Louis Semple Clarke, or Semple Clarke or simply LS, (1866-1957) was a pioneering businessman and engineer in the American

automotive industry The automotive industry comprises a wide range of company, companies and organizations involved in the design, Business development, development, manufacturing, marketing, and selling of motor vehicles. It is one of the world's largest industry ...

. One of the central founders of The Autocar Company, Clarke was also an inventor who made numerous contributions to the development of modern motor vehicles, including innovations in the use of the

drive shaft A drive shaft, driveshaft, driving shaft, tailshaft (Australian English), propeller shaft (prop shaft), or Cardan shaft (after Girolamo Cardano) is a component for transmitting mechanical power (physics), power and torque and rotation, usually ...

, circulating

motor oil Motor oil, engine oil, or engine lubricant is any one of various substances used for the lubrication of internal combustion engines. They typically consist of base oils enhanced with various additives, particularly antiwear additives, deterg ...

sparkplug A spark plug (sometimes, in British English, a sparking plug, and, colloquially, a plug) is a device for delivering electric current from an ignition system to the combustion chamber of a spark-ignition engine to ignite the compressed fuel/air ...

s, and the American convention of placing a vehicle's steering wheel on the left.

Family

Thomas Shields Clarke started out with a single river boat the “Beaver” in 1832, then by 1842 he and his brother in law William Thaw started Clarke and Co and by 1855 his son Charles joined the firm. Originally the firm was called Clarke and Thaw and over 15 years operated a fleet of steam boats which traveled all the way to New Orleans and was the designate shipping firm for all shipping west of Pittsburgh for the

Pennsylvania Railroad The Pennsylvania Railroad (reporting mark PRR), legal name The Pennsylvania Railroad Company also known as the "Pennsy", was an American Class I railroad that was established in 1846 and headquartered in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. It was named ...

. Louis was born into an influential family at an influential time in Pittsburgh Pennsylvania, a time of great economic expansion and innovation for the region and country. The names with which the Clarkes associated themselves were

Andrew Carnegie Andrew Carnegie (, ; November 25, 1835August 11, 1919) was a Scottish-American industrialist and philanthropist. Carnegie led the expansion of the American steel industry in the late 19th century and became one of the richest Americans i ...

Andrew Mellon Andrew William Mellon (; March 24, 1855 – August 26, 1937), sometimes A. W. Mellon, was an American banker, businessman, industrialist, philanthropist, art collector, and politician. From the wealthy Mellon family of Pittsburgh, Pennsylva ...

and

Henry Clay Frick Henry Clay Frick (December 19, 1849 – December 2, 1919) was an American industrialist, financier, and art patron. He founded the H. C. Frick & Company coke manufacturing company, was chairman of the Carnegie Steel Company, and played a maj ...

all of whom were also members of the

South Fork Fishing and Hunting Club The South Fork Fishing and Hunting Club was a Pennsylvania corporation which operated an exclusive and secretive retreat at a mountain lake near South Fork, Pennsylvania, for more than fifty extremely wealthy men and their families. The club was ...

. The club's dam broke in May 1889 causing the largest man-made disaster in US history at the time, the

Johnstown flood The Johnstown Flood (locally, the Great Flood of 1889) occurred on Friday, May 31, 1889, after the catastrophic failure of the South Fork Dam, located on the south fork of the Little Conemaugh River, upstream of the town of Johnstown, Pennsylv ...

. Louis was inspired at this time of innovation and took a keen interest in new inventions and technologies. Louis's inventive nature propelled him to build a handmade camera, with which he took many of the photos which are now part of the county's historical treasure trove. As an avid photographer he was the primary person who documented the SFFHC activities prior and after the dam's collapse in May 1889. The glass plates used to take the pictures surfaced 100 years later when his granddaughter in 1991 found them in the attic. At the time she called

Charles Guggenheim Charles Eli Guggenheim (March 31, 1924 – October 9, 2002) was an American documentary film director, producer, and screenwriter. He was the most honored documentary filmmaker in the academy history, winning four Oscars from twelve nominations ...

who had just finished a documentary on the Johnstown flood and would win an Academy Award for short documentary in 1991. Additionally, the film was narrated by

David McCullough David Gaub McCullough (; July 7, 1933 – August 7, 2022) was an American popular historian. He was a two-time winner of the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Award. In 2006, he was given the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the United States ...

who had also written a book '' The Johnstown Flood'' in 1968 with various pictures including a picture of Louis. Louis was probably the last man at the age of 22 to join the

, as his membership stock certificate is dated April 1889, although he attended the club under his father's membership since his father and various other members had founded the club in May 1879. He and other younger members were energetic about all things mechanical and given the times they placed a small steam engines on boats to cruise across

Lake Conemaugh The South Fork Dam was an earthenwork dam forming Lake Conemaugh (formerly Western Reservoir, also known as the Old Reservoir and Three Mile Dam, a misnomer), an artificial body of water near South Fork, Pennsylvania, United States. On May 31, ...

and often LS would dress up as a sailor and “man” his station.

The Autocar Company

LS was an educated engineer and in the 1890s started working with his brother Charles developing motorized vehicles resulting in the Pittsburgh Motor Vehicle Company supported by brothers, John S. and James K. Clarke along with their father Charles and friend William Morgan in 1897. Initial production included a motorized tricycle and a small car, which the brothers called “The Pittsburgher.” In 1899, the name of the company was changed to “The

Autocar Company The Autocar Company is an American specialist manufacturer of severe-duty, Class 7 and Class 8 vocational trucks, with its headquarters in Birmingham, Alabama. Started in 1897 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, as a manufacturer of Brass Era automo ...

,” and operations were relocated to Ardmore, Pennsylvania, a western suburb of Philadelphia. In 1901 they produced what is considered to be this country's first multi-cylinder, shaft driven car. Initial sales brochures touted that it “cannot blow up or burn up” as well as its ease of control, to the point he taught his wife to drive, making her the first known woman driver in the county. The new design was driven from Ardmore to the

Madison Square Garden Madison Square Garden, colloquially known as The Garden or by its initials MSG, is a multi-purpose indoor arena in New York City. It is located in Midtown Manhattan between Seventh and Eighth avenues from 31st to 33rd Street, above Pennsylva ...

, New York City, in six hours and fifteen minutes, where it was exhibited in the New York Automobile Show of December 1901. The first eight hundred cars were equipped with steering levers, but new innovations helped the Autocar to generate another revolution in innovative design, placing the steering wheel on the left hand side of the car thus establishing the reason we currently drive on the right hand side of the road. Under the Clarke brothers, the company was an early innovator, developing the first American porcelain-insulated

spark plug A spark plug (sometimes, in British English, a sparking plug, and, colloquially, a plug) is a device for delivering electric current from an ignition system to the combustion chamber of a spark-ignition engine to ignite the compressed fuel/air ...

s– a process patented and later sold to

Champion A champion (from the late Latin ''campio'') is the victor in a challenge, contest or competition. There can be a territorial pyramid of championships, e.g. local, regional / provincial, state, national, continental and world championships, an ...

, and which still remains the basis for today's spark plugs. Other early developments included the first American shaft-driven vehicle, double-reduction gear drives, and the recirculating lube–oil system. They Clarkes contributed their engineering abilities toward the war effort as Louis also designed a naval bomb fuse which was adopted as standard and also adapted for army use. His son Louis Phillips, or LP, during the war was responsible for detonating bombs in the US and France. “For approximately the first ten years of the Autocar company's existence Clarke was president and chief engineer of the company. In later years he served the company as vice-president and consulting engineer. He sold his interest in the Autocar Co. in 1929 and retired at that time.”''National Cyclopedia of American Biography''

Palm Beach

Charles John Clarke (1833-1899) was one of the pioneers of Palm Beach, where he established a winter residence in the early 1880s. Louis's father may have been a winter visitor to the Lake Worth area as early as 1885 when he appeared in a photo with hunting and fishing party near Jupiter lighthouse. He was from

Pittsburgh Pittsburgh ( ) is a city in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, United States, and the county seat of Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, Allegheny County. It is the most populous city in both Allegheny County and Wester ...

, where he operated a fleet of boats providing transportation between Philadelphia and Pittsburgh with his partner and brother-in-law, William Thaw. Charles liked the area so much from his first visit that he and Louisa spent the winter of 1890 - 1891 at Elijah N. Dimick's “Cocoanut Grove House” Palm Beach's only hotel at the time. The following winter, Clarke bought the hotel along with about of land from the Lake Trail to the ocean beach. He also bought more on the South Lake Trail, where the Society of the Four Arts stands today. This estate he named "Primavera" ('Springtime'). He then had constructed Palm Beach's first non-wooden residence, the first to have a genuine tile roof instead of wooden shingles, with white stucco outer walls instead of the usual shingles or clapboard. When the house was completed and landscaped at No. 8 South Lake Trail, he and Louisa moved in. Louis also bought property in Palm Beach in 1892. Located on his father's estate, he named it “Dulciora", located on Lake Trail South, which is one of the most attractive estates at Palm Beach. His kept his summer home in Haverford, Pennsylvania. Additionally, his brother's

Thomas Shields Clarke Thomas Shields Clarke (April 25, 1860November 15, 1920) was an American painter and sculptor. He is best known for his bronze sculpture ''The Cider Press'', in San Francisco. Education Named for his grandfather, he was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsyl ...

a famous artist of the time, John and James also purchased property and helped to establish the new community of West Palm Beach where they entertained their affluent friends from Pittsburgh and Philadelphia. By the 1920s West Palm had become the oasis of the East for the wealthy including the Kennedys. Louis had two children, Winifred and L. Phillips. Winifred, married a West Palm Beach pioneer, Roscoe Tait Anthony is credited with having started the first Sunday School in Palm Beach and L. Phillips Clarke was an architect and with his partner,

Henry Stephen Harvey Harvey and Clarke was an American architectural firm formed by Henry Stephen Harvey and L. Philips Clarke in West Palm Beach, Florida, in 1921. The firm was active in South Florida for only a few years, but in that time designed a number of distin ...

, they opened a West Palm Beach office in 1921 and designed many of the buildings in Palm Beach and West Palm Beach including the Comeau Building, the

Murray Building The Murray Hong Kong was a government office building on 22 Cotton Tree Drive, Central, Hong Kong. It has 27 stories and housed some of the key decision making bureaus of the Hong Kong government. The building was auctioned off for re-dev ...

, Guaranty Building, Gus’ Baths, Holy Trinity Episcopal Church, and the Palm Beach County Library all of which represent the style of an aspiring time and most are on the national register for Spanish Colonial/Mission Revival design. The

was purchased by

White Motor Company The White Motor Company was an American automobile, truck, bus and agricultural tractor manufacturer from 1900 until 1980. The company also produced bicycles, roller skates, automatic lathes, and sewing machines. Before World War II, the compa ...

in 1953 which continued to make Autocar Trucks and then was purchased by Volvo in 1981 which continued make Autocar Trucks although they were called

Volvo The Volvo Group ( sv, Volvokoncernen; legally Aktiebolaget Volvo, shortened to AB Volvo, stylized as VOLVO) is a Swedish multinational manufacturing corporation headquartered in Gothenburg. While its core activity is the production, distributio ...

Autocar but still used the familiar bow tie name plate until 2001 when it was sold to Grand Vehicle Works Holdings which manufacturers refuse vehicles in Hagerstown Indiana.

Late life

After retirement LS lived and died in West Palm Beach on January 6, 1957, survived by his two children and a multitude of grand and great grandchildren.

References

Sources

*https://web.archive.org/web/20070803161623/http://www.goldenagetruckmuseum.com/featured_truck.shtml *https://web.archive.org/web/20080509095109/http://www.jaha.org/FloodMuseum/club.pdf *https://web.archive.org/web/20081017061815/http://www.pennhighlands.edu/library/digital/clark.htm *http://www.nps.gov/archive/jofl/home.htm *https://web.archive.org/web/20090108233543/http://americanheritage.com/articles/magazine/ah/1992/7/1992_7_120.shtml *http://americanhistory.si.edu/onthemove/collection/object_1273.html *http://www.lwpa.org/pioneer_charles_john_clarke.html *https://web.archive.org/web/20080627020450/http://graylocke.tripod.com/tsclarke/id12.html