The King was an American

automobile A car or automobile is a motor vehicle with wheels. Most definitions of ''cars'' say that they run primarily on roads, seat one to eight people, have four wheels, and mainly transport people instead of goods. The year 1886 is regarded ...

built by the King Motor Car Company in

Detroit, Michigan Detroit ( , ; , ) is the largest city in the U.S. state of Michigan. It is also the largest U.S. city on the United States–Canada border, and the seat of government of Wayne County. The City of Detroit had a population of 639,111 at ...

from 1911 to 1923, and in

Buffalo, New York Buffalo is the second-largest city in the U.S. state of New York (behind only New York City) and the seat of Erie County. It is at the eastern end of Lake Erie, at the head of the Niagara River, and is across the Canadian border from Sou ...

in 1923.

History

Charles Brady King Charles Brady King (February 2, 1868 – June 22, 1957) was an American engineer and entrepreneur remembered as an automotive pioneer, artist, etcher, musician, poet, architect, mystic, industrialist and inventor.Powell, pp. 6-9May, George S., '' ...

built his first car in Detroit in 1896. The original plan was to enter it in the November 1895 ''

Chicago Times Herald The ''Chicago Times'' was a newspaper in Chicago from 1854 to 1895, when it merged with the ''Chicago Herald'', to become the ''Chicago Times-Herald''. The ''Times-Herald'' effectively disappeared in 1901 when it merged with the ''Chicago Record' ...

'' auto race, but it was not completed in time. King finished it on March 6, 1896, and it became the first gasoline automobile to be successfully driven on the streets of Detroit.Kimes, Beverly Rae. ''Standard Catalog of American Cars: 1805-1942'' (Iola, WI: Krause, 1996), p.807.

Henry Ford Henry Ford (July 30, 1863 – April 7, 1947) was an American industrialist, business magnate, founder of the Ford Motor Company, and chief developer of the assembly line technique of mass production. By creating the first automobile that ...

reportedly followed behind on a bicycle on the maiden voyage of the King. The situation in 1896 Detroit was not nearly as pro-automobile as it would be a decade later. Discouraged, King dismantled his car and sold the chassis to

Byron Carter Byron J. Carter, (August 17, 1863 – April 6, 1908) was an American automotive pioneer. He was a founding partner of the Jackson Automobile Company, and founder of the Cartercar Company. Early life and experience Byron J. Carter was born on Au ...

of future Cartercar fame. G.N. Georgano, Nick. ''The Beaulieu Encyclopedia of the Automobile'' (Chicago: Fitzroy Dearborn, 2000), p.824. King worked for various other car companies before creating another car in 1910 and establishing the King Motor Car Company in February of the following year. The new King car incorporated a number of advanced features, such as a Gray Motors engine cast en bloc, cantilever springs,

left-hand drive Left-hand traffic (LHT) and right-hand traffic (RHT) are the practices, in bidirectional traffic, of keeping to the left side or to the right side of the road, respectively. They are fundamental to traffic flow, and are sometimes referred to ...

, and a centrally-located gearshift.Kimes, p.807. Possibly its most advanced feature was its lubrication system in which the

flywheel A flywheel is a mechanical device which uses the conservation of angular momentum to store rotational energy; a form of kinetic energy proportional to the product of its moment of inertia and the square of its rotational speed. In particular, as ...

served as a form of oil pump. The first factory was rented and located at 1559 West Jefferson, but soon outgrew the space and moved into the former

Hupmobile Hupmobile was an automobile built from 1909 through 1939 by the Hupp Motor Car Company of Detroit. The prototype was developed in 1908. History Founding In 1909, Bobby Hupp co-founded Hupp Motor Car Company, with Charles Hastings, for ...

plant at Jefferson and Concord in early 1912. Just a few months later, the firm was in

receivership In law, receivership is a situation in which an institution or enterprise is held by a receiver—a person "placed in the custodial responsibility for the property of others, including tangible and intangible assets and rights"—especially in c ...

, possibly from over-expansion. The company was bought by chewing gum magnate

Artemus Ward Charles Farrar Browne (April 26, 1834 – March 6, 1867) was an American humor writer, better known under his ''nom de plume'', Artemus Ward, which as a character, an illiterate rube with "Yankee common sense", Browne also played in public perfor ...

from New York City in 1912 for $40,000. He put automobile executive J. G. Bayerline in the president position. Two years later there was a disagreement between the two men and Ward replaced Bayerline in the presidency of the company. In December 1914, a

V8 engine A V8 engine is an eight-cylinder piston engine in which two banks of four cylinders share a common crankshaft and are arranged in a V configuration. The first V8 engine was produced by the French Antoinette company in 1904, developed and u ...

was introduced in the King, a scant two months after Cadillac announced its own V8-powered car. Starting in 1916, all Kings were 8-cylinder models. Production declined from a peak of 3,000 in 1916 to a company low of 240 in 1923. During the healthier years, the company exported cars to Europe, Australia, South America, South Africa, and Russia.Kimes, p.807. Early

4-cylinder The engine configuration describes the fundamental operating principles by which internal combustion engines are categorized. Piston engines are often categorized by their cylinder layout, valves and camshafts. Wankel engines are often categorize ...

cars were medium-priced at $1,350 in basic form, and for $1,565 when fully equipped with windshield, hood, and gas lamps. By 1914, even the V8-powered car was only $1,350, and was advertised as the "World's First Popular-Priced V8". G.N. Georgano, p.824. By 1923, prices were $1,795–$2,550.

Decline

In the fall of 1920, with the Depression of 1920–1921, Artemus Ward and other company directors petitioned to have the company dissolved, citing not enough working capital and a failure to secure loans from banks. The auto press said it was due to inefficient management. Early the next year, Charles A. Finnegan of Buffalo bought the company for $500,000 and assumed company debts of approximately double that. The debt was paid off by late 1922 and the receivership was terminated. In October 1923, the firm moved to a much smaller Buffalo factory, but was bankrupt and finished by early 1924. While in bankruptcy hearings, remaining bodies and parts were shipped to

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe ...

. There, 100 additional Kings were assembled in 1925.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:King (Automobile) Defunct motor vehicle manufacturers of the United States Motor vehicle manufacturers based in Michigan Brass Era vehicles Vintage vehicles Defunct manufacturing companies based in Michigan 1910s cars 1920s cars Cars introduced in 1911 Vehicle manufacturing companies disestablished in 1923 Vehicle manufacturing companies established in 1911 Motor vehicle manufacturers based in New York (state)