When people think of the auto industry, they usually think of Henry Ford and Detroit. What most people don't know is that in the 1890s Cleveland was the automobile capital of America. One reason for this was a Scottish immigrant and bicycle company owner named Alexander Winton.
The Winton Motor Carriage Company went into business on March 15, 1897. Their first automobiles were built by hand. Each vehicle had fancy painted sides, padded seats, a leather roof, and gas lamps. B.F. Goodrich made the tires for Winton. By 1897, Winton had already produced two fully operational prototype automobiles. In May of 1897, the 10 horsepower model achieved the astonishing speed of 33.64 mph on a test around a Cleveland horse track. However, people were still skeptical of the new invention. To prove his automobile's durability and usefulness, Alexander Winton had his car undergo an 800-mile endurance run from Cleveland to New York City.
On March 24, 1898 Robert Allison of Port Carbon, Pennsylvania became one of the first men to buy an American-built automobile when he bought a Winton for around $1,000. Allison had seen an advertisement for the car in Scientific American. Later that year the Winton Motor Carriage Company sold twenty-one more vehicles. One of those customers was James Ward Packard, who would later become the founder of Packard automobile company. It is believed that Packard was not satisfied with his car and complained to Winton. The story goes that Winton challenged him to do better. That same year, Leo Melanowski, Winton's Chief Engineer, invited Henry Ford to come to Cleveland for an interview at the Winton Company. Alexander Winton was not impressed with Henry and decided not to hire him. Henry went back to Detroit to continue working on his second Quadricycle. These miscues would eventually come back to haunt Winton.
More than one hundred Winton vehicles were sold in 1898, making the company the largest manufacturer of gas-powered automobiles in the United States. By 1901, widespread publicity continued to increase interest in the Wintons. That year, news that members of the wealthy Vanderbilt family had purchased Winton automobiles boosted the company's image substantially. It was around this time that Winton built a new factory complex at 10601 Berea Road, on Cleveland's far west side. Later that year, however, a Winton automobile lost a race near Detroit to one of Henry Ford's cars. Winton vowed to come back and defeat Ford. He produced the 1902 Winton Bullet, which set an unofficial land speed record of 70 mph in Cleveland that year. Despite its speed, 'The Bullet' was defeated by another Ford later in the year. The company received some positive publicity In 1903, though, when Dr. Horatio Nelson Jackson made the first successful automobile drive across the United States in a Winton. The trip took 64 days, including breakdowns, delays while waiting for parts to arrive, and the time it took hoisting the Winton up and over rocky terrain and mudholes.
In the 1910s Winton continued to market his expensive, custom-made cars primarily to wealthy consumers. This would eventually lead to the company's downfall, as by the 1920s Winton was unable to compete with the less expensive, mass produced cars like those made on Henry Ford's assembly lines. In 1922, Winton made only 690 cars, and on February 11, 1924, the Winton Motor Car Co. ceased car production.
]]>Alexander Winton was a Scottish immigrant. In 1897, established the Cleveland-based Winton Motor Carriage Co. The company was a success, enabling Winton to build a large estate for himself and his family at the current location of Winton Place at 12700 Lake Avenue in Lakewood. He named the estate Roseneath. Built in 1903, Roseneath boasted 25 rooms, beautiful gardens, and picturesque views of Lake Erie.
Winton enjoyed a banner year in 1903. Not only did he see his family estate completed. His auto plant located on Berea Road also became the largest in the world that year, after operations had outgrown its previous location on East 45th in 1902. The list of accomplishments attributed to the Winton Motor Carriage Co. is too long to include in its entirety, but some of its most notable accomplishments include:
(1) Making the first commercial sale of a standard domestic automobile in 1898; (2) producing the first vehicle to have the moniker "automobile" ascribed to it (The term was used first by Charles Shanks, a Plain Dealer reporter who Alexander Winton drove from Cleveland to New York in 1899); (3) producing the first mail truck to successfully serve the United States Postal Service; (4) achieving a speed of 70mph on a newly paved Clifton Boulevard in 1902, an unofficial land speed record at the time; and (5) producing the first automobile which traveled the continental United States coast-to-coast (San Francisco to New York City) in 1903.
Interestingly enough, Winton was encouraged by one of his engineers to hire a young Henry Ford, but Winton denied him a position. Ford would go on to produce the comparatively inexpensive Model T roadster. Costing around $390, Ford's widely successful Model T was partially responsibly for the demise of Winton's automobile production in 1924, as Winton's least expensive model cost $2,295. Although Winton automobile production ceased in 1924, the Winton Engine Corporation, established in 1912 as the Winton Engine Company, would continue on and eventually be integrated into the General Motors Corporation in 1930.
The decline of the Winton Motor Carriage Co. depleted Winton's personal fortune significantly, leading him to sell Roseneath and move to a smaller home in Clifton Park. Roseneath itself was destroyed by fire in 1962, laying the groundwork for the construction of Winton Place luxury apartments on the Gold Coast. Completed in 1963, the 30-story Winton Place became the tallest high-rise apartment building between New York and Chicago and the tallest building in the Greater Cleveland area outside downtown. Currently, all that remains of the mansion is a yellow-brick wall bearing an inscription of the name "Roseneath."
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