A Cugnot Fardier | Musee des Arts et Metiers At the request of French military officials, French inventor and fortifications expert Nicholas Cugnot designed and builtthe first self-propelled carriage. The first prototype was built in 1769. Designed to tow artillery to the battlefront, its speed was set at three miles per hour so that soldiers could keep pace with it. It could pull a load of five tons and could operate for one hour and fifteen minutes before stopping. Theonly known example, pictured above, is on display at the Musee des Arts et Metiers in Paris, France.
2. Hancock Omnibus
A Hancock Omnibus | Wikimedia The Hancock Omnibus was built by English inventor Walter Hancock and can be considered the first commercially successful steam-powered vehicle in the world. Where Cugnot’s fardier was a military triumph, Hancock’s Omnibus ran a successful passenger route between London and Paddington. The nine carriages that were built carried an estimated 4,000 passengers between 1832 and 1834.
3. Grenvile Steam Carriage
The Grenvile Steam Carriage | Hemmings In 1875,Robert Neville Grenvilleof Butleigh, Glastonbury, Somerset, United Kingdom began designing his steam carriage. It was an era when most cars were built by hand and were extremely expensive to operate. Grenvile’s carriage looks more like a locomotive than a car, but is only capable of carrying seven passengers. One of the passengers had to feed the steam engine to maintain speed — sometimes you have to pay a price to catch a ride! Incredibly, the vehicle ran as recently as 2009.
4. La Marquise
La Marquise | Hemmings Built in 1884 by De Dion-Bouton et Trepardoux for the Count De Dion, La Marquise is a De Dion et Trepardoux Dos-A-Dos Steam Runabout. It has a claim to fame as having won the first automobile race in 1887. De Dion built its competitor as well. It also has the distinction of being the oldest known running automobile. La Marquise was last sold in 2011, setting an auction record for an early automobile when the gavel fell at $4.6 million. The Sotheby’s listing makes quite an interesting read.
5. 1886 Benz Patent-Motorwagen
An 1886 Benz Patent Moterwagen | Foter The Benz Patent Motorwagen is generally acknowledged in car history as the first gasoline powered car. Actually built in 1885, it was not patented until 1886. It was powered by a 954 cubic centimeter single-cylinder engine that created two-thirds of a horsepower. Fuel was supplied to the engine through evaporation initially, but Benz added a rudimentary carburetor in later models. He went so far as to add leather brake shoes in 1887.
6. Hammelvognen
The Hammelvognen | Wikimedia Built in 1886, the Hammelvognen wasthe first car built in Denmark. It was powered by a two-cylinder engine capable of three horsepower. It was quite innovative for the time. The Hammelvognen is one of the oldest cars in the world to offer brakes and a reverse gear. It had an estimated top speed of six miles per hour. Can you imagine going that fast over unpaved cobblestone without a suspension system? The original sits in the Danmarke Tekniske Museum.
7. 1889 Daimler-Maybach Stahlradwagen
A Daimler-Maybach Stahlradwagen | Wikimedia Gottlieb Daimler and Wilhelm Maybach were both early pioneers of automobiles powered by the internal combustion engine. Daimler was more concerned with the powerplant, while Maybach viewed the automobile as a whole. This split vision can be seen in the opulence in every Maybach-badged Mercedes-Benz marketed today. The duo were lifelong friends and continued to work together until Daimler’s death. The Stahlradwagen was powered by a single-cylinder engine that sat under the driver.
8. De Dion-Bouton Quadricycle
A De Dion-Bouton quadricycle | Louwman Museum The success of the De Dion-Bouton tricycle mentioned earlier allowed the builders to move forward with internal combustion engines. De Dion-Bouton engines were so durable that many automobile builders of the day sourced their engines from the company. By 1891, De Dion-Bouton had moved to quadricycles. Some were advanced enough to incorporate an engine cover (also known as a hood or bonnet), rudimentary passenger cabins, running boards, and fenders. Unfortunately, none equipped like that have survived. The model pictured above was built in 1900 and had a top speed of 31 miles per hour. It is on display at the Louwman Museum in The Hague, Netherlands.
9. Duryea Car
A Duryea | Foter Brothers Charles Duryea and Frank Duryea are credited as being the first gasoline-powered commercial car manufacturers in the United States. They drove their first car through the streets of Springfield, Massachusetts in September 1893. It was powered by a single-cylinder four-stroke gasoline engine that was water-cooled. An 1893 Duryea is on display at the Smithsonian Institute.
10. 1894 Balzer
The Balzer car | Smithsonian Institute
Another American-built car was the Balzer. Built in 1894 by New York inventor Stephen Balzer, it was powered by a very lightweight three-cylinder rotary mounted engine. The engine was mounted around a stationary crankshaft that turned a short shaft that fed into the driving gears. The Smithsonian Institute has displayed the Balzer pictured above at various times.
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