28 Facts About Carl Benz

Carl Benz received a patent for the motorcar in 1886, the same year he first publicly drove the Benz Patent-Motorwagen.

Carl Benz is widely regarded as "the father of the car", as well as the "father of the automobile industry".

Carl Benz was born Karl Friedrich Michael Vaillant on 25 November 1844 in Muhlburg, now a borough of Karlsruhe, Baden-Wurttemberg, which is part of modern Germany.

Carl Benz's parents were Josephine Vaillant and a locomotive driver, Johann Georg Benz, whom she married a few months later.

Carl Benz attended the local school in Karlsruhe and was a prodigious student.

Carl Benz had originally focused his studies on locksmithing, but he eventually followed his father's steps toward locomotive engineering.

Carl Benz then moved to Mannheim to work as a draftsman and designer in a scales factory.

In 1871, at the age of twenty-seven, Carl Benz joined August Ritter, in launching the Iron Foundry and Mechanical Workshop in Mannheim, later renamed Factory for Machines for Sheet-metal Working.

Carl Benz finished his two-stroke engine on 31 December 1879, and was granted a patent for it on 28 June 1880.

Problems arose again when the banks at Mannheim demanded that the Carl Benz's enterprise be incorporated due to the high production costs it maintained.

Carl Benz became the joint-stock company Gasmotoren Fabrik Mannheim in 1882.

Carl Benz finished his creation in 1885 and named it "Carl Benz Patent-Motorwagen".

The next year Carl Benz created the Motorwagen Model 2, which had several modifications, and in 1889, the definitive Model 3 with wooden wheels was introduced, showing at the Paris Expo the same year.

Carl Benz began to sell the vehicle in the late summer of 1888, making it the first commercially available automobile in history.

The world's first long distance automobile trip was undertaken by Bertha Carl Benz using a Model 3.

The great demand for static internal combustion engines forced Carl Benz to enlarge the factory in Mannheim, and in 1886 a new building located on Waldhofstrasse was added.

The new directors recommended that Carl Benz should create a less expensive automobile suitable for mass production.

From 1894 to 1902, Carl Benz produced over 1,200 of what some consider the first mass-produced car, the Velocipede, later known as the Carl Benz Velo.

In 1895, Carl Benz designed the first truck with an internal combustion engine in history.

Carl Benz built the first motor buses in history in 1895, for the Netphener bus company.

In 1896, Carl Benz was granted a patent for his design of the first flat engine.

At first, the production models were raced and the Carl Benz Velo participated in the first automobile race: Paris to Rouen 1894.

Carl Benz was a member of the new Daimler-Carl Benz board of management for the remainder of his life.

On 4 April 1929, Carl Benz died at his home in Ladenburg at the age of 84 from a bronchial inflammation.

Until her death on 5 May 1944, Bertha Carl Benz continued to reside in their last home.

The Carl Benz home has now been designated as historic and is used as a scientific meeting facility for a nonprofit foundation, the Gottlieb Daimler and Karl Carl Benz Foundation.

The Carl-Benz-Gymnasium Ladenburg in Ladenburg, where he lived until his death, is named in his honor, as is the Automuseum Dr Carl Benz, located in Ladenburg.

In 1984, Carl Benz was inducted into the Automotive Hall of Fame.