What do the opening of the Boston subway, the start of the Klondike Gold Rush and Louis Semple Clarke completing his first vehicle all have in common? They each happened in the action-packed year of 1897. As prospectors showed off their new found wealth at Merchant's Cafe in Seattle, Clarke aimed to make his fortune off his three-wheeled, one-cylinder gas powered buggy named Autocar No. 1. Soon after his initial tests, it dawned on the inventor just how viable the automobile would become. LS, as most knew Clarke, recruited his brothers John and James, his father Charles, and friend William Morgan to found the Pittsburgh Motor Vehicle Company on this day in 1897.
The team built a second vehicle the next year, this time with four wheels. They called it the Pittsburgher. (I tried to ...