(first posted 1/30/2017) The Buick name is one of the older marques in the automotive kingdom. A brand that has brought about a tremendous number of varied automobiles during its lifetime, an examination of its early days is something that hasn’t happened until now. With our featured car being from 1926, and being the oldest Buick CC has discussed so far, it’s time to learn about the early days of this fabled brand.
David Dunbar Buick was born in Arbroath, in the Angus section of Scotland, in 1854. Buick immigrated to the United States with his family when he was two years old, settling in Detroit.
Due to the death of his father three years later, Buick entered the workforce earlier than most of his contemporaries. At age 15, Buick began working for the Alexander Manufacturing Company, a business entity that produced plumbing fixtures; Buick quickly progressed through the ranks. Upon the demise of the company in 1882, Buick and a business partner acquired the company, renaming it Buick & Sherwood Manufacturing Company.
Buick & Sherwood was rather successful, with Buick obtaining thirteen patents during this time, one of which was for a process for annealing porcelain to steel, creating modern style bathtubs.
Buick sold his interests in the business in 1899 to fund his growing interest in automobiles. It was at this time Buick founded the Buick Auto-Vim and Power Company. Buick’s goal was to improve upon the L-head engines that were in common use during this time. While at Auto-Vim, Buick and business partner Walter Marr developed an overhead valve engine as well as the first Buick prototype automobile.
While Buick and his cohorts were able to definitively prove an overhead valve engine quite often made more power per cubic inch of displacement than a flathead engine, funding had evaporated by 1902. Ben and Frank Briscoe twice helped bail out Buick’s endeavor, the second time being in 1903 when the operation was renamed to Buick Motor Car Company.
Still unable to pay his debts to the Briscoe’s, Buick saw the Buick Motor Car Company sold to Frank Whiting of Flint Wagon Works. This was when Buick operations moved from Detroit to Flint, Michigan.
During this period Buick was selling a variety of marine, automobile, and stationary engines.
Of particular interest is this horizontally opposed two-cylinder engine. The catalog in which these were found show Buick was making a variety of engine configurations, both portable and stationary, in an array of outputs.
These testimonials about the delightfulness of Buick engines are dated from 1901 and 1902.
In 1904, a second Buick prototype – again powered by an overhead valve engine – made a successful trip from Flint to Detroit, a distance of around 70 miles. Upon this success, Whiting was convinced to begin production of a Buick automobile.
Buick had a Model B commercially available for 1904; while their earlier cars were chain-driven, this one from the 1904 Buick brochure appears to have a rear differential. This car has the opposed two-cylinder, overhead valve engine rated at 15 horsepower.
William Durant became general manager of Buick in November, 1904. This placement of Durant effectively eliminated any relevant role for David D. Buick, who subsequently left his namesake company. Mr. Buick would later be involved in a variety of other unsuccessful business ventures, including the Lorraine and Dunbar motor cars.
David D. Buick died in 1929, penniless but not bitter, a mere three years after our feature car was produced. In a 1928 interview, Buick had stated “…money is useless, except to give one mental security.”
Things changed rapidly for the Buick brand upon Durant becoming general manager.
Research about the featured Buick has provided an illuminating if small insight into the workings of Durant and how he was successful in generating publicity for his products. Durant’s bold and novel approach is very well evidenced by this letter found in the 1905 Buick brochure, along with the outcome of his protestations to the automotive media.
A good marketer knows how to make the current of events flow in their direction. The result of Durant’s letter was engine testing in the Buick laboratory, under the witness of the automotive media. This testing yielded results exceeding the advertised power output Buick was stating in their advertising.
This shrewd maneuvering undoubtedly helped propel Buick into being the second largest volume automobile brand in the United States (behind only Ford) from 1907 to 1910, with volumes growing from 4,641 to 30,525 during those years. It is also good to keep in mind this was during a time when the market in the United States was inundated with automotive brands; in 1903 alone, 88 companies entered the automobile business.
When Durant founded General Motors, he used Buick as the foundation for the company. Oldsmobile, Oakland, and Cadillac entered the fold soon thereafter.
Note how both this 1908 Buick, and the 1904 shown earlier, are right-hand drive.
Under Durant, Buick unveiled the Model D (a 1905 Model C is shown) at the 1905 New York Auto Show, generating over 1,100 orders from that appearance alone. This was a great foundation from which more success would follow.
Many advertisements of the time touted hill climbing abilities and the capability of a Buick to climb hills like a goat was seemingly toward the front of the pack. In the early days, hill climbing was used as a barometer of performance – not unlike acceleration to 60 miles per hour being used in more contemporary times.
Two years later, Buick introduced its first four-cylinder engine and in 1910, Buick set a speed record of 115 miles per hour with its “bug-eye” racer. Louis Chevrolet, the famous driver with a car brand named after him, is piloting the car on the left.
Not resting on any laurels, Buick introduced a six-cylinder engine in 1914. This engine was a complement to the two differing displacements of four-cylinder engine available, the motivating force of Buicks since 1907.
This new six was rated at 55 horsepower for 1915, quite a respectable rating for the time, as seen in this unusually arranged advertisement.
An item of note is finding information for automobiles of this period can sometimes be a treasure hunt. One source stated Buick introduced the six in 1915, but two more reliable sources (one of which is the GM Heritage Center) state the introduction was in 1914. This six helped keep Buick in fourth place in the annual sales race for 1914 behind Ford, Willys-Overland, and Studebaker.
A second item of note is how brochures during the early 20th Century had abundant verbiage, often providing very detailed specifications about the car in question. When was the last time a brochure mentioned demountable rims or the materials used in the fabrication of the axles? Compare this random page from a 1914 Buick brochure to the brochures from a century later that are stuffed with glossy pictures and often skimpy on words.
Remember the earlier comment the year of six-cylinder introduction disagreeing by a year? Similar is the case with when Buick initially offered four-wheel brakes. The GM Heritage Center says Buick was the first volume manufacturer to begin offering four-wheel brakes by doing so in 1923. This falls in line with other information saying of the vehicles featured at the 1923 New York Auto Show, only Duesenberg and Rickenbacker had four-wheel brakes while several other manufacturers began offering them during the course of the 1923 calendar year.
It is claimed that by the 1924 New York Auto Show, 26 of the 72 manufacturers present had the availability of four-wheel brakes either as standard equipment or as an option. For those who find it odd that extra brakes were available only as an extra-cost option, this set a precedent of sorts as anti-lock brakes were briefly an extra-cost option after their inception.
Despite any contradictory information, one thing is certain – Buick produced its one-millionth car in 1923.
All this leads us to our featured Buick. This grille arrived for 1924 but the grille was mostly identical for 1925 and 1926.
The goodness that is Tad Burness and his American Car Spotters Guide narrowed it down to those three years. Scouring oldcarbrochures.com identified this as a 1926 model but in either Standard Six or Master Six guise. The model year of this forlorn old Buick was deduced as there was no availability of a two-door sedan with this profile for either 1924 or 1925. Thank goodness it has this body; a few other body styles were available for all three years and determining the precise model year for them would have been a crap shoot.
Since finding this Buick, there had been a high degree of optimism it would be a 1924 model simply because 1924 was the end of an era of sorts at Buick. It was the last year Buick offered a four-cylinder engine for many, many years.
A four-cylinder engine powering a Buick re-emerged in 1980 to be exact.
The most fundamental differences between the Master and Special Six, apart from trim that has undoubtedly suffered on our featured car, was under the hood. The Standard had 60 horsepower with 140 ft-lbs of torque; the Master Six increased the horsepower number by fifteen and the torque rating by thirty-eight.
Buick was doing great during this time. Production for 1926 was nearly 267,000, making Buick the largest automobile producer in the United States after accounting for Ford and Chevrolet.
Whether or not this particular Buick is a Master or Special is simply irrelevant anymore. It’s a static display that appears to have been sitting in this spot for years.
Normally, static displays contain a certain aura of unfortunate due to their potential often being either squandered or unrealized. However, this isn’t the typical static display. It’s a Buick in Chicago, produced the same year infamous Chicago gangster Al Capone was gathering momentum in his career. One can’t help but look at this mafia black Buick and think of all the things it may have witnessed, especially if this Buick is a native of the area – after migrating from Flint, of course.
The possibilities are endless on who this Buick transported and what events it has witnessed. Yet it’s now sitting dormant, its history likely lost in the mists of time, with its future a murky thing, and now serving simply as a street-side, life size diorama exposed to the harsh environment the Windy City serves with wild abandon. It was just below zero degrees Fahrenheit the day these pictures were taken and the breeze was quite stiff.
Stay warm and keep your chin up, old Buick. You won’t be forgotten.
Found January 2015, in Chicago, Illinois, at the corner of Lake Street and North Ogden, under the Green Line and directly across from the Lyon & Healy Harp factory.
I hate seeing an old car just left to sit like this. But these boxy things from the mid 20s have mostly lost their audience.
I had forgotten how deep the “valve-in-head” went in Buick history.
You skipped over a couple of names that are important in Buick staying on top through the tumultuous teens: Charles Nash and Walter Chrysler ran things after Durant lost control of GM the first time. Both left after Durant regained control for the second time. Without those two, I doubt that Buick would have been as strong in the 20s.
There is a lot to enjoy on cars of this vintage. Sure, they were obsolete by WWII or so and it’s simply not capable of running on current highways but the fun factor exists for weekend runs.
From what I could tell, Mr. Buick was not impressed with flathead / L-head engines and that is what propelled him to found the initial Buick company. Nash and Chrysler did indeed play crucial roles into the growth of Buick.
Agree that there is a lot to enjoy here. Studebaker sold well in those years (always in the top 8 from 1920-25) and I occasionally see them for sale on a fanpage I follow. There is a really big difference in style pre and post about 1926. After 26, styling became much more attractive. Those from before are like big boxes. From everything I have read, the 1924 Chrysler 70 was a groundbreaking car that shook up auto design across the board for both styling and performance.
Having had a Model A Ford (1929) I understand the charms of cars of this vintage and would be open to another under the right circumstances. It is certainly a buyers’ market.
JP, have you seen Strong’s Garage YouTube video where they compare a Model 18 to a Model A chassis? Go take a look.
“and it’s simply not capable of running on current highways but the fun factor exists for weekend runs. ”
I don’t know about that, there was a guy from Hagerty Insurance that took to driving a 1930 Model A around as his daily driver for a year. I followed his blog and other then adding Overdrive, beefing up the lights and adding some safety things, the car was strictly stock.
http://www.autoblog.com/2011/03/18/365-days-of-a-one-mans-quest-to-drive-a-ford-model-a-for-entir/
He drove it on all sorts of roads.
There is also a forest green Model A that seems to be tooling around the Columbia, Laurel and Bowie MD area.
So it is not a stretch to say that this 1926 could fixed up and made into a decent long term driver. Perhaps those wheels(if they were wood spoke wheels) could be switched out for set of reproduction steel ones but I feel it would do good at modern speeds(My old Chevette did well enough on the highway)
Both Charles Nash and Walter P. Chrysler lived in the Carriagetown neighborhood of Flint, where their former houses are still standing. Thanks for name-checking those dudes, JP!
Nice article. Google street view photos from 2016 show that the car and gas pump are gone, so hopefully they have a more protected environment now!
Unfortunately, we’ve long gone past the point where to see a car like this you’re either going to look at a static display in a museum, or go to the AACA Fall Meet in Hershey, PA to see one actually being driven.
Loved the article. Big point that you brought up that hasn’t really been pushed in anything else I’ve read about the early years of Buick is the dependency on opposed cylinder engines. While it’s always been a big deal that all Buicks were OHV (Chevrolet and Nash being the only other two brands that could say that), nothing is ever mentioned about engine configuration, leaving the reader to assume that Buick always did in-line OHV engines. Obviously, nothing could be further from the truth.
Cars of this vintage have always been a bit on the rare side at local car shows. Back in the late ’60’s/early ’70’s, the roster at Flood City Region AACA (Johnstown, PA) shows were decidedly slim on anything pre-1932, once you discounted the expected Model T’s and A’s. I can remember a 1925 Nash, and a couple of 1928-1930 Packards. Otherwise the entire show field was 1932 on, with a pretty obvious cutoff at 1942 (one or two 46-48’s were around).
The owner of the company I work for has a large collection of pre war cars going back to a 1908 orient. He does occasionally drive them but the only shows they go to are Hershey and one local charity event. Very interesting to look at the mechanicals of the cars which I believe is what attracts the owner as he’s too young to have a fondness for when they were new.
Prior to the ground-breaking 1901 Mercedes, which set the pattern of in-line front engine, RWD for almost all cars to come for ages, most car engines were horizontal, and the opposing twin configuration was of course the best way to do that, since it was inherently more balanced than the parallel twin like Ford used initially, and others too. I’ve seen quite a few opposed twins in the pre-1905 era.
I know that this is an old post. Opposing piston engines have a lot of advantages, better balance, and maybe better cooling. Believe it or not, even Harley Davidson built an opposed twin motorcycle in the 20’s. It was a 21 inch, approx. 300 cid, front to rear oriented motor, with an enclosed drive chain. It was called the Sport Model and it was very popular. Harley also built a V Twin of double the displacement which was the fabled 45 inch flathead. You don’t hear much about the Sport model these days.
You still see a fair amount of Model Ts and As, and the Buick and other higher end cars were a lot superior to these models. They are much more roadworthy than an old Ford.
Jose ;
You forgot to mention the Harley-Davdison XA opposed flat twin that was a copy of the BMW boxer twin, they didn’t make a whole lot of them but they _did_ make thousands of gen sets powered by the same engine .
-nate
Nate,
He specifically said “in the ’20s”, meaning the HD Model Wf twin, whose cylinders were oriented longitudinally.
It is interesting to see what happens on the far side of the supply and demand curve. Prices for decent Model A’s and T’s seem to have stabilized around $10-$20K.
I’m wondering if we are going to see the same thing happening to 40’s and 50’s cars as baby boomers age and liquidate their collections.
What I’m waiting to see (hopefully I live long enough) is to watch the insane market on muscle cars nosedive to reality.
As a broke 20-something who is way more into 60s-70s Muscle cars than current offerings, I cannot wait for the day.
Very interesting — I knew practically nothing about Buick’s founder or his background/history.
After reading this, I decided to look up David D. Buick in historical Census records, just out of curiosity. He last appeared in the 1920 Census, when he was 65 and long since gone for the company that bore his name. At that time, he was living with his son’s family near Detroit, but under “Occupation,” he listed “Inventor.” I find it interesting that after a lifetime of starts and stops and what must have been bitter disappointments, he still considered himself to be an inventor above all else.
His quote about money being useless, “except to give one mental security,” is an outstanding piece of advice.
I would recommend these:
https://www.amazon.com/Billy-Durant-Creator-General-Motors/dp/0472033026
https://www.amazon.com/Walter-Marr-Buicks-Amazing-Engineer/dp/0976668343/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1485841588&sr=1-1&keywords=walter+marr
A great article on a a great old car. The mention of hill climbing ability in the old ads needs to be put in perspective to understand it’s importance. One hundred years ago the roads were 99 percent dirt and they followed the contour of the landscape. Today many of the low areas between hills have been filled in and bridges were built to span others. The tops of hills have been bulldozed to the bottom to ease steep grades too. What passed for roads back then would be considered 4×4 trails today.
Great article Jason! Thanks! I have always had a soft spot for any pre X-car Buick
The restaurant in the background closed last year as well- I wonder if they owned this wonderful Buick.
I think so. Shame to see that it’s gone. My mechanic is on Lake Street just down the block and I’ve passed that car and looked at it many times over the years. Always was glad to see it still hanging on out there.
Having owned two Buicks, albeit both of much more recent vintage than the featured car, this was extremely interesting. I was vaguely aware of the general history of the marque but this filled it out nicely for me. Thanks for doing the research and also for finding the excellent accompanying imagery.
I got curious and looked up production figures. From 1924-1926, Buick was on fire. In 1924, Buick was in 6th place, having built some 160K cars. In 1925 they built 201K (still 5th place) and for 26 it was nearly 267K, for 3rd place. Buick would not break that 1926 production record until 1940.
Also interesting is that the 3rd place spot was really fluid after Chevrolet solidified its place in 2nd. From 1923-31, the No. 3 spot was shuffled between Buick (4 yrs), Dodge (1 yr), Hudson/Essex (3 yrs) and Willys-Overland/Whippet (1 yr). Plymouth would not hit No. 3 until 1932.
The only thing I can possibly add to this is just how important Buick was to the existence of GM. It was the key core of conglomerate Durant assembled, all of it on the strength of Buick’s very solid sales and consistent profits.
Durant’s many acquisitions had a spotty track record; he collected dozens of companies, some succeeded, but many didn’t. But Buick was the anchor.
And Buick’s historical outsized role in GM continued to be a big factor for many decades. Buick challenged Cadillac at times in the top end of the market, and also spread down to challenge Chevrolet, with its Special. No brand at GM had so much breadth, and undoubtedly political influence.
Buick’s long-time GM in the 30s and 40s, Harlow Curtice, became close with Harley Earl, which explains why Buick was the brand for so many of Earl’s show cars in the 40s and 50s, by which time Curtice was running GM.
I could go on, but Buick really was the core of GM for a very long time. And as such, it is rather appropriate that it has out-survived those pesky little upstarts, Pontiac and Olds (admittedly, Olds was a two year older company, but only joined GM in 1908, and was by then not nearly as strong as it had been during its very early curved-dash years).
Good thing there was no immigration Ban on Scotland back in 1800s,otherwise we won’t be able to drive buicks today.
Let’s keep current politics out of this, please.
Great article, superb iconography and info — thank you for finding all this stuff out for us!
The ’26 Buick though, not my cuppa. These are sort of “pre-styling”, when little attention was paid to detailing, shape and colour. Those headlamps, for instance, do the car no favour at all. Things got interesting from about 1930 on most high-volume cars, IMHO. Technically, the OHV tradition is very interesting, tough!
Harley Earl was hired to style the 1927 LaSalle. Things would never be the same thereafter.
BTW, Tatra, have you seen this? https://www.curbsideclassic.com/curbside-classics-american/museum-classicautomotive-history-1903-premier-the-first-ohc-hemi-head-automobile-engine-and-the-search-for-the-hemis-true-father/
I did later get confirmation that Augustus Herring truly is the father of the hemi (in 1896), and am awaiting some images and other info to write the follow-up.
Walter Marr built the first OHC engine however production was stifled by a fire. I saw the car 2 summers ago at a local Concours and yes it was a true OHC.
http://www.marrautocar.com/Marr_Auto_Car_Company/Welcome.html
Wow! I hadn’t seen this, truly fascinating stuff and a terrific article. That Premier is an amazing machine. Looking forward to the follow-up!
I think our featured car was a victim of the rattle can. The headlights, radiator shell, and bumpers should all be shiny silver, probably nickel plated. This car is dressed down with everything being black.
Sure, it should have more brightwork, but the lack of styling remains. If you google period mid-’20s ads from Nash or Packard, they look almost identical to this Buick, including those flower-pot headlamps. A few years later, after GM Art & Color was created as Paul pointed out, but also when Chrysler really got going, things began to change and styling became a selling point.
Those double moldings that run horizontally below the windowline were on *so* many cars of that period. I once tried to ID a car of that vintage and thought I had stuck gold when I noticed the double moldings. Wrong, just about every sedan or coach not made by Ford used that styling device, which often allowed two-toning or at least a breakup of the slab sides of those unadorned bodies.
Some of the roadsters and touring cars of the mid 20s could look a little rakish, but not the sedans.
Nice article and very lovely Buick from 1926. I wonder if leaving it to just sit like that would be detrimental to it, I mean, wouldn’t engine/transmission parts seize up and the tires develop flat spots? There is a process for preserving cars if you want to store them long-term.
Nice article on a very solid old car .
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A Friend of mine owns a 1928 (IIRC) Buick Sedan in really good shape, sadly he only drives it a few times each year .
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I too hope this lovely old nail gets indoor storage and the TLC it appears to need .
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-Nate
Jason, thank you for this wonderful and informative article. I love it for obvious reasons, tying in as it does with the history of my hometown and the industry that put Flint, Michigan on the map.
Fun-fact: there are some really cool statues of both David Dunbar Buick and Louis B. Chevrolet (and a few other historic persons) in downtown Flint near the central parking lot.
Great find and pictures, and as other have expressed, I hope this Buick is sheltered somewhere and getting the attention it should.
Another fun fact. After Willie Durant took over Chevrolet relations chilled quickly between Durant and the Chevrolet brothers. The brothers opened up a racing shop in Frontenac Quebec where they successfully raced Fords. Sources have it that In honour of their Ford race racing success Fomoco named the Canadian Falcon as the Frontenac in honour of the Chevrolet brothers racing heritage. Who knows…
Interesting tidbit – the 1904 Buick engines had the pushrods on the bottom (like the engine pictured) but as mud tended to get stuck in them (wow) the next year they were moved to the top. There are 2 of these engines known to exist – one at the Sloan Museum in Flint, Mi and another by a collector who has assembled a Model B. The Sloan engine was since the ’80s installed in a replica of the car that made the Flint-Detroit-Flint run but now is being assembled with another partial model B from the Sloan’s collection.
In his 1967 autobiography, Rickenbacker says his introduction of 4 wheel brakes is one of the things that put his car company out of business. He wrote that Studebaker in particular went out of they’re way to show 4 wheel brakes were dangerous and it began hurting his sales.
Any reason why the two spare tyres don’t have any rims?
@ Graham ;
they’re called “Clincher wheels” : the center spoked part remains mounted, you change only the tire, tube and ring assembly ~ look closely, you can see the nuts and clamps that hold this to the wheel spoked part .
-Nate
All the technical information in early car ads and brochures parallels the same phenomenon with the early personal computers. Like the early PCs, there were many early car manufacturers using common parts, but with little standardization. The technical information helped the would-be buyer and operator figure out which device best suited his needs. Even though early car manufacturers (and early PC manufacturers) wanted to sell as many copies as possible, they didn’t want to sell product to buyers whose applications were unsuitable to the product. As there was little standardization, the buyer needed to be more informed, and the selection of which car (or computer) for the task was largely placed on the shoulders of the buyer.
My sister and brother in law got one of those “x car , Skylarks”! Was an “81” model. I believe they got it in late “1980” if memory is working..lol
Was their first car with “a/c”. Had a “6” under the hood.
I’d have a hard time believing a company’s quality control is good if they let as obvious a typo as the “sensibe car” in the “Good on Hills” advert slip through.
Here’s the oldest photographed car from our family: Grandpop’s 1932 Buick, parked on Wyandotte St. in Bethlehem PA sometime around 1941. That spot is halfway down the hill to the center of South Bethlehem, and is narrow, curved and steep. It was known for its runaway trucks — solid wheeled Mack Bulldogs in the ’20s — and bumper to bumper traffic on weekends when the locals escaped south to Philly.
I tried. I never know when the program will upload a photo and when it won’t.
“I’d have a hard time believing a company’s quality control is good if they let as obvious a typo as the “sensibe car” in the “Good on Hills” advert slip through.”
I wonder in those days how that worked – company, ad agency, publication, printer – where in the chain could the typo have slipped in, and where would it have been caught?
You still see folks driving Model A’s around, and I would imagine this car could do basically what a Model A can, so driving around the city and backcountry roads, and rare ventures onto a freeway restricted to the (very) slow lane. Still would be fun!
I imagine, as EV’s take over the land, these 1920’s and 1930’s cars, as well as perhaps most petrol-powered cars, will be restricted to short trips and parades anyhow, as it will become difficult to obtain gasoline on the highway, probably in California it will be impossible sooner than later. In that case, the 1920’s through 1950’s cars might maintain a (low) value longer, since they will be more appropriate for that context anyhow, and probably also simpler to convert to an EV if a “touring” car is desired, simply because they were less engineered in the first place, and hence simpler to re-engineer.
Interesting article, I much enjoyed it.
Interesting history on David Buick. It shows how one can make history but not become rich and/or famous. When GM celebrated the 25th anniversary of Buick, David Buick supposedly was not invited. How sad.
Another note, my great grandfather owned a 1922 Buick. My late uncle (dad’s older brother) found the car still in my hometown in Wisconsin. Last I heard it was in pieces in the current owner’s garage. The owner would not sell it. This was almost 20 years ago. I have heard nothing about it since.