[All photos by the author, unless noted]
(first posted 12/18/2022) By the end of World War II, Americans were desperate for new cars. Production of civilian cars ceased early in 1942, so that factories could produce war materiel, and pre-war cars were getting worn out. Major manufacturers resumed production as quickly as possible, excited for the forthcoming post-war prosperity.
Not everyone believed the post-war period would be prosperous, however. It was commonly thought that all of the war debt would plunge America right back in to a new Depression. With that thinking in mind, business partners Dale Orcutt and Claud Dry began building (first in kit form, but soon followed by fully-assembled models) America’s first economy car, the King Midget.
[King Midget Model I. Photo credit: Hemmings Motor News.]
The first model introduced by Midget Motor Corporation was a single-seater, resembling a miniature version of the “quarter midget” race cars of the day. Approximately 500 were sold by mail-order. The cars were advertised in the back of magazines like Popular Science and Mechanix Illustrated. A glowing review by “Uncle” Tom McCahill in the January 1950 issue of Mechanix Illustrated was a great boost to sales. However, potential buyers wrote to the company hoping for a two-seater car, and thus came…
[The Model 2. Popular Science cover obtained via Google Books]
The Model 2 introduced such niceties (some optional, depending on year of manufacture) as reverse gear, electric starter, safety-glass windshield, top, heater, speedometer, and turn signals. Like the Model 1, the new car was powered by single-cylinder engines, usually a Wisconsin 7.5hp. It is estimated that 1500 of this model were built, during the period 1951-1956.
1957 saw the introduction of the new Model 3. This model would take the company to the end of production in 1970. The all-new design featured unibody construction (sort of; the body and the frame were simply welded together at the factory), as well as 4-wheel hydraulic brakes.
Improvements over the course of the model run included replacing the 7.5hp Wisconsin engine with a 12hp Kohler, for a 50% power increase! Other upgrades included 12 volt electrical system, electric windshield wiper, windshield washer, and even a radio.
The interior was stark, at best. The stripes and two-tone upholstery are custom touches. The door pulls are used to both close and un-latch the doors. This is basic transportation at its finest.
By 1965, sales were lagging, and there was no money for a fresh design. The company’s founders, Dale Orcutt and Claud Dry, were nearing retirement age, with no one to pass the company on to. They put the company up for sale, and it was purchased outright by a King Midget enthusiast. However, his financing wasn’t very solid, and sales were down, largely due to the aging design and increasing price. There is some conjecture that pending safety standards would have reduced sales to kit-only form, but in reality, the run was over for the King Midget.
Sadly, the subject car doesn’t even appear to be a “real” King Midget at all, but a Model 3 body dropped on a golf cart chassis. The above under-body shots show features that were never available from the Midget Motors factory, such as rack-and-pinion steering, disc brakes, and 10″ wheels and tires. The shifter in the car appears to be of the standard golf cart “F-N-R” variety. Nonetheless, the odds of finding an all-original King Midget at the curbside are virtually nil, so one takes what one gets. And while it is indeed parked by the curb, the plates expired in 2012. This King Midget is intended to attract customers to the owner’s business, along with a 1941 Chevrolet COE pickup, a 1941 Chevrolet Suburban, and a “Vanette” van, Powered by Ford, of indeterminate year.
[The badge is original. The hood ornament is decidedly not.]
Author’s note: Most of the historical information in this post comes from the website of The International King Midget Car Club, Inc., with additional information from King Midgets West Publishing.
Kind of a neat little car. I would like one on a 4×4 ATV chassis, as it kind of reminds me of a Jeep Commando of similar vintage.
There is a market for vehicles like this, but not for personal transportation. John Deere builds something similar in their Gator. It’s very useful two seater with a tilt pickup bed, ideal for farming, ranching, golf course maintenence etc. King Midget might still be with us had they seen the potential.
There is a small market for these for personal transport. Plenty of closed communities exist, where suburban communities have banned or restricted car traffic in exchange for golf carts, bikes etc. A King Midget car may be a bit out of date now but the concept is viable, a stylish tiny personal car without the industrial / fleet look of a typical golf cart.
I spent three summers in the late 1960’s in Athens, Ohio. I would occasionally see a King Midget and once even took the “factory tour” when I was about twelve. We were in a manager’s office and there was a map of the United States with push pins in various locations. I asked if the pins represented dealers and was told, “No, those are the people we’ve sold cars to!”
No idea these existed — and up to 1970, no less! You learn something every day… Cheers for this, Evan.
Deer Springs winery and auto museum has a King Midget in their collection. One of those would be a blast repowered with a Sachs air cooled wankel.
Another example of this type of go-kart/car hybrid was the Eshelman Adult Car. I’ve always wanted to see a complete history of Eshelman, including his later “safety cars,” which he built by adding huge bumpers and other gear to stock Chevrolets, until GM shut him down.
If I had to guess, I would surmise that these were a hard sell against used cars, and a factor in their demise. Today the spiritual successors to these are the golf cars that one sees running around in retirement communities. Again, a fairly limited market.
If you prowled the back pages of Popular Science (after reading the Gus Wilson Model Garage stories) you’d see the King Midget advertising, in every issue. That’s how I learned of their existence. I finally saw one on the street. That’s how I learned how little there was to them, but they WERE cute in their own way.
It’s a throwback to the days of automotive individualism.
Today, it’s all “little boxes, little boxes, little boxes made of ticky-tacky,” to borrow a metaphor, except that the “little boxes” in the song came in colors. Today, it’s all SUV-Drab.
Yep, same deal. I would peruse the my dads back issue collection. Model garage was always a favorite. I wanted to see/build a King Midget, and later the Struck Mini-dozer in person. I still haven’t seen a King Midget, but a local construction company has a Mini-dozer they use for advertising . I think the dozer had an optional bigger engine available the while they were contemporary’s.
Gus Wilson and the Model Garage in Popular Science predate both of us and most of the readership here. It started in 1925!
The series ended before many here were born, much less could read…1970, the same year as the demise of the King Midget.
But we can read them today…I just HAD to research them in hopes of finding Gus on the Web:
http://www.gus-stories.org/the_model_garage.htm
Thanks for the reminder. Someone pointed out that site a while back, but I’ve forgotten to look at it for awhile. Also http://www.arcpress.com/modelgarage/gus.htm, which seems to precede the Gus Stories site.
I’ll look at them on occasion. It’s not the same as being in the basement wood shop, the smell of sawdust and old magazine mildew, although I still smell that as soon as I start reading them to this day.
Very cute but only one wheel drive meant they were rather limited in actual use .
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I can’t hold with the ‘ America’s first economy car, the King Midget.’ line as the teens were full of incredibly basic cars…
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Near-A-Car, ‘T’ Model Fords, Whippets, on and on…
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American Austin Bantams in the 1930’s etc .
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What this car photographed in Indio, Ca. ? .
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-Nate
“What this car photographed in Indio, Ca. ?”
No, Boulder City, NV.
I just have trouble picturing the guy who would buy one of these as an automobile rather than a toy. Was there really anyone out there crazy enough, back in the day, to put on his fedora and drive his tiny, tinny, King Midget to work every morning? I say this from the perspective of being just old enough to vaguely remember my mom trying to drive us kids around in the 1949 Buick that she inherited from her aunt. I can pretty confidently say that the straight-eight in that Buick weighed more than a whole King Midget. I know mom had trouble with the steering and brakes in the Buick because they required more muscle than her 100 pound frame contained. I’m thinking that she’d have rolled right over a King Midget with ever seeing it, or even noticing she hit something, in that battleship Buick.
I suspect that the truth about the Tata Nano was also the truth about the King Midget: you’re better served to buy a used car for the same money you’d pay for a new King Midget.
Riding the school bus in the mid sixties I Often saw a middle aged guy waiting to pull out of a subdivision on his morning commute. The top was always up. On another minimal motoring note, they built Freeway cars down the road from me.
I used to see the ads for these, and in my dreams, I drove one to elementary school. Just the thing for kids, not adults. Kinder Midget.
There’s one topic I chose not to pursue in the body of the post, but the comments suggest that perhaps I should have.
In 1946, and really up until the mid-60s, there were very few standards that made a car a car. Federal standards and laws barely existed at all, and state requirements were minimal if they existed at all.
If you look at the Model 1 picture, the only “safety device” on the car is headlights. There was also ONE brake/tail light. No windshield. No wipers, obviously. The whole thing is basically 4 wheels, an engine, and a place to sit.
To judge a 1946, or 1957 car by today’s standards doesn’t make any sense. Then again, Midget Motors sold fewer than 5000 units over its 20-year existence. That’s a lot, in the right perspective. From a modern perspective, Ford sells more F-series trucks IN AN HOUR than Midget Motors sold in 20 years.
A very few people took the King Midget seriously, but it was enough to keep the company around for 20 years!
There was going to be a 4th-generation King Midget, a fiberglass dune-buggy type thing, called the “Commuter.” Unfortunately a factory fire destroyed the only body mold and that was the end of it.
Being a native Ohioan, these were always on my radar (Athens, OH is where “Ohio University” is). I found some 1940s articles from the local paper at the time of the McCahill visit/review:
#1: This and #2 below are from 1969, as the firm tries to remain viable:
#2:
#3:
#4
#5:
The fun things you learn from a 65-year-old newspaper online:
Some backstory, 1952:
While we’re thinking of earlier economy cars, let’s not forget Crosley. If you can get to one of the Little Car shows you’ll usually see at least one prewar Crosley with an air-cooled opposed twin engine up front. After the war this was replaced by the copper-brazed (“COBRA”) engine, an ingenious design of built-up sheet steel components with copper applied to the joints and then treated in an industrial oven. The only way into the finished engine was through the sump, since the head was not detachable. There was a single overhead cam under a cover that could be removed to adjust valve clearances or replace the springs. It was pretty good as long as it held together, very light and relatively powerful for its size (750cc, or 45 c.i.) and time, but fragile in service and with a high rejection rate. A more orthodox cast engine of the same general layout, but with a detachable head, appeared a bit later. This was very popular with some European specials builders, who managed to get some serious power out of it.
The cars themselves were not that much fun, with leaf-sprung solid axles at both ends giving ponderous handling, though the doorless open Hot Shot “sports” model won its class at the first Sebring race. They were still popular enough to be seen regularly even around our little town, two station wagons in particular. One belonged to a friend of mine, the other to an old farmer of immense size. He had modified the car to fit him by removing the front seats and extending the steering column and gear lever so he could drive from what had been the back seat.
“After the war this was replaced by the copper-brazed (“COBRA”) engine, an ingenious design of built-up sheet steel components with copper applied to the joints and then treated in an industrial oven.”
Perhaps I’m being too kind, but I almost feel sorry for Crosley.
As I understand from what I’ve read, the COBRA engine was chosen on the basis of its extreme reliability during World War II, powering generators and refrigeration units. Unfortunately, it was not well suited to the start-and-stop service required of an automotive application, nor did they thrive in the absence of the maintenance they received on PT boats and B-17 bombers.
I had forgotten about that … it compels a comparison to another lightweight utility engine, also a SOHC design, that went on to a long and sparkling career in motor sports. The Coventry Climax FW engines also had certain shortcomings in road-going applications, though nothing that couldn’t be fixed. It too required complete R&R every 500 service hours or so, easy enough to do if it’s a fire-pump, not so great if it’s what makes your Lotus Elite go. But tighter clearances and modern lubrication I think has made the intervals more acceptable.
I wonder if anyone has done a history of the later Crosley engines in competition? That would be a nice story in one of the vintage-racing magazines.
Had a friend in high school who had a King Midget – we spent an afternoon cutting a hole in the engine shroud and running a couple lengths of clothes dryer flexible ducting under the seat for heat. Didn’t work very well and his dad was pretty miffed – though if I remember correctly it didn’t have the original Kohler 12 horse, just a cheap B&S lawn tractor engine. The Kohler was on a wooden skid in his shop needing an overhaul. We drove the K M all summer. Until we threw in together and bought an early 50s strsight 8 Buick. Other than the transmission leaking like a sieve, we had to take a hunk of cardboard where ever we went so as not to leave a puddle, much better way to get around rural Eastern Ohio than the King Midget! I think his dad sold the K M to a Shriner buddy…
It sounds like the King Midget used what were basically lawn-mower engines. I always thought that rear-engined Volkswagens were loud, but driving around with a lawn-mower engine sounds like a terrible experience.
Its hard to believe these were actual road cars but then some of the British kit cars of the 50s were no better, its more of a kids toy to be used on private property than something to brave traffic in I’ll pass.
I just remembered that my mostly non-driving mother was interested in getting one of these. Thank God it was a passing fancy – this was ca. 1960-something – and she stayed pedestrian until she came up to Anchorage in ’65, where I got her a Triumph Herald convertible. Also impractical in its way, but not as much as you’d think, and at least it had a real car drivetrain and brakes at each wheel.
I grew up reading Mechanix Illustrated, and remember the King Midget ads.
A few years ago, I was at the Gilmore for one of their events, and there were two or three Kings there. I couldn’t remember the name at first, but I remembered the look from those ads in MI years ago. I can’t even remember which event it was. Might have been the air cooled show, which I usually miss as it conflicts with the Motor Muster at Greenfield Village.
Looks like a cardboard cutout of a Jeepster!
It reminds me of a “Jolly”. Clown car, would fit right in a Shriner’s parade.
Saw one of these at a car show in Raleigh back in 2012. I’d never seen or heard of one before that point and was rather amused that it was (at least in the eye of the builder and the buyers) a proper car. Neat-looking in a very ugly way.
My father got one in 61 cream with a beige /red interior in exchange for something can’t remember the dentails but I think it had to do with exposure to sell some units. After the cute factor wore off, it was a pain- I remember a taxi following us, chain in hand asking if we had lost something! Ours had a hand wiper(one) no locks so when we went out the neighbourhood kids would roll it to the end of the driveway. All in all a sad excuse for a car. Misery ended when it got T boned by a taxi and thankfully my mom got out in one piece. Replacement – a much cooler 63 Monza coupe.
Like every American male of my age I remember the ads in PopSci and Poupalr Mechanix, but I don’t recall ever seeing a King Midget. By contrast I’ve seen a few Crosleys, and Metroplitans were downright common by comparison (in fact I saw one curbside just last week). So I’m impressed that there are CC’ers who have actually seen or even driven a KM.
Well before the King Midget there was the cycle car. These were built in the ’20’s and had the driver sitting behind the passenger. Air cooled motorcycle engine up front, with a long chain that drove the rear wheels. The narrow width was a feature that would allow the car to fit through a typical garden gate!
The problem with the cycle car was that it couldn’t be built that much cheaper than a standard car, and Ford was driving down the price of the standard car every year. Also a Model T was a real car, could carry a lot of passengers and famously, could go about anywhere.
Ford actually built a version of a mini version of the T that was superior to any cycle car. He parked it in front of the Hotel Pontchartrain in Detroit, a popular meeting place for industry big wigs and financiers, as a warning. If Ford got into the mini car market, he would blow everyone else out of the water! By the end of the ’20’s the cycle car fad was history. But it’s an idea that comes back every couple of decades.
Woohoo! My first ever rerun! It’s a bit “cringe” (as the youths say) to read my earlier work, but thanks for the re-post.
I purchased a used car from a dealership called Parkway Auto Exchange in Red Hook, NY about two years ago. The cool, car-guy owner, John Collins haw a long career in dealerships, now spending his middle age buying clean older cars at auction and flipping them at very reasonable prices. He has quite a collection of NFS vehicles on his property, as well, but his absolute favorite is his copper colored King Midget. He wasn’t expecting me to know what it was, but I am amongst the boomers who dreamed of a KM as a child, so I was excited to meet someone who is a microcar nut, as I am.
Would that name ‘King Midget’ fly in today`s politically correct society? Pretty cool looking car though. It must have been a blast to drive with that hot 12 horsepower engine!