1904 Premier Model F Tonneau

Indianapolis, Indiana is the location of the Indy 500, the heart of American motorsports, and the home of some of the greatest sporting car manufacturers in America, such as the Stutz and Premier. In a similar fashion to Stutz, Premier used racing to help develop its road cars. They are known for their air-cooled machine produced for the Vanderbilt Cup Race but ultimately were barred from competition for being 60 pounds overweight.

They ran three entries in the 1916 Indianapolis 500, achieving excellent results with their road-going cars. Premier also received a perfect score in three consecutive Glidden Reliability tours.

The first Premier model in 1903 was powered by an overhead valve four-cylinder engine and a sliding gear transmission, initially favoring air-cooling for its designs.

This particular Premier automobile is one of two survivors from this early period of the marque. The current owner learned about it in the late 1980s, having been found in tired but substantially complete order.

The car was given a restoration to an exacting standard based on the information available of this little-known era of the brand. The stated schemes for the model were a Brewster Green body, with 'maroon or canary running gear', the latter being chosen. A new body was constructed in keeping with period images of these cars choosing a rear entrance tonneau body over its original side entrance tonneau.

The restoration was completed in 1999 and soon an application was made to the Veteran Car Club of Great Britain for its dating. By June of 2000, a date of 1904 was confirmed. Since that time, the Premier has seen only modest use and ultimately did not travel to the United Kingdom to take part in the run.

By Daniel Vaughan | Oct 2017