Before the Impala! Also made a track inspection car!
Russell Motor Car Company
CCM experimented with gas-powered tricycles and quadricycles, the steam Locomobile and the electric _Ivanhoe_automobiles. The Locomobile had a short range of only 20 miles and froze up in winter. It was discontinued in 1902.
The two-seat Ivanhoe had a range of 40 miles and could reach 14 miles per hour! It was designed by H.P.Maxim, son of Hiram Maxim, inventor of the famous Maxim self-powered machine gun and other things like the mouse trap! CCM formed the Russell Motor Car Company and expanded the CCM plant on Weston Road for auto production. It was named after Thomas Alexander Russell (1877-1940) CCM’s general manager and later its president. In 1905 it produced the Russell model A, a two-cylinder gas engine automobile, sturdy and powerful with pneumatic tires and a three speed transmission it was an instant success even at a price of $1,300 ($500 more than the Ford Model C) which was a lot of money a century ago when workers were paid 25 cents and hour, ten hours a day, six days a week. The model A was followed by the Model B as well as police cars, fire engines and delivery trucks.
The Canadian Magazine April 1906
Russell obtained exclusive Canadian rights to the Knight gasolene engine,
Thanks for persisting Firelock. Nice book for my collection. Thanks to you know who as well, of course. No kid growing up in Canada didn’t have something from CCM.
The terms “sheep trek” and “kangaroo bushes” are unknown in Australia.
As I indicated, sheep stations are generally open grassland with very few trees. The Russell cars might indeed have been used on sheep stations, but the photo is likely to have been taken on a road through a thick forest area, possibly to give a background for a publicity photograph.
American cars were very popular in rural Australia up until the 1960s.
Of course many of these cars were Canadian, particularly Fords, Ford Australia being a subsidiary of Ford Canada, but I recall Pontiac Parisiennes, Fargo trucks and so on. By 1960, locally designed Ford, GM and Chrysler cars were being built with relatively high ground clearance.
The cars had to be strong. Someone, possibly in Windsor Ontario, decided that the Ford Falcon was just right for Australia. It looked good and was the right size but fell to pieces on rural roads. The engineers had to use thicker sheet and more welds and more subtle changes to keep the cars in one piece. The suspension components needed changes too, of course.
This wasn’t confined to Ford. Years later, GM decided to use the German Opel Commodore (an Opel Rekord with a six cylinder engine). The GM engineers all knew about Ford’s problems and an unexpected change was made. The German car had a counterbalanced engine hood, pretty standard for the period. But thi
That will do! Had me hopping all over the kitchen. Throw in some strong fiddle stuff and it could be a tune from up here with French origins. Music truly is universal and timeless.
Vince, if you liked that you’ll love this, nothing to do with sheep, it’s a fisherman song done by Liam Clancy. Liam tells the story.
Haunting and timeless with an undercurrent of pride, it could be about fishermen anywhere, the British Isles, the Canadian Maritime provinces, New England, the Chesapeake, just anywhere.
Adverts for the Russell auto.
