Hey everyone, this week we take a look at a couple of really cool donations from Doug and their new found home, our Mechanics Library. Doug was great enough to donate his copies of a Winton Six Model 24 Care and Operations manual and White Model 45 Five-Ton Truck from 1920. These two great examples are in excellent condition and will find a home in our Mechanics Library, that is if we can get them away from Dan. Currently they are in Dan’s personal library within his office since he wants to read through these examples of automotive history. Hopefully once he has finished them they will find a good home in the mechanics library where other examples of manuals from a by-gone era are located.
Now for those that don’t know the White Motor Company was an automobile, truck and bus manufacturer in Cleveland, Ohio from 1900-1980. The company was founded and developed by three sons of Thomas H. White, a sewing machine manufacturer. Rollin, Walter and Windsor diversified their father’s company by creating the White Steamer automobile in 1900, and ultimately ended up creating the White Motor Car company in 1906. The company shifted its focus to the manufacturing of trucks during World War I and after the war became the number one manufacturer of trucks and custom vehicles. During World War II the White company once again converted to the production of military vehicles. Post war, company mismanagement and mergers eventually led to the company to file for bankruptcy in 1980 and was eventually bought by Sweden’s AB Volvo, who kept the White name until the late 1990’s.
The Winton Motor Carriage company was one of the first American companies to sell a motor car. A Scottish immigrant Alexander Winton, turned from bicycle production to experimental single-cylinder automobile production. On March 15, 1897 the company was incorporated and started producing their first automobiles by hand. Each vehicle had fancy painted sides, padded seats, a leather roof, gas lamps and tires made by B.F. Goodrich. The Winton company was successfully marketed to upscale consumers through the 1910s but sales started to fall in the early 1920s. Eventually the company ceased automobile production in 1924, but continued to produce marine and stationary gasoline and diesel engines. Winton would become Electro-Motive Division of General Motors around 1935, and produce diesel engines for the US Navy and the locomotive industry until finally closing in 1962.
Nice write-up on the history of the two companies and the library. Glad to be a part of the future library and it’s historical content. Keep the good news articles coming.