HISTORY OF THE MOTOR CAR It is difficult to assign definite dates for events in the progress of the automobile. Many men were working on the same problems in different places. This brief outline can point out only the trends and major developments. The self-propelled vehicle dates back to the middle of the i8th century. Credit for the first "road wagon" propelled by its own engine, is generally given to Nicholas Cugnot, a Frenchman, who about 177o built a three-wheeled carriage, with a cumbersome steam power plant operating on the single front wheel. It is claimed that this steam carriage could run at the rate of 21 m. per hour, but it had to stop every hundred feet or so to make steam. Cugnot's second vehicle, pro duced in 1771, is still preserved in the Conservatoire des Arts et Metiers, Paris. (Some histories of the automobile state that his first car is still preserved and not his second car.) During the latter half of the i8th century a few other attempts were made to build steam carriages, many of which were not capable of operating under their own power. The next century, however, saw a number of steam vehicles put to practical use in trans porting passengers. Among these early experimenters were : Oliver Evans in America, making a car in 1787; Trevithick, England (I8or) ; Gordon, England (1824) ; James, England (1824) ; Gurney, England (1828) ; James, America (1829) ; Summers and Ogle, England (1831) ; Hancock, England (1824-36) ; Church, England (1832) ; Maceroni and Squires, England ; Dud geon, America (1857) ; and Butler, England (1883). Gurney put three steam coaches into operation on a route near London covering about 3,644 miles. Around the same time Walter Hancock built the first of nine steam carriages that were to operate on a route regularly.
Starting about 1831, the English parliament enacted laws which practically eliminated the steam coaches from the roads. Among these might be mentioned the Red Flag Law, which required that a man precede the horseless carriage, carrying a red flag by day and a red lantern by night. In addition, the toll roads and bridges raised the charges for the steam carriages until they could no longer operate at a profit. As a result, there was little development
of the horseless carriages in England until after 1896, when the restrictive law was repealed. In Germany and France interest turned toward the internal combustion engine to replace the cumbersome power plant of these early steam vehicles. In 1885 86 Gottlieb Daimler (Germany), patented his high speed internal combustion engine, which is generally credited with revolution izing automotive transportation. Nevertheless, there is some disagreement among historians on this point. Some state that in 1875 Siegfried Narkus (Austria) built a four-wheeled vehicle powered by an internal combustion engine. Benz (Germany), in 1885, produced a tricycle with an internal combustion engine.
Credit is commonly given to Krebs for the first petrol or gasoline automobile incorporating many of the essential features of the modern car. In 1894 he designed the Panhard car with a vertical engine under a bonnet or hood, at the front, and a modern type chassis. The car also had the common type of sliding gear trans mission operated by the right hand, clutch and brake pedals, and a foot accelerator.
About 1896 or 1897 considerable work was carried on in Ger many, France, England and the United States on the development of vehicles driven by internal combustion engines. These cars varied greatly in detailed design ; some had the same general arrangement as the Panhard, while others were patterned on the familiar horse-drawn carriages which they were expected to supplant. The motor car is not the product of a single inventor nor even of men within a single century. Among the European pioneers there were: Daimler, Benz, Maybach, Krebs, Panhard, Levassor, Royce, Serpollet, De Dion, Bouton, Gibbon and Roots; and among the American pioneers were Duryea, Olds, Haynes, Winton, Ford, King, Maxwell, Apperson, Riker, Clarke, Stanley, White and Franklin. These automobiles were produced, of course, in very small numbers because of the limited manufacturing facil ities and of the small consumer demand.