Although the first vehicle to move under its own power (for which there is documentation) was built by M. Brezin in 1769, it really wasn’t until the end of the 19th century that a flurry of automobile-building activity took off.

One of the first cabs off the rank (sorry about that!) to start to pull things together was Karl Daimler, who set up a deal with William Steinway (of piano fame) to produce petrol engines for tramcars, boats, quadricycles and fire engines. In fact Steinway was the owner of the Daimler Motor Company which by 1891 was in full production.

Interesting sidenote – Karl Benz never actually met Gottlieb Daimler…

It was the Duyrea brothers who actually developed the first gasoline automobile in the US in 1893. They modified an old horse buggy and drove it around for about 3 months. Maybe it didn’t run very well, because it didn’t run again, and some 25 years later ended up in a museum.

In 1893 Henry Ford joined the fray. However it wasn’t until 3 years later that he finished his first car. Another 3 years later he established the Detroit Motor Company but never actually sold a production automobile. He shut down the company 2 years later in 1901.