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Templar Car History

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Some you ancient ones may have heard of the Templar automobile. It was manufactured in Lakewood, Ohio, a suburb of Cleveland, from 1917 until 1924. There were at least thirty car manufacturers in northeast Ohio during these years. The founders of the Templar Motor Company were a group of Knights Templar who were involved in the paving and construction businesses. Sources differ on these details, but some of the names identified with the venture include M.F. Bramley, Arthur M. Dean, J.E. Mathews, W.J. Hunkin and D.C. Reed. They named their car “Templar”, and selected the Maltese Cross as its emblem. This emblem appeared on the door sills, hub caps, gas pedal, arm rests and boarding steps. The name was an excellent choice, invoking …show more content…

Upholstery options were red or black. Fenders were black enamel, and the wheels were natural finish woods. Striping and monograms were extra. E.G. “Cannonball” Baker, who was a famous race car driver of the era, was a promoter for Templar. He challenged all comers to match his Templar in speed, endurance and reliability. In 1919 he drove a Templar from New York to Chicago in twenty-seven hours. This was six hours faster than the previous record, and was accomplished over 992 miles of mud, rain and detours, with an average speed of 36.9 mph. In 1921 he set a new record for a run from Akron to Cleveland in twenty-five minutes, averaging over sixty mph. This record was certified by the AAA. The Templar Motor Company went out of business due to post-war depression, supplier problems and a fire at the factory. But mostly it was competition. These cars were individually hand-made, while Ford and others used production lines and interchangeable parts. This lack of modern manufacturing capability doomed most of the fancy autos of the period. A Cleveland bank seized the company’s assets for default on a loan payment in 1924. Stock in the company had been widely sold, and the investors, about 20,000 of them, lost a total of $6 million, which would be $42 million in today’s

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