Holbrook Company of

Hudson, New York Hudson is a city and the county seat of Columbia County, New York, United States. As of the 2020 census, it had a population of 5,894. Located on the east side of the Hudson River and 120 miles from the Atlantic Ocean, it was named for the rive ...

manufactured custom automobile bodies and their leading customer was

Packard Motor Company Packard or Packard Motor Car Company was an American luxury automobile company located in Detroit, Michigan. The first Packard automobiles were produced in 1899, and the last Packards were built in South Bend, Indiana in 1958. One of the "Thr ...

Founded

Harry F Holbrook and John D Graham set up this business to make custom automobile bodies on the west side of

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

in 1908. Holbrook left the business in 1913 and Jack Graham became sole owner and began attracting more orders from Packard's New York branch. The growing order book demanded more shop space and though extra premises were found a mile away it became necessary to move bodies from one shop to the other to get them finished.Hugo Pfau, ''The Coachbuilt Packard'', Darlton Watson, London 1973 1928 Lincoln Holbrook Fully-Collapsible Cabriolet (5960260302)

1928 Lincoln Holbrook Fully-Collapsible Cabriolet (5960260302)

Hudson, New York

After

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

the right new location was found in 1921 about 100 miles north of New York in

and the factory was moved there. The Packard bodies were generally

town car The Lincoln Town Car is a model line of full-size luxury sedans that was marketed by the Lincoln division of the American automaker Ford Motor Company. Deriving its name from a limousine body style, Lincoln marketed the Town Car from 1981 to ...

s and

limousines A limousine ( or ), or limo () for short, is a large, chauffeur-driven luxury vehicle with a partition between the driver compartment and the passenger compartment. A very long wheelbase luxury sedan (with more than four doors) driven by a prof ...

but they built a line of 100 coupés for Packard. They also built some notable phaetons for display at Automobile Salons. The New York businessmen who had provided the financial support for Holbrook were unable to continue the loans after the Wall Street crash of 1929. Holbrook entered bankruptcy in May 1930. Some Holbrook assets were bought by

Rollston Rollston Company was an American coachbuilder producing luxury automobile bodies during the 1920s and 1930s readily acknowledged to be of the very highest quality. After bankruptcy in 1938 some of the same owners began a very similar business und ...

References

External links

{{commons category, Holbrook Company Coachbuilders of the United States Defunct motor vehicle manufacturers of the United States Luxury motor vehicle manufacturers American companies established in 1908 Manufacturing companies established in 1908 Defunct manufacturing companies based in New York City 1908 establishments in New York (state)