Buckeye Gasoline Buggy - History

History

John William Lambert made America's first such automobile in 1891, according to a five-year extensive study by L. Scott Bailey, a well-known automobile historian, editor, and publisher. The study found substantial evidence to enter this claim on Lambert's behalf. The evidence from Bailey's study shows that Lambert designed, built, and ran a gasoline engine automobile in the early part of 1891 that he put on the market. It shows that neither Henry Ford nor the Duryea Brothers have the distinction of building the first such practical working internal combustion gasoline engine automobile in the United States. In Europe Carl Benz and Gottlieb Daimler produced the first gasoline automobiles in 1885/1886. The Duryea brothers made their automobile in 1893 and started the Duryea Motor Wagon Company in 1895 mass-producing cars. Henry Ford started mass-producing cars in 1899 at the Detroit Automobile Company.

Lambert initially designed and built his "horseless carriage" gasoline automobile in 1890. He successfully tested it in January 1891 inside an 80-foot (24 m) farm implement showroom he owned in Ohio City, Ohio. Lambert's three-wheeled surrey-top gasoline-powered buggy was his own design. It had a single cylinder, four-stroke engine. This, the Buckeye gasoline buggy, was a one-seat tricycle with large rear wheels.

Lambert designed a sales brochures advertising its specifications in January 1891. He mailed this brochure out to prospects in the first part of February 1891 with a price of $550. Later in the month of February 1891 he was running his automobile on the main street of Ohio City. Bailey points out there are several letters on file dated in the latter part of February and the early part of March 1891 requesting additional information on this "horseless carriage" that Lambert described in the brochure. Other letters of inquire continued, however Lambert ultimately was not able to sell any.

This first model had a wipe spark ignition and dry cell batteries. The automobile had two speeds forward and none going backwards. A hand steering device was added later when the automobile was used outside on the roads. The weight of the car was 585 pounds. It had wooden wheels with steel rims for extra wear. The carburetor was a surface vaporizer with a flexible diaphragm "compensator." This was patented by Lambert on May 17, 1902. The original model cost Lambert $3200. In 1904 it was lost in a fire when a grain elevator building that he was having remodeled burned to the ground.

In 1895 Lambert decided to manufacture stationary gasoline engines. He moved to Anderson, Indiana and there started Buckeye Manufacturing Company. In that same year he announced he would "soon have a gasoline vehicle on the market" to be called the Buckeye. He sent a picture to the newspapers, which was of the Buckeye gasoline buggy he made in 1891. This endeavor also did not come to fruition. Instead he continued experimentation and devised the friction gearing disk drive transmission. He invented and developed a friction transmission that would be the key feature on all of his future automobiles he would make. Lambert's first model design of 1891 was eventually modified and developed into the Union automobile which first was sold in 1902.