Powel Crosley Jr.’s Indiana Automobile

father, Powel Crosley Sr., was amused by capital, but a very persuasive Crosley man­ Crosley also managed to annoy his the project and promised young Powel a aged to raise $10,000 from investors— father further by becoming engaged ten-dollar reward if his car ran. The first quite a feat in an era when $ 10 was a to a schoolmate named Gwendolyn Crosley car met the challenge by travers­ good week’s wage. His investors were most Aiken. The elder Crosley believed this was ing a city block. The junior Crosley won likely people he had met in the banking entirely inappropriate for a young .man the ten dollars, repaid Lewis, and split the business, and perhaps some friends of his who had yet to establish himself. Aiken’s two-dollar profit with his brother. father—though the senior Crosley strongly family was equally unhappy with the This was more exciting than going to disapproved of his son’s venture. engagement. Certain that his automaking a Reds game or hunting and fishing. But it was only the beginning for the young Crosley; from that day on he was determined to become an automobile manufacturer, no matter what. “The only reason he became rich,” Lewis often said, “was so he could build automobiles.” And become rich he did. As any Crosley enthusiast (automobile or radio) will tell you, Powel Crosley Jr. made millions by introducing the world’s first affordable radio receiver in 1921, followed by what would become the world’s most powerful radio station, WLW. These ac­ complishments laid the foundation for the broadcast industry, and Crosley became known as “the Henry Ford of Radio.” But long before that, Crosley received his training in business in general, and auto manufacturing in particular, in Indiana. In an era when few attended college, Crosley was a college dropout. He enrolled in the University of Cincinnati’s engineer­ ing program in 1904, but nearly flunked out and soon switched to law. That lasted until the spring of 1906, at which point A b o v e : A 1939 Crosley auto­ Crosley threw in the towel and admitted mobile parked in front o f the to himself that he had gone to law school automaker’s Cincinnati man­ only to please his attorney father. Crosley sion. Crosley once said: “I believe spent the next year selling bonds for an that every American who can investment banker. Then, with a twenty- afford AN Y car should have an one-year-old’s natural naivete and self- opportunity to buy a brand new, truly FINE car. ” L e f t : A 1951 confidence, he decided it was time to, as Crosley . Starting he put it, “take a swing at the world.” He in 1949, Crosley had included would realize his dream of building cars disc brakes on all his cars, the with an automobile called the Marathon first automotive firm to do so in Six— a six-cylinder car aimed at the low the . end of the luxury market that would sell for $1,700. There was the small matter of

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