1924 Lincoln Model L Phaeton

Henry Martyn Leland, the founder of Cadillac, was also the founder of the Lincoln Motor Car Company. The first Lincoln automobiles appeared in September of 1920; production was initially slow due to the nationwide recession, which quickly put Lincoln into receivership. The company was rescued by Henry Ford, purchasing the Lincoln Motor Company for eight million dollars in 1922. It became the flagship of the Ford empire, and its success is largely attributed to Henry Ford's son, Edsel. The Leland-era bodies were replaced by the ones designed by Edsel, who had a fine eye and talent for design. Coachbuilders such as Brunn, Judkins, Willoughby, Locke, and Murphy were enlisted to provide custom body designs, many of which appeared in Lincoln's catalogs.

This particular example is a four-passenger phaeton, Style 123, with its design attributed to Hermann Brunn, the Buffalo, New York, designer and coachbuilder. Brunn was not a volume coachbuilder, so the American Body Company, also of Buffalo, was given the construction contract. The company built tens of thousands of bodies for Model T Fords during the 1910s, along with building bodies for manufacturers like Marmon and Wills Ste. Claire. From 1923 to 1926, the American Body Company built 2,726 bodies of the Lincoln style, with 829 produced in 1924.

This Lincoln four-passenger phaeton was assembled on May 22nd of 1924. In 1996, the Merrick Auto Museum acquired it from John Taylor of North Royalton, Ohio. It was given a $400,000 restoration, and is finished in maroon with black fenders and body molding. The interior is upholstered in black leather and has a matching touring top. It rides on varnished 12-spoke artillery wheels mounted with Gehrig 33 × 5 whitewall tires on 23-inch demountable rims. In the back is a leather-covered trunk with twin spares resting to the rear. The radiator cap bears Lincoln's greyhound ornament, and there is a nickel-plated spotlight mounted on the right-hand running board.

Under the bonnet is a 358 cubic-inch fork-and-black V8 engine, developing 90 horsepower at 2,800 RPM, and backed by a three-speed transmission. The Lincoln speedometer incorporates a Waltham clock. The odometer shows just over 56,000 miles.

By Daniel Vaughan | Jan 2020