At the end of last month, Mercedes-Benz officials sent out an e-mail to employees alerting them to the birthday of the automobile. But there is a great deal of controversy as to the actual birthday of the car. The date varies, depending on your definition of the actual beginning of the industry.
Some people look to the year 1678 when a Flemish priest created a small steam car and demonstrated it for the Chinese Emperor. Others look to 1769 when Nicholas-Joseph Cugnot concocted the idea of the modern-day automobile. Still others tend to see 1789 as the year of the first automobile because that’s when Oliver Evans received a United States patent for a self-propelled vehicle.
You can even go back to the Middle Ages, when Mother Shipton, a prophesier of the day, wrote of “carriages without horses” and other concepts that could reflect today’s automobile. Some have even found images in the Old Testament that could describe the vehicle.
But the folks at Mercedes-Benz have a couple of dates in mind when they talk about celebrating the birthday of the automobile. January 1893 is one date, because that’s when Wilhelm Maybach developed the precursor to the current carburetor. January 19, 1903 is another historic day, marking when Benz & Cie tested the first four-cylinder engine in Mannheim.
So the next time you visit your local Mercedes-Benz dealer, you might not want to mention the birthday of the automobile. You might just get a lesson that you weren’t looking for in the first place.
