Automobile Biographies

Roy D. Chapin

Roy D. Chapin was a chairman of the Hudson Motor Car Company.

In the early days of 1901 when the foreshortened Oldsmobile was still an object of wonder and envy, a young college lad slipped away from Ann Arbor in mid-semester and took the train for Detroit. Once there he lost no time making his way out to the Olds plant, and shortly he was speeding down the road with one of their engineers at the furious rate of fifteen miles an hour.

It was an exciting trip. He felt almost as if he were flying, and when they finally came to a stop he had both feet braced against the dashboard and was clinging to the seat. With the thrill of speed there came an enormous sense of what this new motive power was going to mean in the world of transportation.

At that moment Roy Dikeman Chapin, chairman of the Hudson Motor Car Company, chose his career. This was the coming industry. Into it he would throw every bit of energy nature had given him. He hurried into the office of Mr. Olds, who had formerly manufactured gas engines in the town of Lansing, Michigan, where Chapin was born. The factory was then just finishing its experiments and getting ready to turn out the little four and one-half horsepower, curved-dash Oldsmobile.

“I want a job in your plant», he said, his voice tense with excitement. “Can I get it?”

Mr. Olds looked at the excited boy and smiled.

“Sit down, Roy», he said kindly, “and let us talk it over».

The upshot of it was that Olds told him he was just leaving for California and would take the matter up with him when he came back, but Chapin was still insistent.

“That’s a long time to wait, Mr. Olds», he persisted, “and I want to begin now. I don’t care what you offer me so long as I can barely live on it. I just want to be near that car”.

More to satisfy his impetuosity than because he thought he would accept it, Mr. Olds offered him a position as demonstrator at $35 a month.

It was more than Chapin had hoped for. It meant that he would be obliged to drive that car, and, equally important, ride in it.

Nine years later that same boy was heading a company of his own which made the record first-year output of the industry at the time, with a production of 4,000 Hudson cars. It is a company which was so ably organized, so sanely managed that it has never known a setback. In 1916 it put out 26,000 of its new Super-six cars and became the largest maker of fine cars in the world. Eight years later its output ran ahead of 700 cars a day.

But in the interval there was work and plenty of it. Even young Chapin did not come into his own without all the harrowing discouragements and the hours of exhausting labor that pave the road to success.

The first few weeks sped by with amazing rapidity. He spent hours in the factory. He was at the shops early, working on some of the small parts so that he could make minor repairs. This was his first idea. Later, as his vision encompassed the limitless field he had almost unconsciously stepped into, he determined to go at it from the bottom. His whole nature rebelled at half-way measures.

He did not merely want to drive the car, he wanted to make it, and he wanted to improve it, to put it where it would do all the things his imagination told him it could do if it were brought to a higher state of perfection. As soon as he had mastered one of the machine tools in the shops he passed on to another. He was not satisfied until he could run them all, and before long he was deep in a study of the car’s mechanical construction.

But just as he was getting to a position where his knowledge could be used to good account the factory burned down, and for a time it looked as if he would be out of a job. But the Olds Motor Works decided to rebuild, and at the same time plans were put under way for a wider distribution of the car.

Among other sales projects it was decided to start a direct-by-mail campaign which would require the use of a new and somewhat elaborate catalog. Here was Chapin’s opportunity, for he was an expert photographer. In those days catalogs were not so highly illustrated as they are now. He determined to make the Olds booklet a star number.

In a corner of the reconstructed plant he built himself a dark room which was a model of convenience and utility. Here he worked without regard to hours. Finally the work was completed, and while the sales campaign was under way Chapin went back into the shops, where he proved so expert that he was appointed a tester, assisting John Maxwell, who later built the Maxwell car.

That these were indeed early days is shown by a little anecdote told me by Mr. Chapin.

“One day one of the Olds engineers and I were returning from a visit to the Wilson Body plant», said Chapin”. When we were about a mile away the steering spring broke. We worked with the thing for a while without result and then we lifted the little car around in the road and guided it back again by kicking the front wheels, my companion having assured me that in a little shop adjoining the body plant was a very clever mechanician and inventor who could fix us up.
-I was willing to be shown, but will confess that I did not feel much enthusiasm when I saw his shop, which was nothing more than a lean-to. We went in and found a slender, blue-overalled man who came out to see what was wrong with our car. As soon as he went to work I saw that he was an expert mechanician, and his interest in what he was doing was compelling.
-He bolted a plate on our broken spring and before long he had us on our way.
-As we left the shop my companion waved a farewell and called out:
-”Much obliged to you, Henry.”
-Today that mechanician is the richest man in the world.
-It was Henry Ford”.

The following summer Ford came over to the Olds plant to see how things were getting along. He was then experimenting with a heavy, phaeton type of car, and it was some time later before he built a lighter model.

Young as he is, Chapin covers in his contacts a complete directory of the automobile industry. Back in the days when the Olds plant burned, Olds was obliged for a while to purchase his materials outside. Part of his motor supplies came from Henry M. Leland, who, in the following year, headed the Cadillac company. Leland had a little shop and made beveled gears. Those were the days, too, when the Dodge brothers first made their start. At the time, they had a small machine shop down town in Detroit. Olds needed transmission gears, and started them in this line. The upholstering on the first Olds car was done by B. F. Everitt, later of Everitt-Metzger-Flanders and now president of the Rickenbacker company.

It was about this time, in the Fall of 1901, that the second auto show was to open in New York. Chapin was chosen to drive the new model of the Oldsmobile from Detroit to New York on the open road. It was the longest trip that had ever been attempted in this country with a motor car. The previous year a Winton car had been driven to the show from Cleveland, and the feat had attracted a great deal of attention.

Since there were no service stations in those days, the car had a huge box containing extra parts, bolted to the rear. The body was entirely open, and the cold was extreme. The roads, too, in many places were almost impassable. Entering Syracuse, Chapin drove along the Erie Canal tow path, bumping over the tow ropes and frightening the mules. Perhaps this experience with bad roads gave him his vision for the betterment of all American highways.

Progress was so slow that he got behind his schedule and became alarmed. Often he started out before daylight, finding it none too comfortable sliding in and out of ruts in the half-light on standard two and one-half inch single-tube tires. His first serious accident occurred when he hit a big bump at the bottom of a hill, bending an axle and losing the big box of parts. A new axle was shipped to him at Hudson, New York, where he worked well into the night installing it.

Finally, covered with dirt, grease, and the general stains of travel he reached New York City and started down Fifth Avenue to meet the Olds officials, who had preceded him by train. On the Avenue he came across one of the first motor cars he had seen since leaving Detroit, and it attracted his immediate attention. The street was slippery and the wheels of the car ahead wove in and out so strangely that he burst out laughing at the sight. At that moment some one stepped in front of his car and he hastily jammed on the brakes. The Oldsmobile turned completely around, hit the curb and broke several of the spokes in one of the wire wheels. It was a lucky escape for he was only a mile from the end of his long journey, which he completed with greater caution.

What he saw and heard at the auto show stimulated his already lively imagination. He saw movement quickened, distribution increased, transportation costs lowered, remote sections developed, all by means of this new motive power with which he was working. Distance was in a measure annihilated. Transportation was the big issue of commerce. In one way and another it was the vital factor in almost every essential of living.

More than ever he saw the big opportunities ahead for men who had the vision and initiative to grasp them. It is said that the biggest and brainiest men in the country are gathered together in automobile centers. Certain it is that the automobile industry more than any other requires vision, daring, and a quick grasp of new ideas. It has no precedents, is restricted by no hide-bound principles. Men who succeed in it must be creators, originators of new styles, new methods, new plans for mass production at minimum cost. The plants themselves, where output is large, are the acme of efficiency in construction and handling. Competition, the very soul of better output, lets no manufacturer lag along with out-of-date methods. In one way and another the automobile industry has done more than any other to put America on the map as a big producer, and to quicken her commercial activity.

With all these new ideas in his head, Chapin did not consider himself too valuable for ordinary duties, but went right back into the factory at Detroit. By this time his ability was being recognized and he was placed in charge of the repair department, now more appropriately named service department.

“What we considered an efficient service department in those days would be called a joke today”, said Mr. Chapin. “I don’t think anything would give you a better idea of the utter unreliability of the motor car at that time than the remark made by one of our owners during this very trying development period.
-Not only were we one of the first of the car manufacturers, but we were among the first to use slogans. Fred L. Smith, who was then general manager of the Olds Company and whose friendly interest and counsel was of great value to me in those early days, was the inventor of most of these slogans. One of the best of them (so we thought) was:
-“Nothing to watch but the road.”
-But it had not been out long before we heard from one of our owners.
-“The idea is good”, he said. “But I get darned tired of watching the same piece of road.”

Chapin’s duties in the service department put him in close touch with owners of cars. He was sent all over the country and he began to develop a strong selling angle. He was quick, obliging, knew what he was talking about, and soon attracted considerable attention. At twenty-four he was made sales manager, doubtless the youngest in the industry. The Olds company at that time was the largest manufacturer of automobiles in the world.

” That statement sounds much bigger than it really was», said Mr. Chapin with a laugh. ” Sales science was not so necessary in those days as a man who had confidence in the future of the car. A boy of that age who is obsessed with one idea, as I was, is bound to awaken enthusiasm, because real honest-to-goodness enthusiasm is always contagious. I did not know a thing about territorial research; sales resistance, under that name, was an unknown quantity; and statistics in the motor car field did not exist. We were pioneering, purely and simply. The world was our field, every man a prospect, and my faith in the future of the motor car never wavered for an instant. When I sold a car I sold it with the honest conviction that I was doing the buyer a favor in helping him to take his place in a big forward movement.
-However, I think I realized some of my shortcomings. At that period the National Cash Register Company had the most aggressive sales organization in industry, so I made many trips to Dayton to study their methods. Out of this experience I wrote the first sales manual used in the automobile business.
-Shortly after I went into the sales field, Howard E. Coffin was made chief engineer of the plant. It was a great step ahead for the Olds. Coffin and I were great friends and worked together very closely. From the first Coffin had a wonderful grasp of both engineering and design. Whenever he worked out something new we talked it over together both from the engineering and the sales standpoint. It helped me enormously from the sales end, and I in turn gave him any suggestions which came in to me from the selling side. Between the two of us we managed to keep pretty closely in touch with everything that was going on in the motor field”.

What Mr. Chapin did not tell me, but what I learned from outside sources was that these two brilliant young men were considered, even in those days, leading lights in the automobile field. They were untiring workers. This, together with their youthful enthusiasm and a vision remarkable in those early days, marked them as future leaders in the industry.

While sales manager, Chapin had a call from a man living in Elmira, New York, who wanted to handle the Elmira agency. Later this same man, although only an agent, saved the Overland company from going into the hands of a receiver by raising enough money to keep them afloat until he could help them refinance the company.

His name was John Willys.

But, meanwhile, Chapin and Coffin had plans up their sleeves for an organization of their own. With a company under their own management they would have free scope for both production and design. Coffin was a clever engineer and brilliant in design; Chapin was a wonderfully good salesman and an able financier.

Having made up his mind that they would go into business together, Chapin resigned from his position with Olds and went to California for a vacation and to interest capital in this project. Those who had money to invest were more or less afraid of such a radical venture as the automobile business, yet he was making headway when he met E. R. Thomas of Buffalo, known as the builder of the “Thomas Flyer». They talked the proposition over at length and completed arrangements to start a plant in Detroit, building a car similar to the Olds.

Chapin was twenty-six when with Thomas, Howard E. Coffin, F. O. Bezner, and J. J. Brady, he organized the Thomas-Detroit Company. They started in a little match factory which belonged to Louis Mendelssohn. Later, Mendelssohn furnished the money to back the Fisher Body Company and became its first financial head.

The original investment in the Thomas-Detroit amounted to $150,000, all of which was put up in cash. Chapin and his associates raised half of their subscriptions personally, and the balance was furnished by local banks which loaned it to them on blueprints and their reputation. From the first, Detroit banks supported and encouraged the automobile industry, and to their farsighted loans and wise counsel is due much of the success of the young financiers who asked their aid.

Among those who helped them was Alexander McPherson, president of the Old Detroit National, a canny old Scotsman who had a real ambition to see the boys succeed. He backed Chapin and the rest of his crowd from the very first, even as far back as 1906. Five years later Chapin became a director of the bank.

By this time Chapin had an acquaintance which was of the greatest value in the introduction of a new car. He knew the dealers all over the country. He had traveled extensively and understood requirements in different localities. The Olds had been the money maker among the cars, and the dealers of the country were keenly interested in what the new organization was going to turn out. By the time it began producing Thomas-Detroit cars the dealers were lined up and the output for the first year, 506 cars, was sold before it left the shipping department. Today, the Hudson plant turns out more cars every day than this entire first-year output.

A keen analysis of markets showed them that there was a demand for a lower priced car. To build it they must produce in quantity. The Thomas-Detroit was selling at $2,750, and there were no low-priced four-cylinder motor vehicles.

At this time (1907) Chapin, Coffin, Bezner, and Brady owned one-third of the stock of the ThomasDetroit Company. They persuaded Thomas to sell a block of stock to Hugh Chalmers, changed the name to Chalmers-Detroit, and brought out the four-cylinder Chalmers-Detroit 30 at $1,500. An immediate success was scored and great plant expansion was undertaken. They decided an even smaller car might be a money maker. A subsidiary company was formed and a college mate of Coffin, Roscoe B. Jackson, was put in charge of development. Previous to this he had been factory manager of the Olds Motor Works and he was then general manager of the Thomas Motor Company in Buffalo. Today he is president of the Hudson company.

Jackson threw himself wholeheartedly into the plan, for the company was still in the process of formation when he took hold. J. L. Hudson, capitalist, well known in Detroit and a relative of Jackson, became interested and was asked to take the presidency of the company. For him the car was named.

In financing the Hudson barely enough money was put in for development about $20,000. A canvass among dealers proved that the car had such possibilities that it was found easy to sell the output in advance, and the company was largely financed by this means. And ever since then expansion has been financed entirely out of earnings.

After the Hudson got its stride the Chapin and Chalmers groups decided to separate their interests. This put Chapin, Bezner, and Coffin in Hudson control; J. L. Hudson became chairman of the board, and Chapin assumed the presidency.

One of the most important features of Hudson development has been the teamwork. Whenever a man showed special ability the company made stock arrangements with him. A certain amount of stock was set aside in his name and the dividends were credited against it until it was paid for. Under this plan most of the executives have fortunes of their own and stability of management has been secured.

Few men, either East or West, have attained in so few years the standing which has been accorded to Roy D. Chapin. As chairman of the board of the Hudson Motor Car Company, he devotes much of his time to public interests. From the very first he realized that the development of the rural sections of America was largely dependent on the condition of the highways, and he made a special study of road conditions in this country and abroad, attaining such a reputation as an authority that as soon as we entered the war he was called to Washington to head the Highways Transport Committee of the Council of National Defense. This committee was entrusted with the war-time energizing of highway transportation and began a development which has had a far-reaching effect on the entire problem of highway traffic. Since the war he has been connected with most of the broad movements which have had for their aim the making of our roads a medium for the quick and economical transport of men and goods.

In aeronautics, Mr. Chapin is not only an active enthusiast but has aided materially in its national development. He is probably one of the most expert private photographers in this country, and not only does wonderful portraits and beautiful landscapes, but is also an experienced operator with a moving picture camera. He is vice-president and a director in the National Automobile Chamber of Commerce, and is one of its most active workers. He was one of the organizers and is vice-president of the Lincoln Highway Association. As a member of the semi-governmental Highway Education Board, he is one of the leaders in educational work pertaining to highway engineering and highway transport.

But in all his successes and in spite of his large outside interests his loyalty to Detroit has been an outstanding factor, and he has always been identified with many of its prominent business enterprises. For years he has been a director in the First National Bank, which succeeded the Old Detroit National; he is vice-president of the Detroit Symphony Society, director of the Detroit Community Fund, and has taken an active part in all progressive local movements. From the first he has believed in Detroit, not merely as a great manufacturing center, but as a leader in civic enterprises.

Not only from the business but from the personal side, life has been to him a well-rounded success. Ten years ago he married a charming Southern girl, who shares with him every interest of his busy life, and his residence at Grosse Pointe Farms is the center of a happy family life.

Roy Chapin is still so young that one stands aghast to remember all he has accomplished; but he had already arrived when most men of his years were still struggling in the ranks. Throughout his career he has always ranked as the youngest executive of his class in the automobile industry.