New Jersey also had a significant role in the history and evolution of the motor vehicle industry. In 1899, Thomas Edison began working on an electric-powered electric automobile at his Middlesex County laboratories, built three of them by 1912 and received a patent .Henry Ford, who began his career as an engineer at an Edison plant in Michigan and remained one of Edison's closest friends, famously pioneered the mass production of gasoline-powered vehicles, with. Ford Motor operating plants in Kearny and Edison, with the Edison plant later becoming a major producer of Mustangs. After its founding in 1907, General Motors re-incorporated as a New Jersey corporation to take advantage (as did Standard Oil) of the state's lax corporate regulation laws. Apart from cars, New Jersey also had a major role in the early production of fire engines (the Bloomfield plant built in 1920 of American La France Fire Engine & Automobile Company, one of the oldest fire apparatus manufacturers in the US, at its peak manufactured 150 fire trucks each month) and commercial trucks (International Motor Company in Plainfield manufactured Mack truck motors). Parts used in military vehicles and aircraft for World War I and World War II were manufactured there. The 1938 map shows the plant as the General Motors Delco-Remy battery plant. When WWII broke out, it became a unit in a chain of factories building Eastern Aircraft for the Navy. In 1945, International Projector Corporation, manufacturer of moving picture machines, bought the building and planned to employ 600 people. Alfred P. Sloan, Jr. became president of General Motors and took over the company from the original founder, W.C. Durant. Durant lost control of the firm over an unfortunate and inaccurate business error concerning an electric lamp patent which had no validity in the courts.In 1917, the brothers August and Frederick Duesenberg, engineers who had emigrated from Germany and had become known for their racing cars, built a factory in Elizabeth where they designed and built aircraft and ship engines for the Army and Navy in World War I; one of the main engines built in Elizabeth was the Liberty V-12, the first mass-produced airplane engine in the world. After the end of World War I in 1918, they soon sold the building to auto manufacturer John Willys, who expanded the plant. When the 1920 recession hit, the Willys Corp.’s assets were sold at auction to William C. Durant, one of the founders of General Motors, who expanded the site to 40 acres and built New Jersey’s first assembly line.
Durant was undaunted, however, and decided to found his own company, Durant Motors, Incorporated, in 1921. He managed to purchase at public auction the defunct Duesenberg-built assembly plant in Elizabeth to house his new automobile company. The plant had been built by Fred Duesenberg of Duesenberg Motors Corporation in 1917-1918, but was soon taken over and expanded by John N. Willys of the Willys-Overland Company. Willys had poured millions of dollars into the plant for the Chrysler Motor Company, a division of Willys, but in the end, lacked enough capital to utilize it. The Elizabeth plant was considered one of the largest and most modern assembly plants in the country.
General Motors did not expand until 1925, when it bought the buildings in Bloomfield where the company packed Chevrolets for overseas shipments. In 1937, General Motors built a large assembly plant in Linden to make Buicks, Oldsmobiles and Pontiacs. This was the first B-O-P plant built outside of Michigan. General Motors built another plant in West Trenton in 1938 for the manufacture of automobile hardware and parts.
Ford built a new plant in Metuchen in 1948 to assemble Mercuries and Lincolns and one in Mahwah, completed in 1955 and since abandoned. The Studebaker Corporation plant in North Brunswick was finished in 1951, but only filled defense contracts.
Since the late nineteenth century, New Jersey has taken an active role in the development of the automobile manufacturing industry in the United States. Oberlin Smith, of the Ferracute Machine Company in Bridgeton, can be credited with building a "horseless carriage" as early as 1868. Unfortunately, the steam driven carriage ran wild after the control level jolted loose on the Main Street of Bridgeton in the trial run. Smith built a second machine in 1874 and powered it with a marine steam engine. It, too, failed, crashing into the local pond.
J.F. and T.E Connelly of Elizabeth built a gasoline motor in 1889 to run a street car, but they never tried to install it in a buggy. The Duryea brothers of Springfield, Massachusetts, deserved credit for that achievement when they organized the first automobile company in America in 1895. In 1899, the Riker Electric Vehicle Company was founded in Elizabeth to manufacture electrically powered cars.
During this time, there were many subsidiary producers of automobile products and parts, as well. Many of the parts, such as seats, lamps, horns, bodies, etc., were purchased locally. Nevertheless, New Jersey and all the other states were secondary in importance to Michigan's role in the automobile industry.
In 1908, General Motors incorporated in New Jersey because of the new lax corporate tax laws affecting the west side of the Hudson River. In 1923, Alfred P. Sloon, Jr. became president of General Motors and took over the company from the original founder, W.C. Durant. Durant lost control of the firm over an unfortunate and inaccurate business error concerning an electric lamp patent which had no validity in the courts.
Durant was undaunted, however, and decided to found his own company, Durant Motors, Incorporated, in 1921. He managed to purchase at public auction the defunct Duesenberg-built assembly plant in Elizabeth to house his new automobile company. The plant had been built by Fred Duesenberg of Duesenberg Motors Corporation in 1917-1918, but was soon taken over and expanded by John N. Willys of the Willys-Overland Company. Willys had poured millions of dollars into the plant for the Chrysler Motor Company, a division of Willys, but in the end, lacked enough capital to utilize it. The Elizabeth plant was considered one of the largest and most modern assembly plants in the country.
In October of 1922, Durant announced that his Durant 4 and his new Star automobiles would be made in Elizabeth. The first Star rolled out of the plant in November 1922. By 1927, there were 1,000 workers at the plant. By the end of the decade, Durant was out of business, and the Elizabeth plant was abandoned.
Durant's complete collapse cleared the way for the ultimate role New Jersey was to play in the automobile industry - that of the final assembly of automobile parts made in Michigan and elsewhere. New Jersey had all the necessary components: large open areas of land, deep water frontage and a well-developed railroad system. Leading the way in New Jersey was Henry Ford.
Ford erected five buildings in the Kearny marshes in 1918. Eventually, upwards of 8,000 men worked in the Kearny plant, turning out more than 700 cars daily. Late in 1928, after the Model A replaced the Model T as Ford's prime automobile, Ford sold the Kearny works to the Western Electric Company and moved assembly operations to the new 1,500 foot long assembly plant in Edgewater. On December 8, 1930, Ford formally opened (production had begun three weeks earlier) an assembly plant in Edgewater, which was the largest Ford plant to that date. It could produce a Model A car every forty-eight minutes, and was a major supplier of vehicles to the Soviet Union in World War II. It closed in 1955 and was demolished in succeeding years. Edgewater's industrial past has resulted in superfund sites, but not this location, which is now the location of a condo development.
General Motors did not expand until 1925, when it bought the buildings in Bloomfield where the company packed Chevrolets for overseas shipments. In 1937, General Motors built a large assembly plant in Linden to make Buicks, Oldsmobiles and Pontiacs. This was the first B-O-P plant built outside of Michigan. General Motors built another plant in West Trenton in 1938 for the manufacture of automobile hardware and parts.
Ford built a new plant in Metuchen in 1948 to assemble Mercuries and Lincolns and one in Mahwah, completed in 1955 and since abandoned. The Studebaker Corporation plant in North Brunswick was finished in 1951, but only filled defense contracts.