Many automobile companies suffered a brief existence during the infancy of the horseless carriage due to a myriad of reasons, some due to a lack of finances, others to unreliable products, and others due to bad management. When these companies failed, many of their employees, engineers, and financial backers sought new employment from other automobile companies. Thus, many of the same individuals were part of many different companies. One such individual was Benjamin Briscoe of Detroit, Michigan. His fortune was made in the sheet metal manufacturing industry, and with his wealth, he invested in David Dunbar Buick's infant motor company (Briscoe had a 97% interest in the Buick Motor Company). In 1904, he sold Buick to James H. Whiting and used the money to help found the Maxwell-Briscoe Motor Company, makers of the Maxwell automobile, which became the third-biggest American automobile maker in 1909.
Brisco later attempted to consolidate the Maxwell-Briscoe company with the three largest automobile manufacturers of the era - Buick, REO and the Ford Motor Company. When negotiations failed, he organized his own corporation named the United States Motor Company (initially as the International Motor Company) and began acquiring automobile companies. Organized in 1910, it had 11 constituent companies under its umbrella by the close of that year. The list of companies included Stoddard-Dayton, Maxwell, Courier Car Co, Columbia Automobile Company, Brush Motor Car Company, Alden Sampson Trucks, Riker, Gray Marine, and Providence Engineering Works, Stoddard-Dayton, Briscoe Manufacturing, and the Grabowsky Motor Vehicle Company.
By September of 1912, the United States Motor Company (USMC) was in receivership, its downfall a product of bad management and a conflict between two of its backers. When Briscoe retired in late 1912, he was replaced by Walter E. Flanders, who acquired the assets of the USMC and reorganized the company as the Maxwell Motor Company, Inc. Flanders's resume included working for the Ford Motor Company in 1906 and would become instrumental in the creation of the modern assembly line. He left Ford in 1908 to co-found the E-M-F Company (named for its founders: Barney Everitt, William Metzger, and Flanders), which was acquired by Studebaker in 1910. He helped found the Rickenbacker Motor Company in 1921, and passed away in June 1923 following injuries sustained in a car accident.
On June 6, 1925, the Maxwell Motor Company was reorganized by Walter Chrysler into the Chrysler Corporation.
Maxwell Motor Company
The Maxwell Motor Company began life as the 'Maxwell-Briscoe Company' of North Tarrytown, New York. In 1913, it was reorganized as the 'Maxwell Motor Company, Inc.' and its base of operations was moved to Highland Park, Michigan, with some Maxwell automobiles also produced at three plants in Dayton, Ohio.
The company was founded by Jonathan Dixon Maxwell and his business partner Benjamin Briscoe, with the financial backing of J.P. Morgan. Mr. Maxwell had worked for Oldsmobile and Northern, and the early Maxwell automobiles reflected the experience he had gained while working for those companies. The first Maxwell cars, known as the Model L, were a twin cylinder 8/12hp 'tourabout' with two-speed planetary transmission and shaft drive. The larger five-passenger 16hp tourer was called the Model H.
It quickly became one of the top three automobile manufacturers in America, became part of the United States Motor Company in 1910, and was the only company that survived the collapse of the USMC in 1913.
In 1911 and 1912, Maxwell had outright wins in the Glidden Tours.
The 1912 Maxwell
Maxwell had a diverse lineup of attractive vehicles with prices that ranged from $625 to $1,480. The Messenger was a two-passenger Vestibuled Roadster resting on top of an 86-inch wheelbase, powered by a two-cylinder motor, and priced at $625. The Mascotte was a two-door Fore-Door Roadster priced at $950 and utilizing a four-cylinder, 25-horsepower engine installed in a 104-inch wheelbase platform. The Mercury was also a Fore-Door Roadster, priced $200 higher, and built on a 110-inch wheelbase with its four-cylinder engine producing 30 horsepower. The Special was a five-passenger Fore-Door Tourer priced at $1,480 and resting on a 114-inch wheelbase. Its overhead valve four-cylinder engine displaced 4,610cc, had a single Stromberg carburetor, and produced 36 horsepower at 2,600 RPM. It had a three-speed sliding gear transmission, two-wheel mechanical drum brakes, and a leaf spring suspension.
by Dan Vaughan