Edward G. Budd

Edward Gowen Budd (December 28, 1870 in Smyrna, Delaware – November 30, 1946 in Pennsylvania, aged 75) was an American inventor and businessman.

First all-steel sedan
by Edward G Budd Manufacturing Company of Philadelphia for John and Horace Dodge

Budd was born in Delaware in 1870. He studied engineering in Philadelphia in 1888, and in 1899 he took his knowledge of pressed steel to the railroad industry. He worked with the Pullman Company on a contract for Pennsylvania Railroad, building the first all-steel car.

Budd Company
Main article: Budd Company
Pioneer Zephyr

In 1912 he founded the Budd Company, which initially specialized in the manufacture of pressed-steel chassis frames for automobiles.

His company was soon supplying an all-steel sedan body to auto manufacturers. Following discussions between them which began in 1913 Budd's first big supporters were the Dodge brothers, who purchased 70,000 all-steel open touring bodies in 1916. They were soon followed by an all-steel Dodge sedan. The brothers had not believed such a thing possible but they were persuaded to allow Budd to go ahead with the design, die-making and press-installation needed for actual production to begin. Other US manufacturers soon followed Dodge's lead. Closed bodies outsold open bodies from 1923 on.[1]

To hold all this steel together, Budd also pioneered the use of arc welding in automobile manufacturing.

Stainless steel

During the Great Depression in the 1930s, Budd pioneered the fabrication of stainless steel and helped create the Pioneer Zephyr, a streamlined train for the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad. Budd stainless steel railway cars were very successful for many years.[2] During World War II, Budd was also the original maker of the Bazooka projectile and the rifle grenade. He and his company were also instrumental in the development of the radial disk brake and the automatic wheel line.[3]

Legacy

Budd's Pioneer Zephyr was the first of many streamlined passenger trains. The original trainset is on permanent display at Chicago's Museum of Science and Industry.

In 1985, 40 years after his death, Edward G. Budd, the "father of the stainless-steel streamliner", was inducted into Dearborn, Michigan's Automotive Hall of Fame.[4][5]

In 2015, 70 years after his death, Edward G Budd was inducted into Galesburg, Illinois's National Railroad Hall of Fame.[6]

See also

References
  1. page 106, George A Oliver, A History of Coachbuilding, Cassell, London, 1962
  2. Illustrated Treasury of Budd Railway Passenger Cars: 1931–1981 by James Kerr (1981, Delta Publications). ISBN 0919295029.
  3. See Illustrated Treasury of Budd Railway Passenger Cars, at 5.
  4. "Edward Budd". The American Experience. PBS. Retrieved March 15, 2015.
  5. "Edward G. Budd". Hall of Fame Inductees. Automotive Hall of Fame. 1985. Archived from the original on March 15, 2016. Retrieved March 15, 2016.
  6. Vantuono, William C. (October 31, 2015). "From Edward G. Budd to Bombardier Transportation". Railway Age. Simmons-Boardman Publishing Corporation. Retrieved March 15, 2016.
  • PBS Online / WGBH (2000) Edward G. Budd.
  • President and Fellows of Harvard College (2004), 20th Century Great American Business Leaders: Edward G. Budd.
  • Setright, L J K (2003). Drive On!. Granta Books, London. ISBN 1-86207-698-7.
  • Steel in our lives. Retrieved January 19, 2005
  • White, John H. Jr. (Spring 1986). "America's Most Noteworthy Railroaders". Railroad History. 154: 9–15. ISSN 0090-7847. JSTOR 43523785. OCLC 1785797.
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