"The Germans invented the automobile
The Japanese made it affordable
The Americans made it a disposable item
But, the ITALIANS taught it to dance & sing!"

I always liked that old curmudgeon


The Swedes made it safe

 

The Swedes made it safe

Well, they marketed their passive safety devices long before anyone else bothered to

 

Reminds me of my favorite Italian saying: "Fa tutto con gioia". Do everything with joy.

I guess that includes driving great cars.

 

The Italians actually invented the automobile, a year before the Germans!

 

Did they get credit for doing it?

 

It's Bernardi, and the Italian patent date for the first vehicle driven by an internal combusion engine is August 5th, 1882. A car was actually built in 1883. Of course there are vehicles powered by steam and other means of much earlier dates. The information is from this book:

FIAT a Fifty Years Record
Arnoldo Mondadori, 1951(1st edition, English)
Hardcover 298pp plus appendices.

 

The First Car?



With the additional information that you provided: "Italy’s input was from Enrico Bernardi (1841-1919), a Professor of Hydraulic and Agricultural Machinery at the University of Padua, who built a car in 1884 that has laid claim to being the first car in the world. Bernardi ’s engine was first used in 1882 to power a sewing machine and two years later to power his son ’s tricycle to make it a self propelled vehicle."

"...F.I.A.T gave Italy its real standing when they established a factory in 1899."

Source: http://www.ba-education.demon.co.uk/for/cars/history.html

 

By loose definition, an automobile has 4 wheels. The Bernardi has 3 wheels. Enrico Bernardi developed his engine in 1883-1884, but his car was not introduced until 1894, not 1883. The Benz Patent car (3 wheels) was first driven July 3, 1886. The Daimler Motor Carriage with 1 cylinder and 462 cc was developed by Gottlieb Daimler and Wilhelm Maybach. It too came out in 1886 but had 4 wheels. The Benz "Velo" is widely recognized as the first automobile because it had 4 wheels AND was the first volume production vehicle with production of almost 400 units. Sorry folks, the Germans win by number of wheels and date of actual introduction and driving their machine ... FYI, A steam car was rumored to have been developed as early as 1672 by a Jesuit preist named Ferdinand Verbiest.

 

Boy, we are getting some mileage here aren't we? Interesting read and to think DED's quote was on the back of one of my Fiat Freak Out conventions T-shirts. Our convention MC aka Bobb The Fiat Freak has used Mr. Davis's quote at many a Freak Out.

I met Mr. Davis a few years back at one of Bill Warner's Amelia Island Concours and I am sure he is still convinced of who taught the car to dance and sing. As to who invented it, whatever works for you is fine with me.

 

It was glorious Russian inventor, Igor Servansky, invented first automobile!!!

 

Why do Italians have to always be associated with their ability for creative song and dance? When we talk automobiles I believe that there is much more to it. Many have said that it was the Italians that invented the concept of the "sports car." To what extent this is true I can only guess...but with the likes of Ferrari, Maserati, and Lamborghini compounded with Alfa's own legacy I think they have contributed much more to it than "singing and dancing."

With the exception with the "singing and dancing" line for the Italians, most of that quote is interchangable anyway. One could say that modern Fiats are disposable items and at the same time the cinquecento was just as affordable and practical for its time than anything Japan produces today.

...and the argument over who invented the automobile will be debated forever depending on what your definition of an automobile is. Last I heard, it was a French invention.

 

The Italians taught it to rust!

 

The Germans are also up there as far as rust goes. If you've ever had a Porsche 356 from the '50s or 60's you know what I mean. Especially one from the east coast. I've had many of them and wouldn't even look at one if it came from the east.

 

Man, it would sure be a bummer to lose one of those to the tin worm. They're just so pretty. I almost never see one that doesn't look like it's in "creampuff" shape though, so hopefully not too many are dying a rotten death.

The quote I always found funny concerning the rust issue was this, "The British Car Industry invented rust, and then licensed it to the Italians, who subsequently perfected it."

 

Great quote Echo Leader! Many 356s went to the junk yard in the sky before the days when you could buy a new floor and weld it in. Once a 356 has been on a salt road it was doomed. You could cut it out, but it would pop up somewhere else later. Even when someone says "No Rust", a 356 almost always does because it rusts from between the sandwiched sheets of metal that make up the body. Some people, (unlike Akitaman that cut rust out and replace with new metal), will glue new metal over the old with stuff called Duramix. It doesn't solve the problem.

 

Just so I'm clear on the model designation being discussed, since most anyone can tell you math and numbers aren't by forte....is that the older Porsche before the 911 that has a similar body style but "humpier" and "choppier" with a very "teeny-tiny" two cut outs for "teeny-tiny" people in the back seat area?

I'm pretty sure that's the one that Pat liked and wanted a 356 Cabriolet, where I preferred the 911 S, E, or T as far as styling.

By loose definition, an automobile has 4 wheels. The Bernardi has 3 wheels. Enrico Bernardi developed his engine in 1883-1884, but his car was not introduced until 1894, not 1883. The Benz Patent car (3 wheels) was first driven July 3, 1886. The Daimler Motor Carriage with 1 cylinder and 462 cc was developed by Gottlieb Daimler and Wilhelm Maybach. It too came out in 1886 but had 4 wheels. The Benz "Velo" is widely recognized as the first automobile because it had 4 wheels AND was the first volume production vehicle with production of almost 400 units. Sorry folks, the Germans win by number of wheels and date of actual introduction and driving their machine ... FYI, A steam car was rumored to have been developed as early as 1672 by a Jesuit preist named Ferdinand Verbiest.

When I'm feeling better, I'll dig around in Pat's books and see what kind of definitions and information I can come up with so that you can continue the argument....

 

Yeap, thats the one. There was an "A', "B" and "C". The "SC" had more horsepower. A '61 Cab was my second car. I have restored about 3 356 Cabriolets! Did 2 Speedsters also. If only I had the brains to keep them all. Had a few 911s also which were, of course more modern, quieter, faster and smoother driving. On Tuesday,a buddy here at work test drove a 997 that was in the Brabus showroom down the street. The body was done by TechArt and had 670HP. He said it was incredible to drive. The price was also...

 

Yeap, thats the one. There was an "A', "B" and "C". The "SC" had more horsepower. A '61 Cab was my second car. I have restored about 3 356 Cabriolets! Did 2 Speedsters also. If only I had the brains to keep them all. Had a few 911s also which were, of course more modern, quieter, faster and smoother driving. On Tuesday,a buddy here at work test drove a 997 that was in the Brabus showroom down the street. The body was done by TechArt and had 670HP. He said it was incredible to drive. The price was also...

Pat would certainly agree with you on the bold, italicized portion above except in regard to Alfas. Two cars he sold or traded for insignificant amounts of money by today's standard, sold for 1.5 million and 3.5 million while we were married. Not the same model, but the same exact car he owned.

Others including some high profile Alfa guys have made the same mistake, just never expected the exotic car market to take off like it did....we live and learn.

Pat did own at least one Porsche as I recall...

 

Yikes! Now that is REAL money! I bought and sold Porsches, Mercedes, Ferraris etc to pay for college. I would buy Speedsters for $3,000 and sell for $4,000 and think I was making a killing. I paid $5,000 for my mint Maserati Mistral and kept it for 5 years and sold it for $7,000. Like you say live and learn..The two I let get away were a 300SL (the Gullwing convertible) for $8,000 and a real 289 mint Cobra for $7,000. The Cobra sat on the showroom floor at Kendon Volkswagen in Harbor City. We came within $200 and in my brilliance I passed!

 

Trying to determine exactly who invented the automobile is really as pointless as trying to determine what God is, or even if God exists. Everyone has an opinion, but opinion is different from knowledge or truth. Whatever belief works for you as an individual is fine with me.

 

Well, I must agree. With Steve's original question that is.

 

jimcra, nice list of previous cars! Consider me officially jealous! I didn't know that Porsche was using layers of steel for their bodies....is that common? And what reasoning did they have? Increased rigidity?

Did you prefer the Cabrio or Speedster 356s? and what was the Mistral like??

 

So much for trying to back on topic!

 

Oh well nice while it lasted. Moving on!

 

While I have no idea who was first or last, I do think the Italians have a flair for incorporating style and grace into their designs unlike designers of any other nation.

Scott
83 GTV6 (3.0 on the engine stand)

 

Agree or Disagree



No disagreement here.

I was really surprised to find that John Dinkel's Dictionary of Automotive Terms did not include a definition for automobile; I guess, it was assumed if you know what an automotive dictionary is you know what the definition of an automobile is.

A couple definitions of automobile from other sources:

Main Entry: 2automobile
Function: noun
a usually four-wheeled automotive vehicle designed for passenger transportation

Source: http://www.m-w.com/cgi-bin/dictionary

automobile: Chiefly US, 1886, [a.F,] A. . Self-propelling, B. sb. A motor vehicle. Also as vb.

The etymology indicates the word is adopted from French, which may lead us to believe that the French should be credited with the first automobile.

Source: The Oxford Universal Dictionary on Historical Principles. Oxford: Claredon Press, 1933. (Third edition published in 1955.)

This source explores automotive development by components, in the engine portion:

"But for the truly significant advance of the motor car in the closing years of the 19th century, the honours go to two Germans, Carl Benz and Gottlieb Daimler. Benz and Daimler, operating separately, built compact engines running on volatile inflammable liquids such as light petroleum spirit and naptha. Both of these engines were soon developed for motor vehicle propulsion."

"...Benz and Daimler made cars powered by internal combustion engines for sale, so it can be said in the modern context that they were the true founders of a way of life. Plaything, status symbol or necessity, whatever the meaning of a car to mid-20th-century man -- it all really began with these two inventors."

Source: Day, John B.The Bosch Book of the Motor Car: Its Evolution and Engineering Develpment. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1975.

This source is more historically based and follows the evolution of the various steam engines and those prior to the internal combustion engines.

"...and Edouard Delamare-Debouttebville, assisted by his faithful and skilled mechanic Leio Malandin, built a four-wheel car in France with a high compression engine fed on a light essence of petroleum. Features such as overhead valves and a power rating of about 2.5 hp show the degree of sophistication attained. However, in spite of the fact that by many this was at the time considered the first automobile, Delamare-Deboutteville failed to exploit his work on an industrial scale and his name disappeared from the history of the motor car."

"...Meanwhile, another German, Karl Benz, the owner of of Benz & Company in Mannheim, developed his own engine with electric ignition and brought out a three-wheel vehicle in 1886 which, because of the perfect integration of its engine and chassis, can be considered the first true automobile."

Source: Ruiz, Marco, Borgeson, Griffith, Caldera, Maurizio et al. One Hundred Years of the Motor Car 1886 to 1986. London: Guild Publishing, 1985.

So depending on if you use the "automobile" definition based on The Oxford Universal Dictionary of "self-propelled" or the Merriam-Webster Dictionary of "'usually' four-wheeled vehicle" your choice of who invented the first automobile will differ. As I said previously, there is probably not a clear definitive answer without first deciding on the focus or definition of "automobile." However, having said that, I've not found in any of the cited sources any reference to Stu's Italian connection.

 

Miari E Gusti
http://www.3wheelers.com/miari.html

(Also see Bernadi)


The La Società Miari Guisti company was established in 1896 to build the Miari E Giusti. The vehicle was originally introduced in 1894 by Professor Enrico Bernardi and was possibly the first vehicle to run on the roads of Italy. Bernardi had researched the Internal Combustion Engine at the University of Padua where he was Professor of Physics and in 1884 he produced his first engine. This was a small engine and was demonstrated by powering a sewing machine. From 1889 Bernardi became interested in motorised vehicles and so started to build an engine that could propel a vehicle. In 1894 Bernardi introduced his first 3-wheeler. Powered by a 624cc single cylinder four-stroke engine with overhead valve the vehicle has an interesting feature in that the throttle was a bulb mounted on the handlebars and this had to be squeezed and closed to control the speed of the vehicle.




An 1896 Miari E Giusti. (My thanks go to Kerry Croxton for sending in this photo)



The drive to the rear single wheel was by chain. In 1896 the La Società Miari Guisti company was established to sell the vehicle and patents were obtained in several countries including Britain, though when this closed down in 1899, Bernardi formed his own company and produced the Bernardi until 1901.

 

I agree with the Germans invented the automobile - but the others should be...

The Americans made it affordable (don't forget Mr Ford)
The Japanese made it reliable
The KOREANS made it disposable
The Swedes made it safe
The Indians made it dangerous
and The Russians made it rubbish.

 

what about the British?

I agree with Steevo, nothing, and i mean nothing quite drives like an italian car, they have that special something.

 

what about the British?

The British made it GROOVY BABY!

 

the British

How about,

The British made it mis-fire

or

The British made it dark

or

The British made it short-circuit