Oldsmobile is a marquee known for building nice cars. However, the tribal council at GM has spoken, and America’s oldest surviving marquee has been voted off the island.
Ransom Eli Olds was born on June 3, 1864, and raised in Geneva, Ohio. His father, Pliny Fisk Olds was a blacksmith who moved his family to Lansing, Michigan in 1880.
At 22, Ransom began experimenting with steam engines, and developed a 3-wheeled steamer capable of an 18-mile range. In 1893, one of his 4-wheeled steam vehicles became the first American car to be exported, but it was never delivered. Instead, it sank aboard a ship en route to a customer in India.
Olds built his first gas-powered car in 1896. A year later, he and a group of investors formed the Olds Motor Vehicle Company, and managed to produce four cars. The cars were expensive to build and at $1000 each, they proved difficult to sell. However. Olds soon gained the financial support of Samuel L. Smith, a wealthy lumberman. In 1899, the operation moved to Detroit and was renamed.
The Olds Motor Works was to build a different, more economical automobile. But before they even got started, a fire destroyed the plant and all but one car. This vehicle, the famous “curved dash” Olds became the first car ever built in significant quantities using the progressive assembly technique.
The Curved Dash Oldsmobile was built at a new facility hack in Lansing. It had a single cylinder engine, tiller steering, chain drive, and sold for $650. After 600 sold in 1901, the numbers improved dramatically every year thereafter.
Meanwhile, Ransom set a new land speed record in 1903, pushing the Olds “Pirate” to 54.38 mph on Daytona Beach.
By 1905, annual sales totaled 6,500 units, but Olds had left the company. Smith had ignored the car’s popularity, and planned to replace it with a large touring car that he simply preferred. Justifiably upset, Olds left and founded the REO Motor Car Company in Lansing, just a few blocks away.
In 1908, Oldsmobile joined Buick to form General Motors, and REO began to lose ground to its competitors. By 191 Ransom became interested in banking and other endeavors, and began to withdraw from his corporate responsibilities. In 1915, he formed the Ideal Power Lawn Mower Company, and started manufacturing yard equipment of his own design. The next year, he began developing an area near Daytona Beach called Oldsmar. It was intended to be a retirement community for ministers of all religious denominations.
After twenty years as president. Olds retired from REO in 1924. Car sales did not recover from the market crash in 1929. In 1936, a 70-year-old Ransom returned to try and save the car, but production shifted exclusively to trucks, which survived as part of the White Company, and Diamond REO until 1975. In 1997, the industry celebrated 100 years of Oldsmobile.