Thursday, May 20, 2010
Page 11
REMINISCING (Column)
Brown Tries Various Makes of Motor Car
By ROGER M. GRACE
Los Angeles attorney Herbert Cutler Brown was an automobile enthusiast. Below, he’s at the wheel of a two-cylinder 1904 Tourist.
Brown
is apparently seen taking a test drive because next to him is R.F. Burnham,
secretary of Auto Vehicle Company, which made the cars...right here in L.A. Its factory and showroom
were located in downtown at the northeast corner of Main and Tenth streets.
Tenth is now known as Olympic Boulevard. The California Market Center is on the site where motor cars were once made and sold.
The company was incorporated May 5, 1902, and is said to have made 2,692 Tourist automobiles from that year until it ceased operations in 1910.
Below is an ad for the company in the 1905 city directory.
Brown didn’t buy a Tourist Runabout.
His automobile, and true love, became a four-cylinder, 24-horsepower Pope Toledo, mentioned here before.
But, alas, he forsook the Pope Toledo, turning to another make of motor car. The Los Angeles Times reports in its Aug. 20, 1905, edition:“Herbert Cutler Brown, the Pope Toledo crank, has decided to try a Stevens-Duryea for a change....”
He bought the Stevens-Duryea from Western Motor Car Company, run by Charles E. Anthony and his son, Earle C. Anthony (later owner of radio and TV stations). The Stevens-Duryea Touring Car was priced at $2,650 (which today would be about $65,200.00.) The smaller-sized Stevens-Duryea Runabout went for $1,400 (about $34,400.00 now).
The Anthonys’ outfit also sold Cadillacs and Thomas Flyers.
For whatever reason, Brown lent his name to this ad that appears in the Nov. 12, 1905, edition of the Times:
You probably spotted that Brown’s name is misspelled.
Copyright 2010, Metropolitan News Company