In November 1917, the Badger Brass Manufacturing Company was purchased by the C.M. Hall Company of Detroit. Carbide vehicle lamps were a short-lived technology, the technology being developed in the 1890s and electrical lamps becoming the norm by the 1910s. Another short-lived technology was the cyclecar. Automobiles were expensive to buy, to register with the government, and to operate. The cyclecar was the budget response. Coupling small engines with sizes below licensing thresholds, they were especially popular in Europe in the first two decades of the 20th century. This photograph is a prototype cycle car built by Badger Brass in Kenosha, and was designed by Richard Welles and Lewis Keck, called the "True Cycle Car". It is reported as having been powered by a 2 cylinder, 10 hp engine, had a 104 inch wheelbase, and featured driver and passenger in tandem: with the driver in back. It was to be sold for under $400. However, it never entered production. Cyclecars fell from popularity as mass-production and easier registration made automobiles more affordable. Since automobiles in the United States were mass produced from almost the start--Oldsmobile was the first and Jeffery was the second to mass produce affordable cars, both starting in 1902, and just about everyone else mass produced affordable cars in the following years--they never really had a market in the US. In Europe, however, they were very popular into the 20s. We do not know but we would speculate that Welles and Keck had the idea from business trips to Europe for various business endeavors, as sales agents, and to set up war contracts. Welles was a regular visitor to England and France as part of his business life. Welles would also visit Britain and France during the war, both to sell Badger Brass products and as an agent of the Russian government (that of the Tsar) to acquire trucks, as many trucks, and any trucks. For his part, Louis Keck had, for many years, been a sales agent in Europe and Russia for American bicycle companies, as well as for Badger Brass. It might be notable that Orson Welles sometimes told a ridiculous and obviously fictional story of his dad building a flying car, and when he was particularly melancholic he'd bitterly suggest that his father invented the car. Neither are correct, but his father did build a car. And that's cool.
The Jalopy Journal
