The Bedford Automile is an area of
Bedford, Ohio
Bedford is a city in Cuyahoga County, Ohio, United States located to the east of Cleveland. The population was 13,074 at the 2010 census. It is an eastern first ring suburb of Cleveland.
Geography
Bedford is located at . It is a first ring subu ...
, that has been set aside specifically for
car dealership
A car dealership, or car dealer, is a business that sells new or used cars, at the retail level, based on a dealership contract with an automaker or its sales subsidiary. Car dealerships also often sell spare parts and automotive maintena ...
s. The Bedford Automile was officially created in 1956 by the Bedford Automile Dealers Association to create a unified group to speak for the car dealerships in the area. It has since grown to include 26 new and used car dealerships and currently employs about 1,700 employees. It is widely regarded as one of the largest congregations of car dealerships in
Ohio
Ohio () is a state in the Midwestern region of the United States. Of the fifty U.S. states, it is the 34th-largest by area, and with a population of nearly 11.8 million, is the seventh-most populous and tenth-most densely populated. The sta ...
.
The Bedford Automile got its start when Lynn L. Horton and his brother, Ralph E. Horton, opened the first car dealership in Bedford in the early 1920s. The original dealership sold
Ford Motor Company
Ford Motor Company (commonly known as Ford) is an American multinational automobile manufacturer headquartered in Dearborn, Michigan, United States. It was founded by Henry Ford and incorporated on June 16, 1903. The company sells automobi ...
cars, but quickly expanded to offer other makes of cars, such as
Chevrolet
Chevrolet ( ), colloquially referred to as Chevy and formally the Chevrolet Motor Division of General Motors Company, is an American automobile division of the American manufacturer General Motors (GM). Louis Chevrolet (1878–1941) and ous ...
,
De Soto De Soto commonly refers to
* Hernando de Soto (c. 1495 – 1542), Spanish explorer
* DeSoto (automobile), an American automobile brand from 1928 to 1961
De Soto, DeSoto, Desoto, or de Soto may also refer to:
Places in the United States of Ameri ...
and
Plymouth
Plymouth () is a port city and unitary authority in South West England. It is located on the south coast of Devon, approximately south-west of Exeter and south-west of London. It is bordered by Cornwall to the west and south-west.
Plymouth ...
.
Eventually the Horton brothers went into business with another brother, William Horton, and friends Floyd Mosher and Thomas Lally. This resulted in the dealerships eventually being renamed to Mosher-Lally, and later as Lally Chevrolet. Lally Chevrolet still operates in Bedford on the Bedford Automile under the name of Tim Lally Chevrolet. (Tim Lally is a descendant of Thomas Lally.)
As the success of the car sales in Bedford increased, other car dealers opened new dealerships around the original car dealership, expanding along Broadway Avenue. This grouping of car dealerships eventually formed the Bedford Automile Dealers Association. This group not only works to represent its interests in the Bedford area, but also donates heavily to the surrounding community, schools and city to help maintain the integrity of the surrounding area.
In April 2013, the city of Bedford established monuments to the historic Automile.
References
Bedford, Ohio
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