Heavy History: FWD-Seagrave Museum tells the story

For decades, the FWD Museum was a small collection of rare vehicles housed in the tiny machine shop where Otto Zachow and his brother-in-law William Besserdich invented America’s first four-wheel-drive car. The two machinists turned to local lawyer Walter A. Olen to help them establish the Four Wheel Drive Auto Co. of Clintonville, Wis. When he retired in 1952, Olen was honored as the oldest truck maker in the United States.

Known as FWD-Seagrave after purchasing the fire truck maker in 1963, the company reflected a strong sense of history with a tiny “Birthplace of Four Wheel Drive” museum. Thanks to the efforts of Olen’s granddaughter Marcia, a Clintonville native named Mark Thomas and many volunteers, the FWD Museum has added a larger factory building where Topp Stewart tractors were made long ago. This 60,000-sq. ft. facility is being filled up with additional trucks and historical artifacts from FWD-Seagrave’s past.

FWD sprang from Zachow and Besserdich’s 1906 design for a front drive axle with steerable hubs and universal joints. It was devised after their 1905 REO runabout got stuck in the mud. A transfer case and the driveshafts necessary for a four-wheel-drive system were also added. During the summer of 1907, patent applications were filed and the two men built their first car. It was dubbed “The Battleship” and that military-sounding name proved to be prophetic, since making military vehicles would put FWD on the map.

By the fall of 1911, there were 700,000 licensed motor cars in the U.S. and 25,000 trucks. The United States Army owned 12 trucks. Three had been purchased by the Quartermaster Corps for use at the San Francisco, Calif. depot. One went to Ft. Sam Houston in Texas and one was used at West Point. Seven went to Manila. The rest of the Army was using mules for transport, but change was in the wind. Capt. A.E. Williams, a North Carolina native and West Point graduate, was on loan to the Quartermaster Corps from the 19th Infantry and very interested in the concept of a mechanized fighting force.

Williams persuaded his superiors to invite major automakers to participate in a cross-country trial, in the middle of winter, that would take the rucks overlanding through ice, mud and rain. The car manufacturers knew their models would not perform well and decided not to participate. Then, Capt. Williams saw and advertisement from the Four Wheel Drive Auto Company and arranged a trip to Clintonville, where he proposed that FWD participate in a rugged test against trucks made by White, Sampson and Autocar. On Jan. 12, 1912, a stripped-down FWD car was shipped to Washington, D.C. for testing.

The trucks were driven 1,509 miles through Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Tennessee, Kentucky and near to Indiana. Originally scheduled as a four-week trial, the test ran seven weeks at an average speed of 8-10 mph. The trucks realized 4-5 miles per gallon of fuel. Even though the cost was less than feeding mule teams, the initial reaction was that there were too many problems. Capt. Williams was relieved of his special assignment to assess the practicality of a mechanized army. He was sent to the Philippines. Seemingly overlooked was the FWD car’s good performance.

This wasn’t the case for long, however. In the spring, the U.S. Army asked if FWD could design a 3-ton truck with a four-wheel-drive chassis system. In May, the Army asked if such a truck could be readied for a 260-mile test run from Dubuque, Iowa to Sparta, Wis. The previously used White, Sampson and Autocar trucks would also be retested along with 1-1/2-ton Kelly-Springfield, Mack and Kato trucks that were rented for the run.

Despite such reviews, rumors flying around Clintonville of a government order for 12,000 trucks remained rumors and the city’s small company struggled to pay its bills.

In the summer of 1914, Germany invaded Belgium and began a drive toward Paris, France. Suddenly, war machines from airplanes to trucks were being used in fighting and in Clintonville, Walter Olen realized that this opened the possibility of selling a lot more FWD trucks. That fall, a 3-ton truck and a 5-ton model were sold to exporters and shipped to England for testing. Within a month, an order for 50 trucks — more than FWD had made in total — arrived. More orders followed. By the end of 1915, FWD was making money.

During 1915, the company had built and shipped 400 trucks and had Allied Government orders for 200 more each month. It was becoming a million-dollar corporation. In March of 1916, someone offered to buy the company for $2,500,000. As it turned out, it would soon be worth even more than that. A few weeks earlier, there had been an uprising in Mexico with a bandit named “Pancho” Villa killing 14 American soldiers and 10 civilians during a cross-border raid in Columbus, N.M.

Gen. John J. Pershing took 15,000 men into Mexico to hunt Villa down, but this was not easy with mules and wagons trying to push 500 miles (200 into Mexico) over very rough terrain. Realizing it quickly needed mechanized transport, the U.S. Army placed an order for 147 FWD trucks on April 6, 1916. When FWD asked for a four-week delay, the National Defense Act was invoked, so 44 trucks that had been made, painted and put on a train for the British Army, were unloaded, and painted olive drab for the U.S. Army.

When advised that the British order would be held up, that country’s Ambassador in Washington demanded immediate shipment. This inspired Walter Olen to travel to the capital to settle the problem. The solution agreed to was to again repaint the 44 trucks and send them to England. Then, a revised U.S. Army order for 28 trucks and 40 trained drivers and mechanics was prioritized. The company committed all of its old and new resources to the project and made the first shipment to Gen. Pershing on May 19, 1916.

In Mexico, the FWD trucks performed well again. Even Capt. Williams was involved in assessing their capabilities. His official report said, “the FWD is proving its superiority to all others (trucks) in the Mexican service. By January 18, 1917, another trainload of trucks was sent to a military facility in Honolulu, Hawaii making the 8th Regiment of Artillery the first fully mechanized unit of the U.S. Army. The unit had 30 Holt tractors, three Army-scout motorcycles, a Ford truck equipped with rapid-fire light weapons and 36 FWD military trucks, including a machine shop truck and supply and ammunition carriers.

By April 1917, America was heading for involvement in World War I. Walter Olen told his board that, in the specter of war, the company should prioritize U.S. military orders over foreign orders. This was a bit of a hard sell, since half the board members were of German descent. In the end, they decided to be patriotic and accept Olen’s guidance.

The U.S. Army didn’t place an order for trucks until that July, but it was huge. In fact, at that time it was the biggest order the Army had ever placed with a single manufacturer. It called for production of 3,750 3-ton FWD Model B trucks to be delivered at the rate of 175 per month. To meet it, FWD had to hire additional men from all around Clintonville, train the new employees, arrange to construct housing for thousands of soldiers and train a certain number of the fighting men how to drive FWD trucks.

FWD’s success over only five years converted Clintonville from a small city into a boom town. Local residents who had purchased shares of the company suddenly became “wise investors.” A Liberty Loan drive in the city quickly raised $183,000 (against a $50,000 goal). Three other automakers — Premier, Mitchell and Kissel — got contracts to use their factories to build FWD trucks. By mid-summer 1918, FWD had made 10,000 trucks for the U.S. government alone. By war’s end, 35,000 trucks were shipped.

Trucks shipped to Europe included 24,000 used for hauling and supplying cargo, 4,197 ammunition carriers and 5,000 used for other military purposes. And this was 50 percent less than the estimated number needed to supply 2 million soldiers with 25,000 tons of supplies each day. Canadian soldiers said FWD meant “For Wonderful Delivery.” On Armistice Day on Nov. 11, 1918, FWD had 1,600 male employees producing 20 trucks per day, or 600 trucks each month. The factory’s floor space amounted to 185,351 sq. ft.

In the post-WWI era, business slowed and Clintonville shrunk. Trucks that returned to the U.S. were sold cheaply in the war surplus market. The Model B remained in production until 1930, but all-new FWD trucks were designed for purpose-built uses as snow plows, utility trucks, fire engines and oil field service trucks.

During World War II, FWD produced over 30,000 military vehicles, but it wasn’t easy. As in WWI, the manufacture of war goods challenged its production capacity. As with the earlier conflict, the first WWII orders came from England and were for 12 trucks with earth borers. That was followed by an order for 500 FWD SU models, which was doubled by the end of the year. That same year, the U.S. Marine Corps ordered 60 FWDs to be used for troop landings. Then, the U.S. Engineers ordered trucks for bridge builders. Canada placed a large order for 221 SU and HR models. Great Britain ordered 50 log haulers.

Since the prospect of American entry into the war was looming, civilian customers tried to place orders while trucks were available. From March of 1940 to October of 1941, Congress authorized spending more than $63,000,000 for national defense. Shortly after the attack on Pearl Harbor, FDR announced that the U.S. would supply its allies with an amazing 60,000 aircraft, 45,000 tanks, 8,000,000 tons of shipping and other war goods. In 1942, war production went up 300 percent and in 1943 it rose 500 percent.

FWD benefitted greatly. It’s 1941 production rose 300 percent to $16,123,072. At the end of ’42 it was up to $24,028,601. In 1943, it reached $39,192,489. At the end of the war the annual figure was $468,000,000. Employment doubled and then tripled. On Dec. 16, 1943, FWD won its first Army-Navy E award. It would be honored with three more in 1944 and 1945. There were 3,000 FWD employees in Clintonville on V-J Day.

As usual, postwar business tapered off and FWD sales slowed down. In 1958, FWD became FWD Corp. In 1963, it acquired Seagrave Fire Apparatus and moved it from Columbus, Ohio, to Clintonville. In 2003, FWD, FWD Corp., Seagrave, Baker Aerialscope and Almonte sold to an investment group. Seagrave is now the flagship firm of ELB Capital Management. Former American LaFrance exec James Hebe heads it.

On a recent museum visit we started at the Zachow & Besserdich machine shop. Inside was a 1911 car called the Nancy Hank that was used for U.S. Army testing and for picking up mail at the FWD factory. There was also an unrestored FWD Model B chassis, a prototype 1-1/2-ton Army test truck and a four-wheel-drive racing car called the “Butterball Special.” Also stored there was the steam engine first used in the “Battleship.”

The old building also contained many old photographs. We also saw Walter A. Olens’ desk and office furnishings, an old trade show counter and an exhibit on an early FWD female test driver named Luella Bates who demonstrated that women could drive FWD trucks and taught many soldiers how to. There were other FWD historical artifacts.

About two miles away was the much larger, former Topp-Stewart factory. Another part is more modern and dates from when Atlas Conveyor Co., Nordberg, Rexnord and Badger Transport were in operations there. The more modern part of the building has up-to-date LED lighting and gigantic gantry cranes that can pick up and move large trucks.

In one area was The Battleship along with a line of trucks angle parked in “exhibit” style. They included a rare FWD Model B military truck from the late-Don Chew’s collection in Colorado. It was donated to the FWD Foundation by Chew’s family. Next, to it was a 1914 Model B Ammunitions Carrier that was a British Army unit in WWI. It had a camouflage paint job. On the other side of the room was one of a handful of Teracruisers that FWD built for the U.S. Air Force. They were the largest vehicles FWD ever built.

In another area was an assortment of wooden and aluminum patterns that had been used to cast metal parts for FWD trucks. There were hundreds and hundreds of patterns stored on pallets that were stacked three or four high. Also stored in the building then were photographs and documents that are being digitized, thousands of very old glass plate photo negatives from the early days of FWD and huge light-up FWD logos. These have now been moved into a former supermarket that will house the archives.

The Four Wheel Drive Foundation runs the FWD Museum. It’s a non-profit, charitable organization formed to maintain and expand a historical museum to house vehicles and memorabilia pertaining to the early development of the four-wheel-drive principle. The Foundation takes donations of vehicles, as well as documents to archive and manage under the guidelines of the National Association of Automobile Museums.

The Foundation is seeking to preserve historical films and to create new films and media. Members are developing outreach programs and activities and hope to market commemoratives. The Foundation is tax-exempt and donations are fully tax deductible. Donations should go to the Four Wheel Drive Foundation, in care of John Rosenheim, CPA, Secretary, Treasurer, 79 8th Street, Clintonville, WI 54929. Check the Foundation’s website www.fourwheeldrivefoundation.com for admission costs and hours of operation. 

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