Locomobile Company of America

Locomobile Company of America

Industry Automobile

Fate Purchased,

marque used until 1929

Successor Durant Motors

Founded 1899

Defunct 1922

Headquarters Bridgeport, Connecticut, United States

Key people John Brisben Walker,

Amzi L. Barber,

Francis Edgar Stanley and

Freelan O. Stanley

Products Vehicles

The Locomobile Company of America was a pioneering American automobile

manufacturer founded in 1899. It was one of the earliest car manufacturers in the advent of the
automobile age. For the first two years after its founding the company was located in Watertown,
Massachusetts. Production was transferred to Bridgeport, Connecticut in 1900, where it remained
until the company's demise in 1929. The company manufactured affordable, small steam
cars until 1903, when production switched entirely to internal combustion-powered
luxury automobiles. Locomobile was taken over in 1922 by Durant Motors and eventually went
out of business in 1929. All cars ever produced by the original company were always sold under
the brand name Locomobile.
History[edit]

1900 Locomobile steam car

Model circa 1900

Sectional view showing parts and details, circa 1900

1907 Locomobile Type E Touring

The Locomobile Company of America was founded in 1899, the name coined
from locomotive and automobile. John B. Walker, editor and publisher of
the Cosmopolitan magazine bought the plans for an early steam-powered vehicle produced
by Francis and Freelan Stanley for a price they could not resist: US$250,000 (with all of one car
built, but 199 more ordered), promptly selling half to paving contractor Amzi L. Barber. Their
partnership lasted just a fortnight; Walker went on to found Mobile Company of America at the
Stanley works in Tarrytown, New York, while Barber moved house to Bridgeport, Connecticut, as
Locomobile; the Stanley twins were named general managers. The Stanley twins founded
[1]

the Stanley Motor Carriage Company in 1902, becoming the sharpest rival to Locomobile. [2]

Locomobile began by producing steam cars. The steam Locomobiles were unreliable, finicky to
operate, prone to kerosene fires, had small water tanks (getting only 20 mi {32 km} per tank ), [3]

and took time to raise steam; Rudyard Kipling described one example as a "nickel-plated
fraud". Initially, they were offered with a single body style only, an inexpensive runabout at
[3]

US$600 Nevertheless, they were a curiosity and middle-class Americans clamoured for the
[4]

latest technology. Salesmen, doctors, and people needing quick mobility found them useful. More
than 4000 were built between 1899 and 1902 alone. In 1901, Locomobile offered seven body
[3]

styles at prices between $600 and $1,400. Most Locomobiles had simple twin-cylinderengines
(3x4 in, 76.2x102 mm; 57 in , 927 cm ) and a wire-wrapped 300-psi boiler, and burned the liquid
3 3

fuel naphtha to create steam. Typical of the product was the 1904 Runabout, which seated two
passengers and sold for $750 The two-cylinder steam engine was situated amidships of the
[5]

wood-framed car. By now, the car had improved boilers and a new water pump, manufactured by
the Overman Wheel Company in Chicopee Falls, Massachusetts. This company itself built
the Victor Steamer. [6]

1905 Locomobile logo

During the Boer War, Locomobile did establish a new mark of sorts, becoming the first ever
automobile to be used in war; it was a generator and searchlight tractor and catering vehicle, with
the useful ability (in British eyes, at least) of being able to brew a cup of tea by tapping the boiler. [7]

This was, unfortunately, not a sure way to guarantee commercial success, even in Britain, and
Locomobile started experimenting with gasoline internal combustion engines in 1902, starting
with a four-cylinder steel-chassis model designed by Andrew L. Riker. This encouraged the firm
to drop steam vehicles the following year, selling the Stanley brothers back their rights for
$20,000. [7]

Switch to internal combustion engines[edit]

The 1904 internal combustion Locomobile Touring Car had a tonneau, space for five passengers,
and sold for $4500, quite a change from the low-priced steam buggies. The front-mounted,
vertical, water-cooled straight-4 engine produced 16 hp (11.9 kW). A three-speed sliding
transmission was fitted, as on the Système Panhard cars with which it competed. The angle
steel-framed car weighed 2200 lb (998 kg).

Locomobile seven-passenger Touring Car from 1920 magazine advertisement

Like other early marques, Locomobile entered motor racing, contesting the 1905 Gordon Bennett
Cup with a 17.7-liter (1080 in ) racer; after suffering a transmission gear failure, and with no spare
3

available, driver Joe Tracy only managed two circuits of Auvergne before the transmission
packed up entirely. Tracy did better for the company at the Vanderbilt Cup, placing third. A 90-hp[7]

(67-kW) 16.2-liter (989-in ) F-head was sabotaged by tire trouble, so Tracy failed again in the
3

1906 Vanderbilt, but in 1908, George Robertson (wearing #16) took the win in this car, ahead of
fellow Locomobile pilot Joe Florida in third, becoming the first United States-built car to win in
international competition. This would be the high-water mark for Locomobile racing, and they
soon faded from the scene, though Orin Davis did score a win in the Los Angeles–Phoenix rally in
1913. [8]

On the strength of this, Locomobile soon became known for well-built and speedy luxury cars.
The 1908 Locomobile 40 Runabout was a 60-hp (44.7-kW) two-seater and sold for $4750. (nearly
$100,000 in 2006 dollars)

Model 48 and the Durant years[edit]

The most important model for the marque became the impressive Model 48. Introduced in 1919,
it had a very conservative, perhaps dated, concept. It had a conventional but huge chassis with a
wheelbase of 142 in. Its engine was a straight-six with side valves; cylinders were still cast in
pairs and it featured a nonremovable cylinder head. Displacement was 525 in , giving it a 48.6-hp
3

tax rating by North American Chamber of Commerce. Quality of materials and workmanship were
impeccable and among the best in the world. Such was its pricing: A typical open-body cost
[citation needed]

about $10,000 when the average Model T Ford Phaeton cost about $300.
In 1922, Locomobile was acquired by Durant Motors, which not only continued using the
Locomobile brand name for their top-of-the-line autos until 1929, but also still produced the Model
48 until its demise in 1929. Until the mid-1920s, this car was Locomobile's only offering. In 1925,
the marque brought out their first new model, the 8-66 Junior Eight, with a more contemporary
straight eight-cylinder engine, and more importantly, a lower price of $1,785.
Introduction of the even smaller Junior Six was in 1926, but this car stayed only for one model
year. The larger Model 90 that appeared in the same year was produced until 1929.
With the 8-70, Locomobile added one more eight-cylinder car. In the following year, the Junior
Eight 8-66 was phased out.
For 1929, a new 8-86 and 8-88 came out, but it was too late to save the company. Locomobile
died when its parent company, Durant Motors, failed. Production of the volume cars Durant and
Rugby lasted until 1933, but that did not save Locomobile.
Locomobile model specifications[edit]
 Locomobile Model 48 Sportif

Locomobiles in fiction[edit]
A Locomobile is the setting for one of the final scenes of F. Scott Fitzgerald's first novel, This Side
of Paradise, in which the protagonist, Amory Blaine, argues for socialism to the father of a college
friend, who staunchly defends the capitalist ideal.
In the spring and summer of 1946, a seven-passenger 1911 Locomobile touring car was driven
from Boston to Los Angeles and back as a promotional tour for the Columbia Pictures film Gallant
Journey. While not appearing in the movie, the Locomobile attracted much attention for the
picture on the tour.
In Thomas Savage's 1967 novel The Power of the Dog, set in the 1920s, the Locomobile is
esteemed by protagonist Peter Johnson as a peer to the Pierce-Arrow: "... Those were the
vehicles of the high and mighty, and he knew that only the Locomobile (fancied by old General
Pershing, among others) rivaled the Pierce."
Clive Cussler's 2007 novel, The Chase, as well as the 2010 novel The Spy, featured a 1906
Locomobile.
In Dashiell Hammett's 1925 mystery story "Scorched Face", the rich girls for whom the
Continental Op is looking, were driving a Locomobile "with a special cabriolet body" when they
disappeared.
Papa LaBas from Ishmael Reed's 1972 novel Mumbo Jumbo drives a Locomobile.
The Locomobile is central to the 2015 historical novel by Lisa Begin-Kruysman titled Around the
World in 1909: Harriet White Fisher and Her Locomobile. The Locomobile is driven, hauled,
pushed and floated in places where no man, let alone woman, had yet explored, certainly not on
wheels.

See also[edit]
 Freelan Oscar Stanley & Francis Edgar Stanley
 John Brisben Walker
 Amzi L. Barber
 Stanley Motor Carriage Company
 Mobile Company of America
 List of defunct United States automobile manufacturers

References[edit]
1. Jump up^ Wise, David B., "British Steam-Car Pioneers", in Northey, Tom, ed. World of Automobiles (London: Orbis Publishing, 1974), Volume
11, p. 1207.
2. Jump up^ Kimes/Clark, p. 853.
3. ^ Jump up to:a b c Wise, p. 1207.
4. Jump up^ Kimes/Clark, p. 85.
5. Jump up^ Kimes/Clark, p. 854.
6. Jump up^ Kimes/Clark, p. 1453.
7. ^ Jump up to:a b c Wise, p. 1208.
8. Jump up^ Wise, p. 1209.

Further reading[edit]
 Frank Leslie's Popular Monthly (January, 1904)
 David Burgess Wise, "Locomobile: British Steam-Car Pioneers", in Northey, Tom, ed. World
of Automobiles. London: Orbis Publishing Ltd, 1974. Volume 11, pp. 1207–9.
 Kimes, Beverly Rae (editor) and Clark, Henry Austin, jr., The Standard Catalogue of
American Cars 1805–1942, 2nd edition, Krause Publications (1985), ISBN 0-87341-111-0
 Bridgeport Working: Voices from the 20th Century. Bridgeport Public Library. Web. 13 Oct.
2011. <http://www.bridgeporthistory.org/companies/companies_output.cfm?companyid=8>.
 Kimes, Beverly Rae, Pioneers, Engineers, and Scoundrels: The Dawn of the Automobile in
America, edited by SAE (Society of Automotive Engineers) Permissions, Warrendale PA
(2005), ISBN 0-7680-1431-X
 Ball, Donald L. The Genealogy of the Locomobile Steam Carriage, 1899–1904, 1994
 Harte, Bret (September 1902). "Advertisement: Recent Awards For The
Locomobile". Overland Monthly, and Out West Magazine. XL (3). Retrieved 2009-08-15.

External links[edit]
Media related to Locomobile Company of America at Wikimedia Commons

 Old 16 Locomobile (VanderbiltCupRaces.com)

 1906 Locomobile The story of the 1908 Vanderbilt Cup win
 Locomobile Catalog on DurantCars site 1920s Locomobiles
 Locomobile items on Henry Ford Museum site
 Locomobile Society Home Page
 Locomobile Advertising View the old locomobile ads
 1923 Locomobile Model 48 Sportif in the 'Hemmings' magazine