Pope Manufacturing Company

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Promotional leaflet for Columbia bicycles (1886)

The Pope Manufacturing Company was an American bicycle, motorcycle and automobile manufacturer founded by Colonel Albert A. Pope in Hartford, Connecticut in 1876 .

Cycles

Pope designed the first bicycle in 1877 and had it built by the Weed Sewing Machine Company in Hartford. In 1878, the Pope Manufacturing Company began making the Columbia high-wheeler and took over the Weed Sewing Machine Company in 1880. Pope bought Pierre Lallement's patent for bicycles and then any other bicycle patents he could get hold of. In doing so, he curtailed the possibilities of other US bicycle manufacturers and made a fortune with the license fees due. He used the latest achievements in bicycle manufacturing, such as ball bearings for all moving parts or steel tubes for the frames. He also invested a lot of money in advertising for bicycle clubs, bicycle newspapers, and bicycle races. By 1896, Pope was the leading American bicycle manufacturer. In 1899 he founded the Bicycle Trust , which consisted of 40 smaller bicycle manufacturers that he had bought up.

The Pope Manufacturing Company also pioneered the stamping process for metal parts.

In 1884, the Englishman Thomas Stevens (1853–1935) set out from Chicago with a Pope penny-farthing as the first person to set out on a bicycle tour of the world that lasted over two and a half years.

Electric automobiles

In 1897, the Pope Manufacturing Company began manufacturing an electric automobile. In 1899 the company had built over 500 vehicles. This year, the electric vehicle division was split off and the Electric Vehicle Company of William Collins Whitney merged. This gave rise to the Columbia Automobile Company , which mainly built electric vehicles, but later also had petrol-powered automobiles in its range.

Automobiles and Motorcycles

Pope-Hartford (1911)
Pope's motorcycle (1914)

In 1901, Pope tried to get back into the automobile market after the run on bicycles subsided. He bought up a number of smaller businesses and incorporated them into his empire. So in 1903 the Pope-Robinson Company and in 1904 the Pope Motor Car Company and Pope-Tribune came into being . The Pope Manufacturing Company also built automobiles and motorcycles under the name Pope-Hartford from 1904 . Hiram P. Maxim became chief engineer in the motor vehicle division.

The first vehicle had a single-cylinder engine, but a two-cylinder followed in 1905, and the first four-cylinder the following year. The first six-cylinder model appeared in 1911. In 1909, a Pope-Hartford Model T won a car race to mark the 300th anniversary of the founding of San Francisco .

While the other automakers in his empire only existed for a short time, the Pope-Hartford brand lasted until the beginning of the First World War . Albert A. Pope died in August 1909 at the age of 66 and his brother George took over the company. In 1913 the Pope Manufacturing Company had to file for bankruptcy. Automobiles were manufactured until 1914 under the leadership of an insolvency administrator . The company's assets were gradually sold and in January 1915 the last buildings and land went to the Pratt & Whitney engine factory . George Pope died at the age of 75 in April 1918.

Pope-Hartford automobile models

model Construction period cylinder power wheelbase
A. 1904 1 10 bhp (7.4 kW) 1981 mm
B. 1904-1905 1 10 bhp (7.4 kW) 1981 mm
D. 1905 2 row 16 bhp (11.8 kW) 2235 mm
G 1906-1907 2 row 18 bhp (13.2 kW) 2235 mm
F. 1906 4 row 25 bhp (18.4 kW) 2489 mm
X 1907 2 row 20 bhp (14.7 kW) 2413 mm
L. 1907 4 row 30 bhp (22 kW) 2591 mm
R. 1908 4 row 25 bhp (18.4 kW) 2591 mm
M. 1908 4 row 30 bhp (22 kW) 2845 mm
S. 1909 4 row 30 bhp (22 kW) 2896 mm
T 1910 4 row 40 bhp (29 kW) 3099 mm
W. 1911 4 row 50 bhp (37 kW) 3150 mm
Y 1911 6 row 50 bhp (37 kW) 3404 mm
27 1912 4 row 50 bhp (37 kW) 3150 mm
28 1912 6 row 60 bhp (44 kW) 3404 mm
31 1913 4 row 40 bhp (29 kW) 2997 mm
33 1913 4 row 50 bhp (37 kW) 3150 mm
29 1913 6 row 60 bhp (44 kW) 3378 mm
35 1914 4 row 40 bhp (29 kW) 3010 mm

literature

  • Beverly Rae Kimes, Henry Austin Clark Jr. Standard Catalog of American Cars 1805–1942. Krause Publications, Iola WI 1985, ISBN 0-87341-045-9 .
  • Robert D. Dluhy: American Automobiles of the Brass Era: Essential Specifications of 4,000+ Gasoline Powered Passenger Cars, 1906-1915, with a Statistical and Historical Overview. Mcfarland & Co, 2013, ISBN 978-0-7864-7136-2 . (English)
  • James J. Flink: America Adopts the Automobile - 1895-1910. Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 1970, ISBN 0-262-06036-1 . (English)
  • David Beecroft: History of the American Automobile Industry. Publisher lulu.com, 2009, ISBN 978-0-557-05575-3 . (Reprint of a series of articles in The Automobile magazine . First published between October 1915 and August 1916; English)

Web links

Commons : Pope Manufacturing Company  - Collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Bicycle stories