Henry Ford's First
Car--The Quadracycle (1896)
Introduction
The automobile is an integral part of American society and has been since the turn of the 19th century. Our nation is one of the largest in the world, making transportation over distances very important. In the days before the invention of the Automobile a very small distance would require hours of travel time. This vast land area was perhaps the largest motivation for the success of the automobile. In the more than 100 years since it's invention the automobile has developed from a primitive, inefficient machine into an efficient, reliable, comfortable, and technologically advanced piece of everyday life. The automobile is an American tradition, which will most likely live on forever.
This page will discuss the origins of the automobile, and some of the significant developments of the automobile in its first fifty years.
