A65 #29--SOLVED--Benjamin Briscoe

[Aaron65]

Who's this guy and what's his car connection?

[Aaron65]

Up a level, who's this businessman/industrialist?

[Wendax]

From India?

[Aaron65]

Nope, wrong continent...

[Wendax]

South America?

[Aaron65]

South America?

[Aaron65]

I was a major player in the early American auto industry...

[João]

Benjamin Briscoe?

[Aaron65]

Yes! OK Joao, tell me a bit about his car adventures and the point is yours...Locked for you!

[João]

Yes! OK Joao, tell me a bit about his car adventures and the point is yours...Locked for you!

Thanks Aaron65!

From Wiki :

"In 1901, the automobile industry was in its infancy when Briscoe helped finance David Buick's first car. He was later president of the Maxwell-Briscoe Motor Company that manufactured the Maxwell automobile. This was probably his greatest success in the industry. The company was backed by J. P. Morgan & Co. and Richard Irvin & Co., but in the panic of 1907, Briscoe had the first of many bad experience with bankers and was forced to do his own financing.

Mr. Briscoe conceived the idea of consolidating the four largest automobile manufacturers—Ford Motor Company, Buick, REO and Maxwell-Briscoe—into one company. His negotiations with William C. Durant, Henry Ford and Ransom E. Olds failed, so he proceeded to organize his own corporation along the broad lines he envisaged resulting in the United States Motor Company.

U. S. Motors continued production of the Maxwell and was soon also producing the Stoddard-Dayton car, the Brush Runabout (in which his brother Frank Briscoe was a principal), Alden-Sampson trucks and others. The firm continued to operate the old Maxwell-Briscoe plants and bought up such concerns as the Columbia Motor Car Co., owner of many patents, including the Selden patent. Briscoe had an option on the Cadillac car at one time, but never exercised it, and it eventually went to Mr. Durant, who had organized the General Motors Corporation.

A few months after leaving U. S. Motors, he and his brother formed Briscoe Frères at Billancourt, France, home of the Renault, to design and build a car on the continent according to American methods. The result was the Ajax. A year later the brothers brought out the Briscoe car in America manufactured at Jackson, Michigan but which they promoted as the first French-designed American car. When World War I broke out, Benjamin Briscoe turned his manufacturing facilities over to war production and he never returned to the automobile business. His partners continued to manufacture Briscoe models until 1923."

[Aaron65]

That's the guy...in a small way, this guy was responsible for General Motors...