone for example,damages crops and lowers air quality while, paradoxically,chlorofluourcarbons emitted by automobile air-conditioners may becontributing to the depletion of the planets natural high-altitude ozonelayer. Even with air pollution controls in place, automobile exhaust stillaccounts for 90% of the air pollution in modern cities.

DETROIT'S CRISIS YEARS : 1971 - 1979

Although the United States would cling to her top seat in the worldautomobile industry for nearly a decade yet, by 1970 it was already clearthat her grip on the position was slipping. America`s cars were stillexamples of style over substance, built to break rather than last, bearinggasoline thirsty engines, and suffering from bad publicitv due to thepublic`s perceived indifference of the Big Three to concerns such as safetyand pollution control. The advent of the Japanese import in conjunctionwith two serious fuel crises within five years would prove a one two punchthat would bring down the Auto King after nearly seventy years ofdomination.

American Motors Tries Something New

The struggling American Motors was having a hard time competing with theBig Three in 1970. The company`s executives decided to introduce a new carinto the market to compete with the VW Beetle instead, hoping that sincethe Big Three appeared not to be interested in that part of the market itwould have a clear field.

Later that year the American Motors Gremlin appeared: It was anodd-looking little car with styling charitable described as "controversial"which was a nicer word than "ugly". The car's stylist defended its looks,claiming that only an unconventional design would have garnered the carenough attention to bring in the customers. That may or may not have beentrue, but for whatever reason, the little car sold well enough to prompttwo of the Big Three to respond with designs of there own later in theyear.

GMs offering was the Chevrolet Vega: while Ford brought another of LeeLacocca`s designs, the ill stared Pinto. Chrysler ignored the trend towardsmaller cars and unwisely offered no subcompact for several years to come.Either because the new subcompacts were pushed through production in ahurry or because the companies did not feel that the subcompacts wereworthy of heavy investments, neither car was very good. The Pinto'sdisastrous safety flaws lead to multimillion dollar lawsuits and badpublicity for Ford, while the Vega's problems included body rust, oilleaks, rough engines and cylinder head warping.

Long Lines at the Pumps

It was unfortunate for the Big Three that they had not put more effort intodesigning well made subcompact cars, because the first major oil crisis wasjust around the corner. It would usher in the age of fuel conservation andengine economy, and with the Big Three woefully unprepared for bthe change,the door was opened for the Japanese carmakers.

When gasoline engines were first made in quantity, America`s domestic oilsupply was more than sufficient to provide for the country's needs.Originally, the only use for petroleum was to make kerosene lamps, and withthe advent of the electric light even that use was declining. The arrivalof the gasoline engine gave the Petroleum industry a whole new reason toexist. Today, gasoline comprises nearly a third of the total oilconsumption of the world.

As the car became more and more common in America, use of gasolinenaturally increased past the point where domestic oil reserves couldprovide enough fuel for everyone. This point was reached and passed in the1950s, but hardly anyone noticed because the discovery of new large oilfields in the deserts of Saudi Arabia and other middle Eastern countriesensured that fuel would continue to be plentiful. American consumersfailed to realize, however, that when oil became a precious commodity, itbecame a source of power - power which had now passed out of Americanhands.

The hard lesson was driven home in 1973 with the outbreak of the Yom KippurWar between Israel and her Arabic neighbors. Oil stopped flowing to theUnited States and to most of Europe as well not because the wells had gonedry but because the Arab nations had decided not to sell it to thecountries that were supporting their enemy, Israel. Gasoline pricestripled over a few months and people stood in line for hours to get fuelfor their cars. Some European nations, with no domestic oil supply,resorted to banning driving entirely on Sundays. It was a rude awakeningfor American gasoline consumers, abruptly forced to become aware of howdrastic their fuel needs had become and how great their dependence was onforeign powers to supply it.

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Large car sales went into an immediate downturn with the worst hit beingthe Large sized, medium priced cars such as Ford`s Mercury. An economicalcar suddenly seemed a much better choice than a powerful one.Unfortunately, the American auto industry wasn`t building any dependablefuel-efficient cars, nor was it prepared to do so in the near future. Inresponse to the crisis, the Big Three to start making plans to downsizetheir product, but it would be several years before the changes would bereflected in the creation of new, smaller cars.

The second oil crisis hit just five years later in 1978, brought on by thestruggle to overthrow the American supported Shah of Iran. Prices, whichnever came down after the first crisis, tripled yet again. Then in 1980Iran and Iraq, both major oil producers, went to war with each other,stopping oil production from both countries and guaranteeing that the highgasoline prices would continue for the immediate future. For the Americanauto industry, there would be no turning back. The day of the gas guzzlingcar was well and truly over.

The Rise of Japan

The entry of Japan into the auto industry started early, but stumbled badlyseveral times before finally achieving success. Japan`s first car wasbuilt in 1902, an experimental model only that used an American engine.Five years later a car was built for production but only twelve were madebefore the company collapsed. By the early 1920s there were many tiny carmanufacturers in Japan, none of them supccessful.

The first automobile company in Japan to actually turn a profit was foundedin 1926, its product being an experimental car built by Kwaishinsha MotorWorks. The initials of the founders were combined to created the company`soriginal name, DAT. Five years later DAT bought out a car named "Datson",meaning, literally "son of DAT" and in the year after the name was changedagain to Datsun to honor the rising sun emblem of the country's flag. In1934 DAT joined with the new Nissan company to form today's Nissan Datsuncorporation.

The only other pre WWII car manufacturer in Japan was Toyota which started,improbably enough, as a textile manufacturer. Its first offering wasbrought out in 1935. The car looked like a cross between a Ford and aChrysler Airflow and by the standards of the West was a poor vehicle

It was not until the second World War that Japan's auto industry reallytook off. The vast industrial and technological expansion that Japanundertook in order to fight WWII formed the basis of its post war industry.Production was very slow at first; only 215 Toyotas were built between 1947and 1952. But during the 1950s Japanese engineers traveled to the U.S.and began to study American production methods, and in 1953 Toyotaproduction had jumped to 16,500. Financing for Japan`s industrialcapitalization, expansion and modernization were provided by its governmentand by low cost loans from the World Bank.

Once they had learned the basics of modern mass production methods, theJapanese engineers went on to do what America's companies had failed to do:improve on them as an example, Toyotas production manager, Taiichi Ohno,developed stamping machines that could be easily changed to make severaldifferent parts from a single machine. This saved on capital, since fewermachines were needed and eliminated wasteful and inefficient stockpiling.Conversion of one of Ohnos machines could be done in a few minutes insteadof the three hours or more it could take to convert a standard Detroitmodel.

Early Japanese marketing efforts were restricted to home, for only oneperson in ten in Japan had a car in the 1960s, compared to one in two inthe U.S., one in five in West Germany, and one in six in Britian. Even aslate as 1967 only 11% of Japan`s car production was exported During the1960s the Japanese car industry expanded and developed as new companieswere founded and older companies merged. Nissan took over Prince Motors ofTokyo, Toyota absorbed Daihatsu, and the huge Mitsubishi company joinedforces with Isuzu Motors. Honda, ruler of the motorcycle market, beganmaking cars in 1962. In 1968 Toyo Kogyo, which began as a corkmanufacturer began producing the Mazda marque, some with Wankel rotaryengines.

The Japanese automobile got off to a shaky start in the United States. Thefirst Toyotas reached California in 1957 against the wishes of the car`sdesigner who felt (rightly) that the vehicle was not ready to challenge theU.S market. By American standards of the day, the early Toyotas werepoorly made , with engines so underpowered that they could not acceleratefast enough to get on a freeway safely. Toyota dealerships were consideredonly by the most desperate car dealers.

The turning point came in 1973, when Honda brought its subcompact Civic tothe United States. It was the right car at the right time, and salessoared. Other Japanese automakers soon followed. American consumersdiscovered that Japanese imports cost the same (or less than) American madesubcompacts, but were more durable, ran better, and were much more fuel

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efficient Compared to the Vega and the Pinto, they seemed like wonder cars.Word spread quickly among buyers and within a very few years the Big Threerealized they had a serious problem on their hands as sales of Americancars went into a steady decline. By 1980 Japan had passed the UnitedStates in overall production and in 1987 imports accounted for 31.3% of allautomobiles sold in America.

THE POPULAR CAR TODAY : 1980 - PRESENT

Since the end of World War II the car industry has taken on an increasinglyglobal character. Cars are imported and exported from every majorindustrialized country, and multinational ventures are becoming more commonevery year. Foreign automakers have established links with U.S. firms andall major Japanese manufacturers have opened plants on U.S. soil. A cartoday may be owned by a company in one country, be designed by a company ina second, be assembled in a third, and contain parts originating in five orten more. The heaviest concentrations of car owners are found in NorthAmerica, Western Europe, Japan, Australia, and New Zealand, all of whichhave ratios of one car for every 2 - 4 people. China, by contrast, has oneper 2,000 people.

Countries with automotive industries include Japan, the United States,Germany, Canada, France, Italy, Sweden, and regions of the former U.S.S.R.America has the Big Three of General Motors, Ford, and Chrysler. Japan hassix major firms Toyota, Nissan/Datsun, Honda, Mazda, Isuzu and Suzuki. InGermany, Volkswagen leads by a large margin, followed by Opel (GMs Germanbranch), Ford, Daimler-Benz (with Mercedes), and the Bayernische MotorenWerks (BMW). France has Renault, Citroen/Peugeot, and Simca, while Italy'sonly major popular car manufacturer is Fiat. Volvo and Saab are made inSweden, and South Korea, a very recent entry into the field, is doing wellwith Hyundai.

The United Slates produced two thirds of all the world`s cars in 1950. By1990 that fraction had dropped to one-fifth, although the total number ofcars built was about equal to that of 1950. For most of the early years ofthe auto industry, Britain held the second place spot behind the U.S. Thislasted until Germany, building on the strength of the Volkswagen, seizedthe position in the 1960s. In the 1970s Japan surged past Germany andshortly thereafter the U.S. itself to take the lead.

Tough Times for Detroit

One quarter of the cars sold in the United States were made in Japan by1980, an astonishing turnaround from just ten years before. The success ofthe Japanese import can be attributed to two simple factors: first, theyhad the right car at the right time to take advantage of a lamentable lackof foresight on the part of American automakers, and second, they were ableto refine the mass production process in order to combine high output withhigh quality control.

The U.S. government, alarmed by this threat to a major national industry,in 1981 convinced Japan to impose restrictions on its automakers to giveAmerican car companys time to retool and modernize their factories. In thefollowing year the United Auto Workers revealed the growing desperation inthe industry when they made major concessions to manufacturers, hoping tohelp get the American auto industry back on its feet. Between 1978 and1984 the Big Three spent a total of about $69 billion throughout the worldin an attempt to become competative, putting the money into productredesign and plant modernization.

Since 1984 sales of American cars have been slowly rising, although it willtake them quite a while to regain lost ground, if indeed they ever do.American carmakers recovered from earlier difficulties such as the GreatDepression, given time, but in those cases the slump was a world widephenomenon affecting carmakers everywhere in roughly the same way. Even inthe depths of the Depression, the American auto industry still turned outmore than twice as many cars as its nearest rival. This latest decline isspecific to the United States, a loss in global market share rather than ageneral depression of sales, and as such it will be harder to recover from.

No one in the American car industry is giving up, however Lee Lacocca saidin 1988, "Americans are fat and happy" but that doesn`t mean America isfinished. When it gets tough, they will straighten out". His confidencemay or may not be justified. The matter is further clouded by the growinginternational nature of the industry. In recent years, cooperativemarketing deals and production mergers between American companies andcarmakers from other nations have blurred the line between import anddomestic vehicles to the point where it is difficult to say where a caractually comes from. All three major U.S. carmakers have internationalplants and have sub-assemblies and parts manufactured by foreignaffiliates. Japan and South Korea have been the major partners, althoughEurope and South America are in the process of joining them.

As of 1970 an American make of car was truly American made, designed andbuilt by Americans with all parts manufactured in the United States. Incontrast, in 1990 a Ford Festiva was a Korean built Mazda design, aChevrolet Turbo Sprint was a Japanese built Suzuki, and a Pontiac Le Mans

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was a German designed Opel Kadett built in Korea! One of the main reasonswhy foreign built cars are being sold as American is that the enormous costof retooling a factory can be avoided if an already-developed foreigndesign is used. In 1990, cars of the Ford-Lincoln Mercury group came fromKorea, Mexico, Canada, Austria, and German as well as the U.S.. As of 1970there were no foreign companies building cars on American soil, while in1989 and 1990 the best selling American built car was the Honda Accord. In1991 a Dodge Stealth was selected as the pace car for the Indianapolis 500auto race, until it was discovered that most of the car was built outsideof the United States. A public outcry prompted a change to a Dodge V10Viper.

The decline of the American auto industry has brought about a similardecline in Detroit; once the fourth largest city in America, it dropped toseventh as job prospects, dwindled in the 1980s. Unless American carmakerscan accomplish the difficult task of regaining consumer confidence in theircars. Detroit`s decline seems likely to continue. In America, importsused to be purchased by people who either fancied "exotic" cars or whowanted one as a status symbol. Today, it is Henry Ford`s "average man" whobuys a Japanese import - ordinary people in lean economic times trying tosave money on repair and running costs and maintain trade in values. Therehas been a surge in new car designs and ideas emerging from Detroit inrecent years as the city strives to return to producing not only the mostcars, but also the best cars. Only time will tell if they will succeed.If they do not, the next Detroit will be a city in Japan or Germany.Regardless, the popular car will undoubtedly continue to be thetransportation of choice in modern nations for decades to come.

---Typed by SHARD - DTL

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