Brush Motor Car Company

This article is about the U.S. automaker. For the British rail-locomotive company, see Brush Traction.

Brush Runabout
Overview
Manufacturer	Brush Motor Car Company (1907-1909) Brush Runabout Company (1909-1913)
Production	1907–1913 13,250 produced
Body and chassis
Class	Entry-level car
Body style	2-row phaeton
Powertrain
Engine	One Cylinder,

Brush Motor Car Company (1907-1909), later the Brush Runabout Company (1909-1913), was based in Highland Park, Michigan.

History

The company was founded by Alanson Partridge Brush (February 10, 1878, Michigan – March 6, 1952, Michigan). He was a self-taught prolific designer, working with Henry Leland at Oldsmobile, and went on to helped design the original one-cylinder Cadillac engine. Although there were many makes of small runabouts of similar size and one to four cylinders at this time (before the Model T Ford dominated the low-price market), the Brush has many unusual design details showing the inventiveness of its creator. The Brush Runabout Company, along with Maxwell-Briscoe, Stoddard-Dayton, and others formed Benjamin Briscoe's United States Motor Company from 1910, ending when that company failed in 1913. Runabouts, in general, fell out of vogue quickly, partly due to the lack of protection from the weather.

1912 Trans-Australian Trip

In 1912, Sid Ferguson, Francis Birtles and a dog named Rex drove a Brush Runabout across the Australian continent. The pair started out on the west coast in Freemantle and ending on the east coast in Sydney, with the trip occuring between March and April of that year. Ferguson and Birtles became the first persons to successfully undertake such a trip.

Design

Brush designed a light car with a wooden chassis (actually, wooden rails and iron cross-members), friction drive transmission and "underslung" coil springs in tension instead of compression on both sides of each axle. Power was provided by a large single-cylinder water-cooled engine. Two gas-powered headlamps provided light, along with a gas-powered light in the rear. The frame, axles, and wheels were made of oak, hickory or maple, and were either left plain or painted to match the trim. Wider axles were available for use in the Southern region of the United States, where a 60-inch tread fit wagon ruts on country roads. The horn was located next to the engine cover, with a metal tube running to a squeeze bulb affixed near the driver. A small storage area was provided in the rear, with a drawer accessible under the rear of the seat. A feature of engines designed by Brush was that they ran counter-clockwise instead of the usual clockwise. This was Brush's idea intended to make them safer for a right-handed person to crank-start by hand. Prior to the invention of the electric starter, crank-starting a clockwise-running engines frequently resulted in dislocated thumbs and broken forearms if the hand crank kicked back on starting.

The Liberty-Brush was a simiplfied version of the standard Runabout, offered at a lower price.

Extant Examples on Display

• 1908 Model BC Runabout is on display at Fountainhead Antique Auto Museum in Fairbanks, AK.
• 1908 Runabout (restored) at the Old Rhinebeck Aerodrome
• 1909 Runabout (restored) is on display at the Linn County Historical Museum in Brownsville, Oregon.
• 1910 Runabout (original) is on display at the Swigart Antique Auto Museum in Huntingdon, Pennsylvania.
• 1911 Runabout (restored) on display at the Miles Through Time Automotive Museum in Toccoa, GA.
• 1912 Runabout (restored) is in storage at the Smithonian National Museum of American History.

Gallery

• 
  Brush Runabout Company factory
• 
  1907 Brush Model B Runabout
• 
  1909 Brush automobile, housed in the Linn County Historical Museum in Brownsville, Oregon.
• 
  1911 Brush Model F
• 
  1912 Liberty-Brush Runabout
• 
  1912 Runabout, owned by a resident of Saskatoon, in a local museum.
• 
  A bevy of Brushes
• 
  Brush ID Plate

See also

• Brass Era car
• Chalmers Motors
• List of defunct United States automobile manufacturers
• List of car brands
• United States Motor Company
• Not to be confused with Brush Electric Company nor Brush Traction (United Kingdom company)
• Francis Birtles

External links

• brushauto.net Brushauto.net is a website with original brush media and information including advertisements, manuals, and images.
• Liberty Brush Automobile on Smithsonian site The Liberty Brush was distinguished from the standard model by a different treatment of fenders which were not attached to the separate side step. The standard model had long sweeping front and rear fenders connected to a very short running board.
• Brush Owners Club website
• A recounting of the Ferguson and Birtles trans-Australian trip in 1912