1920 Mercer

edited by David Barth, 30 January 2009.
Courtesy The Crawford Auto-Aviation Museum in Cleveland, Ohio, USA.
Information is from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
Photos were taken in January 2009.

There was considerable talent and backing for the Mercer Automobile Company when it was started in 1909 by two important Trenton, New Jersey families, the Roeblings and the Kusers. Ferdinand Roebling, son of John A. Roebling, was the president, and his nephew, Washington Roebling, was the general manager. John A. Roebling had extensive success with wire rope manufacturing and suspension bridge design when he built the Brooklyn Bridge. The secretary-treasurer was John L. Kuser, who, with his brothers Frederick and Anthony, had amassed a fortune from banking, bottling and brewing.

Washington Roebling was friends with William Walter, who had been making a small number of high-quality automobiles in New York City. The Kusers owned a vacant brewery in Hamilton, New Jersey, and brought Walter and his car factory there in 1906. However, Walter found himself deeply in debt by 1909, so the Roeblings and Kusers bought him out in a foreclosure sale. They changed the company name to Mercer, named after Mercer County, New Jersey. Talented designers and race drivers contributed to the new effort, and the focus became proving their product in competition.

In 1909 the first Mercer appeared on the dusty roads of New Jersey. Named the Speedster, it was almost a complete break with tradition. Low, streamlined (for its time), with a curved dashboard, it had a lean racy appearance. It was expensive, but the Mercer Automobile Company had no interest in mass sales. Every man in the plant took great pride in the product, and every inch of the machine bespoke quality and strength. The bridge-building Roeblings spared no pains in the construction of their car.

In 1910 the Type 35R Raceabout was introduced. It was a stripped-down, two-seat speedster, designed to be "safely and consistently" driven at over 70 mph (110 km/h). The car was capable of over 90 mph (140 km/h). The Raceabout's inline 4-cylinder T-head engine displaced 300 cu in (4.9 L) and developed 58 horsepower (43 kW). It won five of the six 1911 races it was entered in, and hundreds of racing victories followed. The Raceabout became one of the premier racing thoroughbreds of the era, highly coveted for its quality construction and exceptional handling.

On the track the Raceabout was indomitable. Its short wheelbase and supple frame snapped the car through the tightest corners. The small but potent engine drove the car to victory in hundreds of races. The Indianapolis, Vanderbilt Cup, and Elgin Trophy events always found Raceabouts up with the front runners. It had Houdaille shock absorbers that were imported from France, and the first cord tires used in America ran on the second place Mercer in the 1913 Indianapolis race. The car has a light, airy appearance and is excitingly dashing with its "monocle" windshield. Drivers like Ralph De Palma and Barney Oldfield muscled the flashy Mercers to many world records on the track and at timed trials.

The Type 35R Raceabout topped the Speedster. It is a car that today is perhaps the most sought after classic automobile. This was a true production sports-racing car that exhibited perfectly controlled dual performance. A Raceabout could be driven sedately to church and putter along in traffic to the outskirts of town. Then, once the open road was reached, one flipped the exhaust cut-out, revved up the famous T-head engine, shifted up through all four gears, and the Mercer flashed away at racing speed, leaving behind a cloud of dust and an earth-shaking roar that echoed from the hills.

In February 1914, Eddie Pullen, who worked at the factory from 1910, won the American Grand Prize by racing for 403 miles (649 km) in a Raceabout. In the 1914 road races in Elgin, Illinois, two Raceabouts collided and wrecked. Spencer Wishart, a champion racer who always wore shirt and tie under his overalls, was killed along with the car's mechanic, John Jenter. This prompted the company to cancel its racing program. The Raceabout's designer left the company that year, and subsequent designs did not live up to the glory and appeal the Type-35R had earned.

In October, 1919, after the last involved Roebling brother died (Washington Roebling had perished in the 1912 Titanic disaster), the company was obtained by a Wall Street firm that placed ex-Packard vice-president Emlem Hare in charge, organizing Mercer under the Hare's Motors corporate banner. Hare looked to expand, increasing Mercer's models and production, and also purchasing the Locomobile & Crane-Simplex marques.

The combined firm began to produce luxury cars, but the new management somehow misunderstood the appeal of the Mercer. It was never designed as a passenger car, and it was never intended for large-scale production. It was always meant to be something special. Like the MG-TC, the Raceabout was a true sports car, starkly functional and exciting.

Within a few years, the cost of these acquisitions and the economic recession took a financial toll on Hare's Motors. Locomobile was liquidated and purchased by Durant Motors in 1922, and Mercer produced its last vehicles in 1925, after some 5000 had been built. An independent effort to revive the marque in 1931 resulted in only 3 vehicles being constructed and displayed.