Studebaker was best known for automobiles, but its history went much further back than that. It began in 1852, when Clem and Henry Studebaker started building wagons in their blacksmith shop in South Bend, Indiana. The enterprise prospered and grew into what they claimed was the world鈥檚 largest producer of horse-drawn vehicles.
Studebaker entered the automobile business in 1902 with an electric car, but soon phased it out and switched to gasoline engines.
Studebaker鈥檚 fortunes varied over the years, but generally they developed a reputation for reliable, quality cars that excelled in setting stock-car speed records.
Studebaker acquired Pierce Arrow Motor Car Co. in 1928, but all this did was lead them to a brush with extinction in 1933. Receivership resulted, but they managed to recover and survive through the 1930s Depression.
Studebaker broke new ground in 1939 with the introduction of its all-new compact Champion model. This lighter, slimmer version of a full-size car proved very popular and help Studebaker recover from the Depression. It set the tone for their cars for many years.
During the Second World War, all automobile manufacturing stopped and car companies contributed to the war effort. Studebaker鈥檚 input included trucks and radial aircraft engines.
When peace came, there was a rush to resume production to meet the pent-up car demand created by the Depression and the industry shutdown.
It was seller鈥檚 paradise, and the established companies returned to building slightly modified pre-war designs while preparing new postwar models. Studebaker was no exception. It began offering 1942 designs with new trim and mouldings, but its line did not include the Commander and President models they had offered in 1942. They produced the Champion only, now called the Skyway Champion.
During the later part of the war, Studebaker engaged freelance industrial designer Raymond Loewy, stylist of the original 1939 Champion, to create a new postwar car. Loewy favoured light cars with svelte, tight lines, and those were the principles that guided him in shaping the new Studebaker.
Loewy, assisted by Studebaker鈥檚 in-house styling chief Virgil Exner, had the new car ready shortly after the war. Studebaker鈥檚 main wartime contribution of Curtiss-Wright aircraft engines had not disrupted its car assembly lines too much, so it was able to quickly return to production. After selling its slightly disguised 1942 models for a few months, it was ready to launch its all-new 1947 Loewy design.
The new Loewy-Exner 1947 Studebakers were a sensation. The envelope body, integrated fenders, flat flanks and distinctive trunk outline combined to form what we now call a 鈥渢hree-box鈥� design.
It was comprised of a clearly delineated hood, cabin and trunk. The Starlight coupe, as it came to be known, was particularly futuristic with a rear window that wrapped all the way around from door to door, making the roof appear to float above it.
Studebakers were so symmetrical front to rear that humorists soon began calling them the 鈥渃oming or going cars,鈥� suggesting they couldn鈥檛 tell the front from the back. But in spite of jokes and mild ridicule, Studebaker was clearly charting the future direction in automobile styling.
The small company from South Bend, Indiana, had stolen a march on Detroit鈥檚 Big Three (General Motors, Ford and Chrysler) who would take until 1949 to bring out their full line of postwar, three-box cars.
The new 1947 Studebaker Champion, Commander and Land Cruiser were introduced in April 1946 and went on sale in June. The Commander and Land Cruiser were essentially Champions with a longer wheelbase, with the hood, front fenders and rear doors extended.
Styling was the 1947 Studebaker鈥檚 claim to fame because their technology was carried over from pre-war designs. The 2.8-litre (170 cu in.) side-valve, 80-horsepower, six-cylinder Champion engine came from the pre-war Champion, and the 3.7-litre (226 cu. in.) Commander/Land Cruiser side-valve six dated back to the early 1930s.
Although Studebaker experimented with torsion bars, it ended up using its pre-war 鈥淧lanar鈥� double-A-frame front suspension with transverse leaf springing. At the rear were conventional leaf springs and a solid axle.
Studebaker styling remained basically unchanged, except for trim and grille treatments, until 1950, when their 鈥渂ullet nose鈥� models arrived. By this time, the rest of the industry had caught up, and Studebaker no longer held the styling advantage.
In spite of some excellent designs such as the Hawk series and the futuristic Avanti, Studebaker suffered the plight of other small automakers and disappeared from the scene. It lasted until 1966, and built its last cars in its Canadian plant in Hamilton, Ont.
But for those few years following the Second World War, the audacious little company from South Bend led the industry in styling.
