The Milburn Light Electric
Version 2.8
For more information about Milburn, please see the L-O webpage
The story of the Milburn family and their farm wagon company is fascinating and worth investigating. Merchant George Milburn purchased the original wagon company in 1848. His daughter Ann married Clement Studebaker, tying together the families who built the two largest wagon companies in North America. Milburn Wagon moved from the small - South Bend adjacent - town of Mishawaka Indiana to the bustling bayside city of Toledo, Ohio for better infrastructure, shipping access, and political support. An impressive new Toledo factory was built in 1873-1875 on Monroe Street.
However, the Milburn family had about as much to do with electric cars, as Chief Pontiac’s family had to do with gasoline ones.
The Milburn family’s equity was eroded by a series of disasters. During construction of their grand state-of-the-art factory a major storm occurred, collapsing much of the unfinished building. Shortly after operation began, a pair of fires required infusions of more capitol, further diluting the Milburn family’s equity stake.
Some of the funding came from Frank Dunlevy Suydam the principal owner of the Toledo Bending Co, a supplier of wagon parts, and the son of an attorney who owned a successful wagon wheel and carriage company in nearby Lebanon Ohio. Frank’s father had recently succumbed to injuries resulting from moving a building, giving him money to invest. As the second generation of the Milburn family lost interest, Suydam, and other affluent Toledo businessmen, bought them out. The new owners and directors were often in compatible industries, such as wholesale lumber and woodworking machinery. Charles F. Milburn was the youngest son and had the strongest interest in wagon building. He was the factory superintendent by 1880, and became company President in 1888. The Toledo interests eventually bought out his position, and Charles moved to Chattanooga Tennessee, where Milburn had an established wagon repository. He went back into the carriage business with W. J. Bass, and built a fine mansion on high ground.
Frank Suydam became the company’s driving force. In 1876 he was elected Secretary, and in 1894 he became President, a position that he held until his death in April of 1911. He, along with his partners and sons, made Milburn into a very successful wagon and carriage company.
When motorcars emerged as an economic force, Milburn started making auto bodies and electric cars. Throughout its electric car period, Milburn’s main business was as a contract body builder for other automobile companies, specializing in light panel truck bodies, with electric car manufacturing occupying a smaller part of the factory complex, involving about a quarter of the workforce. The Electrics were mostly a coach building and assembly process, as the platform and running gear were made elsewhere.
Frank’s second son, Horace Suydam, attended the University of Michigan. A fellow electrical engineering graduate, and tennis teammate, was Henry Perkins Dodge. Dodge had the idea of an electric automobile with a solenoid type controller similar to those used in streetcars. In 1908 Henry Perkins “Perc” Dodge, with his older brother Frederick Holms Dodge, founded the Ohio Electric Carriage Company to make electric luxury cars.
They needed partners and a place to produce the car. Around February of 1909, Perc looked up his college teammate and made an agreement with his father. The bodybuilding and assembly was done in part of the Milburn factory. The new car was called the Ohio.
The Ohio Electric Carriage Company was incorporated that September and capitalized at $75,000; with lumber baron Abram M. Chesbrough as president; Frank Suydam Jr., secretary; and James Brown Bell (husband of Marie Suydam) treasurer. Also on the board were Rathbun Fuller (VP Toledo Railways & Light Co.), H. P. Dodge’s father-in-law, Harry E. Marvin, and footwear wholesaler Robert R. Lee. H. P. Dodge was general manager. Production of the Ohio commenced in late 1909 with the 1910 model.
Ohio and Milburn were considering a merger, but after Frank Suydam’s unexpected death from appendicitis, in the spring of 1911, Horace Suydam, Milburn’s secretary since 1896, became president. He favored a new generation of simpler, lower priced electrics, using the Milburn Company’s efficient, highly mechanized, body assembly techniques, which kept Milburn a price point leader in wagons and carriages long after many such enterprises had failed. Predictably, H. P. “Perc” Dodge wanted to continue developing his concept for the perfect luxury Coupé, and moved Ohio Electric to a new home a few blocks away on Bancroft Avenue.
At the time of the split, Milburn was making farm wagons, buggies, and bodies for nearby automobile manufacturers Willys-Overland and Pope-Toledo. Around 1911-1912 Milburn was also building delivery truck bodies for the Model T Ford. Detroit was only 60 miles to the North.
Milburn had a market cap of $700,000 with 550-600 employees. The market cap of Ohio had risen to $150,000.
Horace had Milburn buy the Toledo Bending Co, which was owned by the late F. D. Suydam Sr. and his younger brother, Henri H. Suydam.
In 1913 Milburn was run by: Horace W. Suydam president; Hiram R. Kelsey vice president; Frank D. Suydam Jr. secretary; and Frank Hafer, treasurer. Also on the board were A. G. Wright Jr., William I. Grove, William A. Gosline Jr, Thomas Vanstone, and Herbert Baker. G. W. Schamp was the purchasing agent. Capitalized with $375,000 in preferred stock at 6%, and 325,000 common shares, there were no bonds.
In 1914 many of those who left with the Ohio Electric project returned to make the lower price electric favored by Horace Suydam, who continued as president; Dr. Otto Marx, became the vice president; Frank D. Suydam Jr., continued as secretary; and Frederick H. Dodge, became treasurer; R. S. Woodhull was the sales manager.
Light-yet-robust vehicle platform specialist Karl Probst designed the mechanicals and George Woodfield designed the bodies––both had distinguished careers before and after Milburn. This lighter, less expensive, electric Coupé was promoted vigorously, and rapidly gained market share, triggering a price war among established brands. The first company slogan was “weighs nearly ton less.” Some of the initial weight and price savings came from using only half the battery voltage that had become standard with the established manufacturers. The weight saving was only 50 lbs, as the fewer cells had 17-plates per cell rather than the standard 9, thereby giving similar capacity in watt-hours. Some of this saving was lost to the heavier wire needed in the motor circuit.
A small part of the weight saving was in an idea advertised as being found in European car designs of the time, and was also used in the 1914 Columbian Electric, made in Detroit, another lighter and cheaper electric. By cantilevering the chrome vanadium front and rear springs, a shorter chassis was achieved for the same wheelbase. This design took weight saving a bit too far, as running at an angle into a trolley track or curb could bend the steering linkage, and there was no place to bolt a bumper. The Columbian was noticeably smaller than a typical mid-teens electric coupé, too small to be taken seriously. The initial Milburn model 15 was about halfway between the Columbian and a typical Brougham. The Milburn cost fifty dollars less than the Columbian.
Milburn started with three models, a Coupé, a Roadster, and a light delivery truck. Starting with the delivery truck, and continuing with the model 22 Brougham, Probst replaced the cantilevered front spring design with standard half-elliptic front springs, hung from extended frame horns. The rear springs remained cantilevered. In 1917 Milburn accepted the advantages of the 80-volt battery and more conventional chassis for their new model 27 Brougham.
The worm-gear rear axle had a rather large nickel-steel worm gear driving a relatively small bronze alloy worm wheel, with a ratio of 9.75 to 1. The driveshaft was of one piece with no U-joints, similar to the design introduced by Baker Electric in 1904 and adopted by Ohio Electric in 1910. The steel side panels were welded into one piece, creating a smooth seamless effect. They employed sash-less windows and steel crown fenders.
The lower price point, and very aggressive marketing, helped make the Milburn popular, and a little more competitive with the new luxury gas cars, which had begin employing electric starting and lighting systems.
Milburn was the last significant manufacturer of electric cars to enter the market in the twentieth century. They used aggressive marketing during their growth period (1916-1917), with more stylish color ads and brochures than their competitors, just ahead of Baker and Rauch & Lang. Based on the extravagant color ads, which seem to have taken artistic liberties as to color options––most cars were painted one solid color. Two-tone cars had the panels and hoods in color, with the chassis, window frames, and fenders in black. Originally offered in royal blue or Brewster green, colors in the illustrations were often pastel, and included pink, white, burgundy, light blue, royal blue, grey, and brown.
According to Detroit Electric battery maker E. T. Stretch, the electric car part of the Milburn factory was mostly an assembly plant, with the chassis and electrical components made by other companies. The electric car operation had about 200-250 employees.
George H. Woodfield worked at Milburn through the electric car era, and was listed as a body engineer. Considering his background and subsequent career he was very likely responsible for the look of the cars as well as the body integrity. Woodfield is credited with setting up the body tooling and processes that made Milburn a leader in the enclosed wood frame body business, both personal and commercial. Enclosed light delivery bodies became their specialty. While at Milburn, Woodfield invented a mechanical window-lifter made by sister company Dura, and used in all Milburns.
During the late teens Milburn expanded its model range to include some faux radiator sedans and two types of limousines, intended for taxi service. Neither of these sold very well, and none remain.
According to a company press release, more cars were sold in the first six months of 1919 than total sales for any previous year. Unfortunately, on December 16, 1919, in the middle of the night, the main factory suffered a major fire, said to have caused $800,000 to $1,000,000 damage. The east wing of the original factory, with paint & trim shops, along with the company offices, was destroyed. Quite a few cars were in storage for delivery the next spring; they were moved to safety before the fire reached them. Assembly, paint, and trimming moved to a four story brick and concrete building on the campus of the University of Toledo that the government had built to train Army mechanics. The offices moved to a building downtown, which had been occupied by the Red Cross. Body manufacturing remained at what was left of the Monroe Street location, delivery bodies and custom work continued at factory number 2 on Summit, the old Toledo Bending plant. In January of 1920, at the New York Auto Show, sales head R. S. Woodhall told the press that because the body factory was not affected, manufacturing had restarted after only ten days, with production expected to be back to full capacity by March of 1920.
From approximately 1919 to 1923 Milburn was probably the largest producer of electric pleasure cars in North America, as competition had all but vanished. Only Detroit Electric, and Rauch & Lang, was still limping along, in much smaller factories. Probst remained the chief engineer at Milburn until April of 1923. Later he consulted on the Jeep design at the American Bantam Car Company.
In February 1923 the company’s major assets, including the 20-acre grounds with the coach-works, lumberyard, and mill, were sold to the Buick Manufacturing Co (General Motors) for two million dollars. GM turned around and put the factories up for sale five months later, as capacity at the recently acquired Fisher Body Company plants made the factories redundant. Milburn ran the plants through April to finish current contracts for Oldsmobile Brougham bodies. The last few electric cars from that factory were shipped by May. On July 16th of 1923, Toledo Milburn dealer J. A. Kellam took over control of the remaining electric car and truck company, handling sales and distribution, while H. W. Suydam remained in charge of service. Milburn never returned to strength. They sold cars, trucks, and parts, until they ran out of remaining stock.
Milburn car owners included William H. Seward (son of Lincoln’s secretary of state), Col. Webb C. Hays (son of US president Rutherford B. Hays and co-founder of Union Carbide), Atwater Kent Jr., and football legend Amos Alonzo Stagg. Woodrow Wilson’s Secret Service borrowed a Milburn, as Wilson objected to the sound of a motor running behind his carriage.
The total number sold was around 4,500 units; a figure of 7,000 is often quoted, but is not supported by the known serial numbers. At least 50 of the Broughams remain.