The Duryea Motor Wagon Company

The photographs on this page, brought to life.

Charles E. Duryea in his third automobile, built 1893-94, winner of the Chicago contest of 1894. Library of Congress.

The first American company to build gasoline automobiles broke up over a proposal to move to Detroit. Charles and Frank Duryea started in Springfield, Massachusetts in 1895. On Thanksgiving Day that year Frank won the Chicago Times-Herald race — fifty-four miles at an average of seven and a half miles an hour, and the first automobile race in the United States in which anyone finished at all. By the end of 1896 the brothers had sold thirteen cars, and their first ten production vehicles were the first automobiles sold in America. Then they fell out. The dispute was over financing, and the terms would have meant moving the company to Detroit. They refused, and went their separate ways before the end of the century. Frank built Stevens-Duryea cars until 1927. Charles carried on alone, still building experimental vehicles as late as 1916. The original partnership collapsed in 1907. Detroit got the industry anyway. If a Duryea or a Stevens-Duryea is somewhere in your family's history, add what you know below. Compiled by MyHistoryStone from published reference sources, August 2026. Corrections welcome.