Merrimac Body Company

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Merrimac Body Company
legal form
founding 1919
resolution 1934
Seat Merrimac , Massachusetts
Branch Body shop

The Merrimac Body Company (Merrimac for short) was an American manufacturer of automobile bodies , which in the period between the world wars produced bodies for various American chassis manufacturers in larger series. Merrimac was a subsidiary of the Judkins company, which was also a body manufacturer .

Company history

Du Pont Le Mans Speedster with Merrimac body

Founded in Merrimac , Massachusetts in 1857 as a carriage manufacturer, Judkins has also manufactured automobile bodies since the beginning of the 20th century. Judkins specialized in closed steel structures, which were unusual and expensive at the time. In 1919 Judkins received a major order from Mercer for 200 open bodies that the company could not process with the existing structures. Therefore, the Judkins management, which at that time still consisted of members of the company's family, founded another body shop at the same location, which was named Merrimac Body Company. The company was organizationally separated from Judkins, but the Judkins family temporarily held management positions at Merrimac.

Merrimac's first order threatened the company's existence. Mercer had not paid in full for the 200 superstructures ordered, but bought them on credit. In 1921, Mercer went bankrupt, resulting in a loss of income at Merrimac. A little later, an order from Lincoln was prematurely canceled. The financial losses Merrimacs had to be offset by grants from the parent company Judkins.

At the beginning of the 1920s, Merrimac mainly manufactured open bodies for chassis from Flint , Franklin and Locomobile . The orders for this came either from the manufacturers themselves or from automobile dealers.

From 1923 to 1927 Merrimacs had a close business relationship with Rolls-Royce of America , a subsidiary of the British manufacturer Rolls-Royce , which manufactured chassis for the North American market in Springfield , Massachusetts for several years . Merrimac supplied around 420 - mostly open - bodies for Rolls-Royce up to 1927. The most successful model was the Pall Mall , a five-seat tourer of which more than 200 copies were produced.

From 1928, Merrimac manufactured open bodies for Franklin , a manufacturer that offered automobiles with air-cooled engines. "Several hundred copies" were also made of this.

In 1927 there was also a business relationship with the luxury class manufacturer Du Pont Motors . Based on designs by Du Pont's in-house designer G. Briggs Weaver, Merrimac produced around 120 sports and touring cars, of which a series called LeMans Speedster was the most successful.

As a result of the global economic crisis , the demand for high-priced upper-class vehicles fell across the country. Merrimac, like other body manufacturers, was affected by this. The chassis manufacturers also had to bear the consequences of the crisis. At the beginning of the 1930s, Rolls-Royce of America and Du Pont, among others, stopped automobile production. Merrimac stopped manufacturing new bodies from 1931 onwards. In the following years Merrimac only carried out repairs and conversions of existing bodies. In 1934 the company was closed.

literature

Richard M. Langworth: Encyclopedia of American Cars 1930-1980 . New York (Beekman House) 1984. ISBN 0-517-42462-2 .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Company history on the website www.coachbuilt.com (accessed on January 3, 2016).