Triumph & Tragedy: America's great lost auto companies

There were over 160 American car manufacturers in 1919.

Packard: luxurious and high-tech (1899)

Like Lamborghini decades later, Packard was indirectly created by a competitor’s shortcoming. James Ward Packard (1863-1928) purchased a car made by Winton in 1898 and ran into numerous problems with it. Believing he could do much better, he enlisted the help of his brother William and two ex-Winton employees to design and build the first Packard car in the Ohio candle-making shop he owned.

Packard’s first car was ready in 1899. Called Model A (pictured), it was powered by a single-cylinder, horizontally-mounted engine rated at 9 hp. Five examples were made (including the original prototype) before it was replaced by the Model B in 1900. 49 units of the B were sold; Packard was quickly making a name for itself.

While Packard’s first cars were manufactured in Ohio, the company moved to Detroit in 1903 after one of the city’s wealthiest men invested in the company. It remained there as it earned a solid reputation for making luxurious, engineering-led vehicles. It credibly competed against Rolls-Royce and Mercedes-Benz, among other prestigious companies, during the 1920s and the 1930s.

Packard loses footing

Packard’s business plan was built around the belief that discerning luxury car buyers wanted power, comfort and useful features, not frivolous annual sheet metal updates. On the contrary, Packard argued its clients sought a car that looked current year after year. This train of thought was certainly valid at one point but style became increasingly important around the turn of the 1950s and Packard’s stellar reputation was no longer enough to move its cars out of showrooms - especially in the wake of relentless model-year design updates pioneered by General Motors as early as the late 1920s but becoming much more pronounced after the war.

The company’s sales began to drop as motorists flocked to more modern rivals. Packard countered the offensive by releasing the new 24th Series models in 1951. Sales encouragingly climbed. The next major update to its line-up came in 1955, when it released the 55th Series and introduced a V8 engine to replace its time-tested straight-eight. Buyers again began to take Packard seriously, but the company couldn’t pay for the overhaul. It had two options: merge, or die. PICTURE: 1956 Packard Clipper

Packard’s fight for survival

It chose the first option. Packard joined forces with Studebaker in 1954, a few years before an economic downturn swept across the United States. The alarm bells nonetheless rang after the company sold 13,000 cars in 1956. Ultimately, in spite of the visual and mechanical updates it made to its cars, Packard was considered an old-fashioned brand in a market where buyers wanted the newest car on the block.

The Packard plant on East Grand Boulevard in Detroit closed in 1956, putting thousands of men and women out of work and plunging a sizeable part of the city into poverty. The factory wasn’t deep in an industrial area; it was – and still is – on the edge of a residential neighborhood. For 1957, Packard’s line-up was reduced to badge-engineered Studebaker models made in the firm’s South Bend, Indiana, factory. Less than 5000 examples were sold that year, leading journalists and analysts to speculate the end was near for the storied name. They were right. Packard production ended in July 1958 after 588 cars were sold during the model year. PICTURE: 1958 Packard Hawk.

The Packard plant

The last remaining trace of Packard’s influence on the American automotive industry is its former factory on the north side of Detroit. Designed by Albert Kahn (1869-1942), the sprawling facility hasn’t made a car since 1956 but small businesses rented some of the buildings through the 1990s. 

The Packard Plant (pictured) is one of the largest industrial ruins in the world. It attracts squatters, graffiti artists, urban explorers, vandals, photographers and curious tourists alike. The land it’s on has limited value but the scrap metal recovered in the rubble could be worth millions of dollars.

Decades-long disputes over who owned and controlled the factory unexpectedly prolonged its life. It was foreclosed in 2013 and sent to auction but failed to sell. Spanish investor Fernando Palazuelo purchased the facility for $405,000 later that year and, to many people’s surprise, published grandiose plans to restore it rather tear it down. He planned to divide it into retail space, office space, recreation space, art space and light industry. The plan involved luring automotive suppliers back to Detroit.

Construction teams have started clearing debris from several buildings, and work on the structure’s roof began in the summer of 2019, but the restoration process is expected to take between 10 to 15 years.

Studebaker: from horses to horsepower (1902)

The Studebaker brothers made horse-drawn carriages for decades before they reluctantly took their first steps into the automotive industry. The company made good money selling carriages; it notably supplied the Union Army during the American Civil War and the British Army during the Boer War. Business was going well and making cars sounded more complicated than it was worth.

However, around the turn of the 20th century, it became increasingly evident that the horse-drawn carriage’s days were numbered. Launched in 1902, the first Studebaker-badged car was an electric model that was little more than a carriage upgraded with a motor linked to a heavy battery. It had a 13mph top speed and a 40-mile driving range.

Studebaker made several different types of electric cars from 1902 to 1912, including a four-passenger model equipped with two electric motors, but it also manufactured gasoline-burning cars starting in 1904. In 1913, its line-up ranged from a two-seater roadster called 25 that was powered by a four-cylinder engine to a six-seater limousine named E equipped with a straight-six engine made up of three blocks linked to a common crankshaft.

Studebaker’s struggles

Studebaker stood proud as one of America’s largest carmakers during the 1910s and the 1920s. Its management’s short-sightedness as the Great Depression ravaged the United States sent it into bankruptcy in 1933 but executives Paul Hoffman and Harold Vance skillfully saved it. Studebaker’s future looked bright in 1945. Financially bolstered by lucrative army truck contracts during World War II, the company celebrated strong sales and enviable profits through the end of the 1940s.

Trouble had already started to brew underneath the surface, though. Labor costs were very high and its South Bend, Indiana, factory needed urgent improvements. Additionally, competing with giants like Ford and General Motors (GM), who were willing to increase sales at any cost, took a heavy toll on smaller firms with fewer resources, including Studebaker. Its annual profits had become losses by 1953 and no one clearly knew how to turn the situation around.

Studebaker merged with Packard in 1954 to reap the rewards of economies of scale. While Detroit’s big three were thinking big, Studebaker attempted to capture the lower end of the market by introducing the Lark (pictured) for the 1959 model year. It was a hit; Studebaker posted a profit during the 1959 calendar year. While company president Harold Churchill wanted to invest the profits into a full line of small cars, its board of directors insisted on diversifying.

The Studebaker Lark

The Lark could have saved Studebaker. On paper, it was a real oddity; South Bend pelted a relatively small car with a pure, simple design in an industry chock-full with ostentatious land yachts. It was like bringing a terrier to the Iditarod. And yet, the model struck a chord with new car buyers. Studebaker’s sales rose sharply from 44,759 units in 1958 to 126,156 the following year. It appealed to buyers who needed more car than a Volkswagen Beetle but less than a Chevrolet Impala.

The Lark line-up included a sedan and a station wagon (pictured). Buyers could choose a straight-six or a V8 engine. Regardless of configuration, the Lark proved itself as a solid, dependable car but the entire line sorely lacked excitement. Performance was a must during the 1960s; the Chevrolet Corvair offered an optional turbo and even humdrum Rambler caved by releasing the Marlin in 1965. Had Studebaker realized this and acted accordingly, it could have survived at least a little bit longer thanks to the Lark.

Studebaker’s gradual demise

The board’s decision not to commit its resources to launching a full line-up of smaller models wasn’t unfounded. Studebaker’s car-building division clearly struggled, so entering new, more profitable segments of the industry could secure profits. By 1963, Studebaker owned 13 divisions including a Canadian car-building arm, Minnesota-based appliance company Franklin, supercharger manufacturer Paxton, a firm that manufactured tire studs and even Trans International Airlines.

Keeping Studebaker afloat during the early 1960s required a tremendous amount of talent, money and time. Keeping it afloat while feeding 13 additional divisions and towing Packard was an even more difficult challenge. The Packard name was finally dropped from the corporation in 1962, the same year that Studebaker released the stunning, Raymond Loewy-designed Avanti coupe. It was too little, too late. In the red again, the firm shuttered its historic South Bend, Indiana, factory in December 1963. Studebaker production carried on in a second factory located in Hamilton, Ontario, but that closed in 1966. Most of its non-automotive divisions thrived during the 1970s and the 1980s and many still operate in 2021, though the Studebaker name is long gone. PICTURE: Studebaker Hawk.

Hudson: putting an emphasis on value (1910)

Announced in 1909, Hudson was a promising entry into the burgeoning automotive industry because it was founded by former Olds Motor Works employees (the firm later became Oldsmobile) and funded by Joseph L. Hudson, the wealthy owner of the massive Hudson’s department store in downtown Detroit. Hudson earned the right to name the company by injecting $90,000 (about $2.5 million in 2021 money) into the project.

Hudson’s first car, the four-cylinder-powered Model 20 (pictured), came standard with two headlights, side-mounted oil lamps, a generator and a horn, features that were uncommon on a $900 car (about $25,000 in 2021) at the time. Aluminum and brass trim added an upmarket touch to the design. Motorists loved it; Hudson made a record-breaking 4000 cars during its first year.

Hudson’s Step Down design

In 1948, Hudson began rolling out some of the most distinctive-looking cars on American roads. The Super and the Commodore inaugurated the firm’s Step Down design language. Cars influenced by this approach to styling were characterized by a low, wide and highly aerodynamic design. The company later expanded its range with a shorter model named Pacemaker and a high-performance, 145 hp variant called Hornet (pictured as a coupe) which competed in NASCAR events across the America. It notably won 12 of the 41 Grand National races held in 1951.

Head-turning design and a racing pedigree weren’t enough to help Hudson capture a significant share of the new car market. It still offered a straight-eight engine when most of its rivals had switched to a V8. Its line-up lacked variety. And, like all of its similarly-sized rivals, it struggled to keep up with the Big Three. Merging was inevitable - and we'll come to that shortly.

Willys: Jeep’s foundations (1915)

Successful car dealer John North Willys (1873-1935) purchased a relatively small, Indiana-based automaker named Overland in 1907 and renamed it Willys-Overland two years later. Willys was a businessman, not an engineer, and he was content with running the company until he decided to put his name on a car in 1915.

The Willys-Knight was powered by a 45hp sleeve-valve engine manufactured by Knight. It was priced at $2500 (about $63,000 in 2021 money) which made it rather expensive. As 1920 approached, Willys decided to pare its line-up down to three core lines. The first was aimed at the Ford Model T; the second was a mid-range model with a four-cylinder engine; the third was a range-topping car powered by a straight-six.

The latter model was still under development when Willys ran into financial problems. The Chase bank agreed to help save the company if Willys stepped down. A certain former Buick boss named Walter P. Chrysler became boss instead.

Willys goes up, down, up, down

Willys embarked on a roller-coaster ride during the 1920s and the 1930s. Chrysler remained in charge of the firm for two years and gave the reins back to John North Willys when he left to turn around Maxwell-Chalmers. In an odd twist of fate, the six-cylinder-powered car Willys never released later evolved into the first Chrysler-badged car launched in 1924.

Back in his old office, Willys put his business genius at work again. The company sold about 200,000 cars in 1925, up from around 50,000 in 1921. He left for the second time – this time on his own terms – in 1929 and became America’s first ambassador to Poland the following year but his company was on the brink of another downturn as it navigated the Great Depression.

Annual sales dropped to 26,444 in 1932 with few signs to suggest an improvement was around the corner. President Hoover allegedly personally summoned Willys back to Toledo, Ohio, to turn around the company he founded. There was little Willys could do on such short notice. The firm went into receivership in 1933 and its executives decided to focus on making smaller cars to survive. Its true salvation came in July 1941 when it landed the military’s contract to produce thousands of Jeeps during World War II. PICTURE: 1931 Willys Six.

Willys goes all-in on Jeep

Willys wasn’t looking forward to resuming passenger car production after World War II. None of its cars sold particularly well in the years leading up to the war and there was absolutely no reason to believe they would fare any better in the middle of the 1940s. Luckily, the company had the Jeep to fall back on.

It quickly transformed the war-proven MB into a full line of four-wheel drive models that included the CJ-2A (which was essentially a civilian version of the Jeep; pictured) and a station wagon. This strategy worked remarkably well; Jeep had a monopoly on the off-roader segment in the US.

Willys goes to Brazil

Willys returned to the passenger car segment in 1952 with the Aero, a model offered in a variety of body styles, but it left for good in 1955. Jeep models outsold those sold under the Willys banner by a wide margin so executives chose to focus on the most profitable part of the business. The Aero wasn’t ready to retire, though.

Now part of the business-savvy Kaiser empire, Willys sent the tooling and the rights to the aero to Willys-Overland do Brasil where production continued until 1971. The model received several changes over the course of its production run. It was sold by Ford after the company took over Willys do Brasil and late examples even wore Ford badges. PICTURE: 1953 Willys Aero-Ace.

Nash: a former GM exec’s dream (1916)

After resigning from his post as GM president in 1916, Charles Nash purchased the Thomas B. Jeffery Company in Kenosha, Wisconsin, for about $9 million (around $211 million in 2021 money). Nash began putting his name on Jeffery’s cars in 1917 and introduced the first car developed under his stewardship in 1918.

Called 680-series, it was – like most cars made during the 1910s – available in several different body styles. Pricing ranged from $1295 (about $26,000 in 2021) for the four-door, five-seater model powered by a 55 hp straight-six to $2085 (about $41,000 in 2021) for a two-door coupe.

Nash thinks small

American cars grew almost exponentially in the years following World War II. Nash was among the handful of American automakers that identified a demand for a small, relatively efficient car. In the early 1950s, it asked Pininfarina for a design and Britain's Austin for an engine as well as production capacity to release what’s often considered the first subcompact car in the United States.

Named Metropolitan, it went on sale during the 1954 model year with a base price of $1469 (about $14,000 in 2021 money). The Metropolitan’s production process was relatively complicated. British coachbuilder Fisher & Ludlow manufactured bodies in Birmingham and shipped them to the Austin factory in nearby Longbridge, where they were fitted with a four-cylinder engine from the A40. Complete cars were then shipped to America. We'll come back to Nash in a moment...

Duesenberg: America’s most prestigious car (1920)

Bankrupt bicycle manufacturer Frederick Duesenberg (1876-1932) moved from Iowa to Minnesota with his brother, August, in 1913 to create the company he gave his last name to. Early on, the firm designed and manufactured engines for race cars and boats. Duesenberg-powered cars were immensely successful in competition and the brothers became famous in racing circles.

Fame brought money and money attracted investors. In 1916, New York-based investors helped the brothers form the Duesenberg Motors Corporation and construct a factory in New Jersey. The plant manufactured engines for the military during World War I and turned its attention back to the automotive industry when peace returned.

Called Model A (pictured), Duesenberg’s first car made its debut in 1920, though an array of last-minute changes delayed it until the 1922 model year. It was powered by an 88 hp straight-eight engine.

Cord commissions the Model J

In 1926, Auburn president Errett Lobban Cord (1894-1974) purchased Duesenberg and immediately asked its founders to create what he allegedly referred to as a supercar. The Model J (pictured) made its global debut two years later and it was immediately heralded as one of the most prestigious cars on the planet.

Huge, quick and correspondingly expensive, the Model J was powered by a 6.9-liter straight-eight engine that made 265 hp. The eight had twin overhead cams and four valves per cylinder, track-bred features that were highly unusual on a production car during the 1920s. Motorists able and willing to pay about $8500 (roughly $127,000 in 2021) for a Model J could comfortably reach a 116mph top speed.

Cord asked Duesenberg to manufacture 500 examples of the Model J without specifying a timeframe. This goal looked reachable until the stock market crashed in October 1929. Suddenly, selling a big, expensive car like the Model J became almost impossible. Production nonetheless continued and Duesenberg managed to build 360 examples by the end of 1931.

Duesenberg’s end

Model J (pictured) production carried on through the 1930s. About a dozen coachbuilders on both sides of the Atlantic (including LeBaron, LaGrande, Murphy and Weymann) skillfully turned the bare chassis into anything owners were comfortable paying for. The possibilities were endless; Duesenberg’s clientele included some of the wealthiest businessmen, politicians, oil heirs, gangsters and movie stars in the world.

Duesenberg introduced a supercharged model with 320 hp in 1932. The brand could have continued to rival Rolls-Royce, Bugatti and other elite brands for decades but it was abruptly axed when Cord sold his car-building empire in 1937 and exited the automotive industry. The Auburn and Cord brands disappeared at the same time. There have been some attempts to revive Duesenberg, including one in 2011, but none have been successful.

Checker: America’s best-known taxi (1922)

Chicago-based businessman Morris Markin (1893-1970) founded Checker in 1922 through a series of acquisitions and mergers. Early on, the company sold the cars it manufactured to the Checker Taxi Company in Chicago, a separate entity that ran a lucrative taxi business. Interestingly, it was car rental mogul John Hertz who inspired Markin to gradually buy Checker Taxi. With the two operations under the same roof, Markin controlled both supply and demand from the company’s headquarters in Kalamazoo, Michigan.

Checker released several models from the 1920s to the 1950s, pausing during World War II to manufacture equipment for the military. The emblematic model it made virtually unchanged for decades was released in 1956 as the A8 (pictured). Later, better-known variants received an updated front-end design with twin headlights and an eggcrate grille. These versions also spawned sedans, station wagons and limousines aimed at private buyers who wanted a solid, no-frills car.

Checker’s monopoly crumbles

Checker uniquely spent decades not having to worry about profits or sales. It knew approximately how many taxi cabs were operating in the US and it could calculate how many would need to be replaced in a given year. Checker wasn’t under pressure to make regular updates to its cars because cab drivers wanted to drive a recognizable car so the only major changes involved engines from the GM parts bin. Operating costs remained low. For a long time, Checker was a relatively easy company to keep running smoothly.

The firm had a monopoly on the taxi sector but earning money became more complicated in the 1970s when New York City and other major urban centers began loosening their taxi regulations. This move opened the door to the big, body-on-frame sedans made by Ford and Chevrolet. These were cheaper to buy than the Marathon yet they were just as durable and considerably more modern. They weren’t as spacious inside but that that was a small price to pay for saving money.

Former GM president Ed Cole purchased a sizable stake in Checker after he retired and planned to modernize the company but the plan fell apart after his death in a plane crash in 1977. Many nonetheless expected to see the Marathon’s successor in 1983. Some rumors pointed to a model based on a stretched Volkswagen Rabbit; others pointed to a model based on the same X platform as the Chevrolet Citation and the Oldsmobile Omega, among others. Neither project saw the light at the end of the Kalamazoo production line.

Sales dropped to 2574 units in 1980, down from 5231 the following year, and fell to 2000 units in 1982, the year the company stopped making cars. At the time, media reports claimed Checker lacked the necessary resources to develop a successor to the Marathon, which was no longer selling in big enough numbers to justify keeping in production. Checker nonetheless continued manufacturing body panels for GM, Ford and Chrysler until it filed for bankruptcy in 2009. PICTURE: Checker Marathon 50th Anniversary (1972)

Checker’s comeback

In 2017, Massachusetts-based Checker Motor Car Company announced plans to launch production of a Marathon-like car offered in several body styles (including, oddly, a pickup) by 2018. As of 2021, the company hasn’t manufactured a single car and its plans seemingly remain on hiatus.

DeSoto: right below Chrysler (1928)

Detroit-based Chrysler founded its DeSoto division in 1928 to offer cheaper cars with more mass-market appeal. The firm released its first car, the Model K (pictured), for the 1929 model year and immediately set an enviable record. DeSoto sold 81,065 examples of the model during its first 12 months on the market, a feat no other carmaker had accomplished before, and a record that would stand for decades. 

DeSoto’s position in the Chrysler group became murky when the firm purchased Dodge in 1928. At the time, many speculated company founder Walter P. Chrysler (1875-1940) created DeSoto only to convince the bankers who controlled Dodge to sell him the carmaker. Those allegations have never been proven but what’s certain is that, by 1930, Chrysler ran two mid-range car firms that often overlapped.

DeSoto’s tough times

DeSoto manufactured aircraft parts during World War II. It returned to making cars in 1946 after overcoming a series of obstacles like material shortages. In the subsequent years, the mechanical and design improvements made to its cars largely mirrored those carried out to Chrysler, Dodge and Plymouth models. The Firedome V8 with hemispherical combustion chambers arrived in 1952; 1955 brought Chrysler’s Forward Look design language.

The firm’s sales remained relatively healthy until they fell by over 60% in 1958 due in part to a recession that blanketed the US. DeSoto was hardly the only company hit hard by the economic downturn, but its sales never managed to recover. PICTURE: 1956 DeSoto Diplomat Plaza

DeSoto’s last stand

Chrysler decided to close the DeSoto brand in 1960, 47 days after announcing its 1961 models. Ironically, 1960 was also when the Ford Falcon beat the DeSoto Series K’s first-year sales record by finding 475,676 buyers.

The company made approximately two million cars over 32 years, including 3034 for the 1961 model year. Imperial and Plymouth later followed DeSoto into the grave. PICTURE: 1961 DeSoto Hardtop Coupe

Cord: the front-wheel drive pioneer (1929)

Not one to shy away from embarking on a business venture, serial entrepreneur Errett Lobban Cord founded the automaker that bears his last name in a bid to fill the gap that separated cars made by Auburn and those manufactured by Duesenberg, two well-known brands he already owned. Named L-29 (pictured), the firm’s first model arrived with a classic but elegant exterior design and a lavish interior.

It took motorists by surprise because it sat noticeably lower than comparably-priced car thanks to the use of front-wheel drive, which was highly unusual and extremely innovative at the time. L-29 buyers had several body styles to choose from, including a five-passenger sedan and a convertible with two or four seats. Every variant used a 4.9-liter straight-eight engine rated at 125 hp.

The L-29’s bumpy career

Indiana-based Cord priced the L-29 (pictured) at $3095 (about $46,000 in 2021 dollars) but it unintentionally introduced the model at the worst possible time. The stock market crash that plunged America into the Great Depression happened two months after the L-29’s unveiling. Panicked, Cord lowered the L-29’s price to $2395 in 1931 (about $40,000 in 2021) but sales never recovered.

And yet, the firm made about 5000 examples of the L-29 which was exactly the number it aimed for when developing the car. Cord nonetheless canceled the L-30 it planned to release as a replacement for the L-29. The company shut down for the first time on the last day of 1931.

Cord’s comeback

Cord unexpectedly returned to life when it released the 810 (pictured) in 1936; the 810 was developed by sister company Duesenberg as its entry-level model. Engineers chose a front-wheel drive layout to lower the car’s silhouette and executives consequently decided it made more sense as a Cord than as a Duesenberg.

The 810’s so-called coffin nose design made it even more stunning to look at than the L-29. Today it’s still considered one of the most beautiful American cars ever made. Sales started in 1936 with a base price of approximately $2000 (about $38,000 in 2021). Power came from a 125 hp V8, while the 812 model that appeared in 1937 had an optional supercharger that bumped the V8’s output to 170 hp.

Then Auburn, Cord and Duesenberg closed in 1937 when Errett Lobban Cord abruptly exited the automotive industry, amid government investigations into his murky business ventures. Michigan-based Buick dealer Dallas Winslow purchased its assets and continued selling parts. 3000 examples of the 810 and 812 were made.

Cord’s numerous revivals

Winslow sold the Auburn-Cord-Duesenberg corporation to a teacher named Glenn Pray in 1960 for $75,000 (about $650,000 in 2021 money). The deal included an immense stock of new parts that Pray used to briefly re-launched the Cord brand during the 1960s. He cleverly called his replica 8/10 Sportsman. The 8/10 (pictured) was 20% smaller than the 810 it was modeled after, hence the name. Instead of a V8, Pray fitted his replicas with an air-cooled flat-six engine borrowed from the Chevrolet Corvair.

97 cars had been sold by the time Cord production ended for the third time in 1966. Pray continued selling parts and restoring cars until his death in 2011. His son Doug has since taken over the business. Pennsylvania-based Elfman Motors briefly owned Cord but didn’t make any cars. In 1968, Sports Automobile Manufacturing relaunched Cord production by releasing two models called Warrior and Royal, respectively. Both were inspired by the 810 but they received modifications like exposed headlights. The Warrior used a Ford-sourced V8 engine while the Royal received a V8 from Chrysler. Pricing was ambitious and its design looked dated but not desirably so. Production ended yet again in 1970.

Cord may be on the cusp of a fifth resurrection. The trademark, licensing and manufacturing rights to the brand will be auctioned in Indiana in August 2021. Worldwide Auctioneers hasn’t provided a pre-auction estimate.

Crosley: is America ready for small cars? (1939)

Ohio native Powel Crosley (1886-1961) elevated multi-tasking to an art form. His company became the world’s largest radio manufacturer in 1922 and later leaped into broadcasting too. After branching out into the burgeoning appliance sector, the firm pioneered the concept of adding shelves to a refrigerator door and invented a non-electric fridge with no moving parts. He also owned the Cincinnati Reds baseball team and experimented with aircraft-making, to list only a few of his ventures.

His plate was full, and he certainly didn’t need additional revenue, but those who knew him explained making cars had always been his dream. He tried in 1911 when he designed the Marathon Six, a luxury car, but failed to secure money to start production. In 1939, with considerably more experience, he was ready to give manufacturing a second shot. He believed America needed a small, affordable car.

Called Crosley, the car made its debut on the Indianapolis Speedway in 1939. The choice of venue was a little bit misleading; power came from an air-cooled, 12 hp two-cylinder engine that unlocked a 50mph top speed. Priced at under $300 (about $5500 in 2021 money), 2017 examples found a home during 1939 but sales dropped to 422 units the following year in the wake of reliability problems. PICTURE: 1946 Crosley 4CC

Crosley’s COBRA

Powel Crosley multi-tasked through World War II. His various businesses manufactured proximity fuzes, engines, radio parts, trailer and gun turrets, among other products. The firm hastily returned to the automotive industry after the war by securing the American government’s permission to make 16,000 cars between July 1945 and March 1946. It still believed the United States needed a small, universally-affordable car and thoroughly modernized the model it sold before the war with an updated design and a new four-cylinder engine called COBRA (an acronym that stood for copper-brazed) made with sheet metal. Crosley’s two-door sedan carried a base price of $905 in 1947 (about $10,000 in 2021).

Crosley made several variants of its diminutive car including a two-door sedan and a two-door station wagon before turning its attention to an affordable sports car. Called Hot Shot (pictured), it was presented in 1949 with a front-end design that seemingly foreshadowed the Austin-Healey Sprite. Problems encountered with the COBRA engine convinced Crosley to develop a four-cylinder with a cast-iron block. It was first fitted to the 1175lb (534kg) Hot Shot, where it made close to 70 hp at 10,000 rpm, before spreading across the rest of the range.

Crosley fades away

Crosley sales peaked in 1948 when it sold 29,084 cars, an encouraging number. It looked like smaller really was better, and Crosley had seemingly figured out how to talk Americans into small cars, but its success was short-lived. Sales plummeted to 7431 units in 1949 as larger firms like Ford and GM released new models with more power and features than ever before.

Crosley valiantly tried turning its business around by adding a pickup and a cute, Jeep-like off-roader named Farm-O-Road to its line-up but neither made a significant impact on sales. Post-war austerity was over; Crosley couldn’t match the excitement delivered by Detroit's chrome-festooned, V8-powered cars. The demand for compact cars that rocketed VW Beetle sales hadn't arrived yet.

The Marion, Indiana, plant that made Crosley’s cars shut down in July 1952. The company sold 2075 cars during the 1952 model year, a rounding error at best on a bigger company’s balance sheet. Crosley later found itself under the General Tire and Rubber Company’s umbrella but never made another car.  PICTURE: 1950 Crosley

Kaiser-Frazer: beating the big three (1947)

Industrialist Henry J. Kaiser (1882-1967) specialized in making ships, not cars. Kaiser Shipyards emerged as one of the top shipbuilders during World War II. After the war, when most American automakers were slowly dusting off their pre-war models, Kaiser saw a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to immediately gain market share by releasing the first all-new post-war design. He knew little about the automotive industry so he teamed up with Graham-Paige executive Joseph Frazer (1892-1971) to accomplish his goal.

Announced in August 1946, Kaiser’s 1947 line-up included two models called Special (pictured) and Custom, respectively. Both looked more modern than the pre-war designs offered by Ford and Chevrolet, among other brands, and buyers noticed. Kaiser sold 70,474 cars during the 1947 model year despite pricing starting at $1868 (about $21,000 in 2021). This figure was encouraging for a new brand no one had heard of before but bigger, better-known brands easily outsold it. Chevrolet’s 1947 sales totaled 684,145 units, for example, America's biggest car producer that year.

Standing out from the pack

Kaiser’s relative success didn’t last. Sales begin to drop in 1949 as rivals gradually released new models. The company survived largely thanks to a sizable loan from the American government’s Reconstruction Finance Corporation. Kaiser was lucky to be alive but it wasn’t saved yet. It redesigned its cars in a bid to stand out from the competition. It also experimented with innovative features and body styles like the Vagabond’s two-part tailgate (pictured), the compact Henry J (which was notably sold through Sears stores under the Allstate banner) and the fiberglass-bodied Kaiser-Darrin sports car. And yet, sales dropped to around 32,000 units in 1952.

Frazer left the company in late 1949 and the cars that wore his name were phased out after 1951. The company was consequently renamed Kaiser Motors Corporation. Like many smaller automakers, Kaiser sought a merger partner during the 1950s to keep up with the pace of the big three’s growth. It purchased Willys-Overland, which was also in dire financial straits, in 1953 to form Kaiser-Willys. In hindsight, that Willys owned Jeep was one of the only bright points in the alliance.

Kaiser’s Argentinian deal

Unable to recover, Kaiser stopped building cars in the United States in 1955. It shipped most of the approximately 1000 cars it made that year to Argentina, where buyers seemingly saw more potential in its models than in America. Industrias Kaiser Argentina (IKA), its Argentinian arm, re-named the Manhattan (pictured) Carabela and built it locally for seven years.

Kaiser Industries sold its shares in IKA to Renault in 1970, sold Jeep to AMC that same year and left the automotive industry for good. PICTURE: 1953 Kaiser Manhattan

Bigger rivals like Ford and GM overshadowed Nash throughout most of its existence, despite Nash's innovations that included the first compact air conditioning system to be fitted to a production car.

In the 1950s, when the production and price war between the two giants reached new heights, Nash concluded it was necessary for it to merge with another automaker in order to survive. It purchased Hudson in 1954, creating American Motors Corporation (AMC). Some of their respective designs survived after the two companies joined forces but the Nash and Hudson names disappeared in 1957. PICTURE: Rambler American

Kenosha, Wisconsin, remained a strategic location for AMC. It made millions of cars in the plant between the year it was founded and 1987, when it was purchased by Chrysler and quietly shut down. Under Chrysler’s stewardship, the Kenosha factory became an engine plant that notably manufactured the 4.0-liter straight-six engine that equipped the Jeep Wrangler until 2006.

800 people worked at the plant in 2009. Chrysler closed the Kenosha factory – the last vestige from the Nash era – as it navigated bankruptcy in 2010. By then, employment had dropped to 575 workers. The factory was demolished in 2013 and the city of Kenosha began preparing the land for redevelopment. In 2018, officials announced plans to turn the property into a tech hub. PICTURE: The Kenosha factory in 1917

Edsel: Ford’s short-lived project (1958)

In the late 1940s, Henry Ford II realized the company his father founded didn’t have enough divisions to retain buyers as they progressed in life. The Ford-Mercury-Lincoln hierarchy was at least a few rungs short. The process of expanding the line-up began in 1956 when the Continental nameplate was promoted to a semi-standalone, range-topping brand. Edsel was announced in 1957 to fill the gap between Mercury and Lincoln. Its 1958 line-up included the Ranger, the Pacer (pictured), the Corsair and the Citation.

The four models shared the same basic design characterized by a tall, vertical grille whose inspiration came from cars made in the 1920s and the 1930s. Roy Brown (1916-2013), the stylist in charge of forging Edsel’s design language, later explained his aim was to create a car that looked like nothing else on the road and that was recognizable from a block away. He succeeded, for better or worse; many cite Edsel’s controversial front-end treatment as one of the reasons for its failures.

Edsel’s quick demise

Ford executives believed Edsel could sell approximately 200,000 cars annually but the division built only 63,110 units during the 1958 model year. Internally, officials admitted the company suffered from an identity problem. Buyers didn’t know what an Edsel was or where it stood in the Ford family.

Edsel sold 44,891 cars during the 1959 model year, a figure which represented merely 0.8% of the new car market in America. Ford decided to cut its losses rather than invest additional resources into the brand to reach its 200,000-unit goal. Publicly citing poor sales and steel shortages, the company pulled the curtain on its Edsel brand in November 1959, about a month after the 1960 models went on sale. Edsel made 110,847 cars during its short-lived existence. PICTURE: 1958 Edsel Corsair

Avanti: Studebaker’s legacy (1962)

Studebaker ended production of the Avanti (pictured) when it closed its South Bend factory. It never seriously considered manufacturing the car in Canada; it was a low-volume model whose production process was expensive and time-consuming. Besides, as a halo car, there was little it could do to save the company.

South Bend Studebaker-Packard dealers Nathanial Altman and Leo Newman believed such a good design shouldn’t go to waste. After unsuccessfully trying to convince investors to take over production, they pooled their resources and purchased part of the South Bend factory, the tooling needed to make the Avanti and the rights to the name. They replaced the Studebaker-sourced V8 with a 300hp V8 ironically borrowed from the Chevrolet Corvette, one of the cars the Avanti was designed to compete against.

The Avanti II

Altman and Newman built 45 Avanti II-branded cars in 1965, the post-Studebaker coupe’s first year on the market. Sales increased to 59 units the following year and somewhat unexpectedly reached the 100 mark in 1968 even though pricing started at $6645 that year (nearly $50,000 in 2021).

The Avanti II received several minor mechanical and visual tweaks during the 1970s. In 1982, several years after Altman’s death, real estate developer Stephen Blake purchased the company and began the delicate process of modernizing its line-up. He added a convertible body style, carried out design updates (pictured) and made several modifications to the suspension and the chassis. Sales remained too low to offset the investment and Avanti filed for bankruptcy in 1986, 20 years after Studebaker folded and 24 years after the original Avanti made its debut. The story didn’t end there, though.

The traveling Avanti

Michael Eugene Kelly bought Avanti in 1986 and asked Tom Kellogg, one of the designers who worked with Raymond Loewy on the original model, to modernize the design with an eye on the 1990s. Kelly’s custodianship didn’t last long; John Cafaro took over in 1987 and swiftly moved production from Indiana to Ohio. He expanded the line-up with the addition of a four-door model (pictured) to lure more buyers but the Avanti remained an obscure, expensive toy many considered as little more than a kit car – partly because its built quality was about as good as a kit car’s.

Kelly bought Avanti back from Cafaro in 1999 and moved the company twice, first to Georgia and later to Cancun, Mexico. By this point, the Avanti shared little more than a vague silhouette with its 1962 predecessor. Examples made in the early 2000s were built using Ford Mustang-sourced components.

Avanti – the final remains of Studebaker – collapsed for the final time when the FBI arrested Kelly on fraud charges in 2006. This time, no one stepped in to re-launch production. Courts liquidated Kelly’s assets to reimburse the elderly victims of his Ponzi scheme and he died in 2013. Most sources agree the various manufacturers made about 8100 examples of the Avanti post-Studebaker.