7 replies to this topic

[GPevolved]

As a threshold matter, I apologize in advance if I am merely missing the obvious in resolving my question. 

 

My question involves Gottlieb Daimler and his early use of licenses and patents to make money.  Specifically, why was it so hard for Daimler to sell cars in his native Germany?

 

In his book, Mercedes and Auto Racing in the Belle Epoque: 1895 - 1915, Robert Dick states:

"The motorized hippomobile speeded up to more than 15 km/h, threatening all passerby, dogs and horses between Cannstatt, Untertürkeim and Esslingen until the authorities strictly forbade 'further driving trials with the auto-carriage.'  Gottlieb Daimler realized than in the Germany of 1886 there was no artiface that could sell a gasoline carriage..." (Dick at Pg. 10).

 

I suppose my question is a matter of interpretation.  Were motorcars, in fact, illegal in Germany circa 1886, or rather, was the populace so against motorcars that selling them was an unviable business proposition?

 

I suppose there are other possible explanations as well.  If anyone has any thoughts, I'm curious.  Ludvigsen's Quicksilver Century also does not seem to answer this question directly.  

 

Thanks in advance for any thoughts or historical tidbits.  

[Michael Ferner]

I suppose you could just as well ask if personal computers were illegal in Germany (or anywhere else) in the 1970s.

 

As for motorcars, look to Paris, France. Nowhere else in the world were circumstances right for the motorcar to become a "hit". It's mostly a question of money in the right hands, social acceptance, willingness to try something new and the right infrastructure. Not easy to tell this in a few words, you might want to read some general history about the fin de siècle.

[ensign14]

It's not quite the same as the personal computer, because Britain, for example, had largely legislated steam buses off the roads in the Victorian era, which caught cars up in the backwash.  It's more akin that if Germany banned anything travelling at more than 10 mph on roads other than buses then that would have been an effective ban on cars and motorbikes before they existed.

 

The personal computer analogy would have worked if it had been illegal to have any electronic device capable of calculating more than 100 times per second, to protect a monopoly on punched cards.

[Michael Ferner]

All right, if the PC analogy doesn't work for you (and I'm too tired/busy/uninterested to think of something else), then the flat statement that motorcars were not illegal in Germany has to suffice.

 

Edited by Michael Ferner, 13 March 2016 - 10:28.

[GPevolved]

This clarifies, and I appreciated the analogy.  Thanks.

[robert dick]

In the 1880s, the roads were made for pedestrians and dogs, for horse-drawn vehicles, for the cattle, sheep, pigs, geese and ducks. But suddenly horseless carriages appeared on the roads, motor-cars driven by goggled and stop-watched sportsmen. Suddenly any remark or comment of the pedestrians, dogs or horses concerning the speed, appearance, smell or noise of the motor-car and its furred occupants was actionable. But the roads were not made for the sportsmen! So it was no surprise that the populace did not like the horseless carriages.

Originally, there were also a lot of difficulties in France. It was only after countless requests that in May 1873 Amédée Bollée received his "permis de circulation", meaning that he was allowed to drive his Obéissante steamer on the roads of the département de la Sarthe. And after two more years of paperwork, in August 1875, he was allowed to use the steamer in nine French départements, including Paris.
 

[uechtel]

And perhaps also "Cannstatt, Untertürkeim and Esslingen" can not be regarded as representative for whole Germany. These were provincial towns in Württemberg, one of the many semi-independent sub-states in Germany at that time. Certainly not comparable to a future-minded metropole like Paris. So it would be interesting to learn which kind of "authorities" did forbid driving automobiles, for Württemberg only or for the whole empire?

[Michael Ferner]

The local "Schandarm", perhaps...