Cole Motor Car Company: Indianapolis Luxury Maker and Early V8 Pioneer, 1908 to 1925

Cole Motor Car Company was an early automobile maker based in Indianapolis, Indiana, and its cars were built from 1908 until 1925. They were quality-built luxury cars, and the company is recorded as a pioneer of the V8 engine. Its story begins with a carriage business run by Joseph J. Cole, and it ends with a liquidation that Cole chose rather than risk his fortune on further losses.

Where did the Cole company begin?

Joseph J. Cole, who lived from 1869 to 1925, first tried to build a car in 1903 at Rockford, Illinois. He and his son ran a shop that sold wheels, automobiles, motorbikes and even lawn mowers, and they also carried out mechanical repairs. Their planned four-cylinder touring car, to be sold as the Rockford, went nowhere, so they opened a Rambler dealership instead.

In 1904 Cole bought the Gates-Osborne Carriage Company and renamed it the Cole Carriage Company. There he built his first automobile, a high-wheeled motor buggy with a two-cylinder engine. Local stories say he forgot to fit brakes, and on the first trip he had to keep driving until the fuel ran out. The carriage works was then making about 3,000 carriages a year.

Production of the car began in the same year with help from engineer Charles S. Crawford, who later worked for Stutz. Marketed as the Cole Solid Tire Automobile, the high-wheeler found about 170 buyers before Cole decided the type had no future.

A carriage maker's gamble on the motor car, a V8 a year behind Cadillac, and a liquidation chosen before the debts arrived.

How did the Cole car business change after 1909?

In June 1909 the Cole Carriage Company was reorganised as the Cole Motor Car Company. It developed a conventional small car, the Cole Model 30, whose name was confusing because it had a two-cylinder engine producing only 14 HP. The car rode on a 90-inch (2,300 mm) wheelbase, and it came as a runabout with two, two-and-a-half or four seats at $725, $750 or $775. About 100 were built, and the solid-tire car stayed on sale alongside it.

At the end of 1909 a new model arrived for 1910, also called the Series 30 after its 30 HP four-cylinder engine. Its wheelbase grew to 108 inches (2,700 mm), and there were four open body styles. The Tourabout was the cheapest at $1,400, while two touring cars and a runabout called the Flyer cost $1,500 each. Cole sold 783 cars before the year ended, and that sales figure marked a clear step up.

The Flyer also raced. One won the 1909 Brighton Beach Marathon, a 24-hour race with 16 participants. Two Series 30 Flyers entered the Massapequa Sweepstakes, one of the 1910 Vanderbilt Cup races, and William Endicott, known as Wild Bill, won the ten-lap event. He covered 126.4 miles (203.4 km) in 138 minutes and 4.32 seconds.

For 1911 the Series 30 received a longer chassis, with a wheelbase of 118 inches (3,000 mm). A roadster and a touring car for two or five passengers were priced at $1,600 each, a fore-door touring car arrived with doors at both front and rear, and a Toy Tonneau for four passengers cost $1,650.

How did Cole move into four and six cylinders?

The Series 40 replaced the 30 in 1912. It was bigger, with a 122-inch (3,100 mm) wheelbase and a four-cylinder motor rated at 40 HP on the NACC scale, which equated to about 60 bhp (45 kW). Its displacement of 286.3 cubic inches, about 4.7 litres, sat behind open bodies priced from $1,885. A Colonial Coupe cost $2,500, and two limousines sold for $3,000 and $3,250, which put Cole firmly in the luxury market.

For 1913 Cole offered three model lines. The Series 40 now rode on a 116-inch wheelbase, the 50 HP Series 50 used the older 40 chassis, and the first six-cylinder car, the Series 60, was in fact a 40 HP machine on a 132-inch wheelbase. Prices ranged from $2,485 for an open car to $4,250 for a seven-passenger Berline-Limousine. That year Cole also gained electric ignition and lighting for the first time.

In 1914 the Model Four, a 28.9 HP four-cylinder on a 120-inch chassis, took over from the 40 and 50. The six became the Six, with 43.8 HP and a 136-inch wheelbase, and it came in a big seven-passenger touring car, a roadster and a toy tonneau at $2,600 each, with a coupe at $3,000 and a limousine at $4,000.

Sales were low in 1914, so Cole cut prices for 1915. The Four became the Standard 4-40 at $1,485 for the open cars, and the Six split into two ranges. The Model 6-50 had a 29 HP engine on a 126-inch wheelbase, and the Big Six 6-60 had 40 HP on the 136-inch chassis, priced at $2,465 for a roadster or seven-passenger touring car.

Why did Cole build assembled cars?

Cole could change models and engines easily for two reasons. The first was that until 1915 the company did not offer yearly model changes, and it replaced series when management felt the need. Many early cars were built this way, and Packard kept to that system until late in the 1930s.

A second factor was that Cole cars were assembled from bought-in parts. Its engine, clutch, transmission and axles all came from outside suppliers. Makers of such cars had a slightly lower reputation than builders who made every part themselves, but Joseph Cole thought specialist suppliers could give more attention to their items, and he preferred the term standardized car.

Cole also turned down a takeover. Joseph Cole negotiated with William C. Durant about a deal that would have made the company a General Motors subsidiary, but Cole finally refused.

When did Cole launch its V8?

In mid-1915 Cole brought out its own V8, roughly a year after Cadillac had pioneered the type. The engine displaced 346.3 cubic inches and produced 39.2 HP. It was built by Northway, then a General Motors division that also made the Cadillac V8. The car was named the Model 8-50, with a 127-inch (3,200 mm) wheelbase and five body styles priced between $1,785 and $3,250.

The V8 was aimed at Cadillac, at the Stearns-Knight sleeve-valve V8 that followed in 1916, and at Lozier, which cut its prices to a similar level for its final season. Above that level sat Mercer, McFarlan and Packard, with prices starting near $3,000, and Kissel with its 4- and 6-cylinder lines. Cole kept the V8 until the end of the make, dropping its fours and sixes after 1916.

For 1917 the car became the Model 860, with five body styles at much the same price. Names such as Tuxedo Roadster, Tourcoupe and Toursedan showed how marketing was becoming more showy. The company made 4,193 Cole automobiles that year.

How did Cole market its cars after the war?

The marketing became more aggressive in 1918. Slogans included There's a Touch of Tomorrow In All Cole Does Today and Did You Ever Go Ballooning in a Cole?, the second referring to balloon tyres, which were offered as an option that year and became standard only in 1925. The model was sold as the Aero-Eight, its internal designation being 870, and it came as a roadster, a Sportster and a touring car at $2,395 each.

The Aero-Eight was much the same technically in 1919, but it offered seven bodies at prices from $2,595 to $3,795. Some closed bodies had an octagonal rear quarter window as a styling feature, and that year 6,225 Coles were built, the largest annual output of the period.

For 1920 the Model 880 was announced as the forecast of future fashions, with an advert promising 15,000 miles (24,000 km) of tyre life. Only three open body styles were offered, and the closed cars had names such as Sportosine and Tourosine. Cole switched to Johnson carburettors and adopted a one-piece rear axle and a brake adjuster. The V8 was rated at 80 bhp and stayed there until production ended, and prices ran from $2,750 to $3,995.

The 1921 Coles were only slightly altered. Most of the flourishes disappeared, although Sportosine and Tourosine remained. Eight body styles were offered, the three open cars cost $3,250, and the closed bodies ran between $4,250 and $4,450.

Why did Cole decline and close?

Cole opened new, wider production facilities in 1922, but sales fell quickly in a short and severe recession. Prices were cut sharply, most of them below the 1918 and 1919 levels, yet only 1,722 Model Aero Eight 890s were built that year. The Sportcoupe weighed 4,155 pounds (1,885 kg), priced at $3,385, and its speedometer read up to 75 mph (121 km/h).

The 1923 Series 890 gained drum-style headlamps, cowl vents and a windshield whose upper half could be adjusted on open cars. Wire wheels were offered, and some cars had shorter running boards. Only 1,522 cars left the factory that year. Joseph Cole, who had no debts, decided to liquidate the company rather than risk his fortune in a further fight.

The Master series, the 890 renamed, went little changed on dealer floors. Full-length running boards returned, and open bodies were priced at $2,175, a coupe at $2,750 and other closed cars at $3,075. A Cole also paced the Indianapolis 500 in this period.

Five cars were offered for 1925, and balloon tyres became standard. Joseph Cole began to liquidate in early 1925, and 607 cars still left the factory that year. He died suddenly of an infection on 8 August 1925, shortly before the liquidation was finished.

How has Cole history been preserved?

In 1954 Howard Russell Delancy completed a college dissertation on the company at Indiana University, which was later published as a limited book. The book is a detailed history of J. J. Cole and the whole company, and Delancy had access to the surviving Cole family, the company archives and former workers. Decades later, the archives were destroyed when a river flooded the basement of the old factory, which makes the book even more important.

The Cole Motor Car Club began in the early 1990s as a registry of known Cole cars, started by Greg Tocket. It became the Cole Motor Car Club of America, and it lasted until the end of 2009, the company's 100th anniversary. Its newsletter, the Cole Bulletin, reprinted original documents. Leroy Cole, no relation to the family, gathered a large amount of Cole material and gave it to the Gilmore Car Museum and Research Library in 2018.

The Cole Motor Car Registry was revived in 2018 by Kevin Fleck, working with Leroy Cole. Its website launched in October 2018 and tracks surviving cars. The registry has found 75 cars identified by the former club, plus two that were previously unknown, which brings the known total to 77 surviving Cole cars. Some 40,717 cars were produced during the company's life.

Cole's old works still stands on East Washington Street in Indianapolis, numbered 730 to 738. Put up between 1911 and 1913, the four-storey, L-shaped block was also called the Service Supply Company. Its front is faced in white ceramic brick with Art Deco touches, and it was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1983.

Cole models at a glance