It’s hard to say just where Benjamin F. Gregory (1889-1974) belongs in this museum. Some call him a visionary. Others a nutcase. Further harming his legacy is the fact that Gregory was a fabulous promoter and teller of stories with great details. But great details don’t necessarily equal facts.

There is no question that Gregory believed in the concept of front-wheel drive, but he was neither the first champion of the concept nor the first to utilize it in racing cars. J. Walter Christie of New Jersey patented a front-wheel drive system in 1904 and began racing front-wheel-drive cars in 1905. It was when Gregory drove one of Christie’s cars in 1912 that Gregory was first exposed to the idea.

Around 1919, a front-wheel-drive race car was built that Gregory drove in performance exhibitions. Barnstorming was popular entertainment at the time, and was how many people in small towns saw for the first time race cars, airplanes, or professional athletes. Gregory’s car utilized a 90-hp, Curtiss OX-5 airplane engine. Later the engine was replaced with a Hispano-Suiza airplane engine which Gregory claimed to have purchased after selling two diamonds stolen from a brothel madam for whom Gregory worked as a limousine driver. Now with twice the horsepower, the car was clocked, according to Gregory, at 140 mph (which would have been a new land speed record at the time).

Gregory then attempted to put a front-wheel-drive car into production. The best information indicates that the car was based on a Scripps-Booth chassis with the engine and transmission swung around, with the front of the engine mounted against the firewall, sending power forward through the transmission, a de Dion-style differential, and half-shafts connected to the front wheels with U-joints. Much of the mechanical design was likely worked out by O. E. Szekely, a Hungarian-born engineer who later was issued several patents, including one for a torque and speed transmission device. (Harry Miller’s famous 1925 front-wheel-drive racing car used a similar design, only much more successfully, coming in second in the Indianapolis 500 race).

The Gregory production car was to sell for $1,550, and some estimate 10, perhaps even 30, roadsters and touring cars were built at a Moline, Illinois, factory around 1921. A picture taken at the 1921 Kansas City Auto Show is proof that at least one was made. However, the cars had a heavy front axle and tended to “fight the driver.” Gregory declared bankruptcy in 1922.

Gregory disappeared from the auto scene for about 25 years, instead becoming a barnstorming pilot who gave airplane rides to (his claim) 600,000 people. After surviving his seventh airplane crash (again his claim), he decided it was best to retire from barnstorming. After WWII, he started a company called Gregory Front-Drive Motor Cars in his shop at 2537 Southwest Boulevard. A 1947 prototype of a small coupe featured a rear-mounted, 22-hp, aircraft engine which, via a drive shaft, powered the front wheels!

His next project in 1953 was a two-seat sports car featuring the rear-engine/rear-drive powertrain of a Porsche 356 mounted in the front, creating a front-engine/front drive roadster. The car solved the steering issue of 30 years earlier through the use of Rzeppa-design constant velocity joints. He hoped to sell 20 of them at $5,000 each. His prototype, which still survives, was the only one ever built.

One prototype developed by Gregory did reach production. Gregory formed the Mid-America Research Corporation in 1946 and hired four of the engineers who worked on the original Bantam jeep project to develop a new ultra-light jeep. With an all-aluminum body, a fully independent suspension, and a 65-inch wheelbase, the MM422 “Mighty Mite”, as it was called, was light enough to be carried by helicopters to the front lines. The Porsche flat-four used in the prototype was replaced with an AMC-built, air-cooled V4, and the wheelbase was eventually extended to 71 inches. American Motors built a total of 3,922 Mighty Mites exclusively for the Marine Corps from 1959 to 1962.

[ Appreciation to the Missouri Valley Special Collections of the Kansas City Public Library for photographs ]

Image Left 1:
Ben Gregory at the wheel of his Curtiss-powered, front-wheel-drive race car, about 1919.

Image Left 2:
The 1947 prototype of a small coupe with a rear-mounted, 22-hp, aircraft engine which, via a drive shaft, powered the front wheels!

Image Left 3:
The 1953 prototype sports car which used the normally rear-mounted Porsche 356 engine and transaxle in the front, creating a front-engine/front drive roadster.

Image Left 4:
The Gregory prototype sports car, made with a plastic body mounted on a tube frame, survives and is seen at the occasional car show.

Image Right 1:
Mr. and Mrs. Benjamin F. Gregory in 1926.

Image Right 2:
A Gregory roadster at the 1921 Kansas City Auto Show, proof that at least one car was assembled. The KCFD badge on the front of the car stands for “Kansas City Front Drive.”

Image Right 3:
Ben Gregory in the cockpit of a plane he used for barnstorming small towns.

Image Right 4:
Gregory’s greatest production success was the MM422 Mighty Mite, built from 1959 to 1962 for the Marine Corps.