In the earliest days of the automobile, if you wanted one, you built it yourself, or at least you attempted to. We don’t know how many, working away in barns and workshops in and around Kansas City, never achieved their goal of a self-propelled vehicle. We barely have records of a few who, to some degree, succeeded.

The earliest evidence of a car being built in Kansas City is blueprints to a three-wheeled electric vehicle designed by John R. Elberg and built with Dr. H.C. Baker in 1894. Elberg remained in the automobile business as a maker of windshields, tops, and limousine bodies for early motorcars.

John C. Higdon, a patent attorney, claimed to have built a “spring motor wagon” in Kansas City in 1896. Higdon later used the vehicle, essentially a motorized buckboard with passenger benches, for promotion of his law practice in St. Louis, and unsuccessfully sued makers of motorized buggies for supposed patent infringement.

Early attempts in Kansas City to manufacture an automobile proved commercially difficult. The Day Automobile Company planned to build automobiles in Kansas City, Kansas, and delivery vans in St. Louis. But after building only a single delivery wagon in 1901, it then concentrated on sales of Oldsmobiles and Locomobiles.

In 1902, Robert Greenlease opened the Hummer Motor Car Company at 217 E 15th Street, but the company folded two years later after having built only three cars. Greenlease instead became a prominent Kansas City Cadillac dealer. William Howey opened the Howey Motor Car Company in Kansas City in 1903, but closed after making only seven Howeys. Howey instead became a developer of land for citrus cultivation in Florida.

The Caps Brothers Manufacturing Company at 317-19 Southwest Boulevard started off promising in 1905, making small runabouts and touring cars powered by a 14-hp, two-cylinder, air-cooled engine. However it was taken over by the Kansas City Motor Car Company who soon claimed in advertisements to have a large factory in Sheffield, commercial vehicles with up to a six-ton load capacity, and a long-wheelbase touring car with a 75-hp six-cylinder engine capable of 70 mph (extraordinary performance specs for a 1907 motorcar). Whether or not the advertised claims were true, the company found itself in receivership by the end of 1907. Renaming itself once again, it became the Wonder Motor Car Company and built a warmed-over version of the original Caps car, until the factory closed for good in 1909.

Unknown is how many 18-hp, two-passenger runabouts and 35-hp, seven-passenger touring cars were actually built by the Croesus Motor Car Company in 1907. But from 1909 to 1912, the W. A. Salter Motor Company, located at 1510-1516 Oakland Avenue, did build five-passenger touring cars and two-passenger roadsters. Both were equipped with a 40-hp, 6.3-liter, F-head four cylinder engine and a planetary transmission, and both sold for $1,750. How many were sold and whether any still exist is another matter.

Image Top Left:
The Elberg-Baker electric vehicle designed and built in 1894.

Image Left #2:
The Day steam delivery wagon built for a dry goods company in 1901.

Image Left #3:
A 1905 advertisement for the 20-hp runabout by the Kansas City Motor Car Company.

Image In Green to the Right:
A 1906 advertisement for the Kansas City touring car and commercial vehicle.

Image Bottom Left:
A 1907 advertisement for a 75-hp touring car built by the Kansas City Motor Car Company.

Image Right Top:
The Higdon & Higdon “spring motor wagon” built in 1896.

Image Middle Middle:
The Caps brothers in one of their motor cars in front of Loretta Academy, W 39th and Roanoke, 1905.

Image Bottom Right:
A 1909 advertisement for the Kansas City Wonder.