Cadillac grew out of the ruins of a car company Henry Ford walked away from
When Henry Ford quit his company in 1902, its backers called in the engineer Henry Leland to value the equipment for sale. Leland talked them into building cars with his own single-cylinder engine instead. The firm they created, named after the Frenchman who founded Detroit, went on to become America's benchmark for luxury.
Cadillac was incorporated in August 1902 in the old Ford factory, taking its name and crest from Antoine de la Mothe Cadillac, who had established Detroit in 1701. Its first cars, finished that October, were ten-horsepower two-seaters almost identical to the 1903 Ford Model A, and they secured more than 2,000 firm orders at the New York show in January 1903. The selling point was precision, since a Cadillac was simply built better than its rivals.
That precision became famous in Britain. In a 1908 test the Royal Automobile Club saw three Cadillacs taken apart, their parts mixed and the cars reassembled, and awarded the Dewar Trophy, which inspired the slogan Standard of the World. General Motors bought the company in July 1909, and a second Dewar Trophy followed for the 1912 electric starter and lighting. Later milestones included a V8 in 1915, a clash-free synchromesh gearbox in 1928, a V16 in 1930 and the first all-steel roof on a passenger car.
The Depression hit hard, with sales down 84 percent between 1928 and 1933. Making matters worse, the company discouraged sales to African Americans until Nick Dreystadt, head of Cadillac service, urged the committee deciding the brand's fate to drop the policy. Sales climbed 70 percent in 1934, Dreystadt was put in charge of the division, and by 1940 sales were ten times their 1934 level. Cadillac was also the first carmaker to adopt the Phillips screw, in 1937.
After the war, designer Harley Earl's influence brought tailfins in 1948, peaking in 1959 before shrinking away by 1965. Cadillac built its millionth car in November 1949 and even produced the M41 Walker Bulldog tank from 1951. Its record year for sales came in 2019, with 390,458 vehicles.
Source: Cadillac
