This work emphasizes those who designed, built and drove automobiles. Covered are factories, both for cars and car parts, from Hella headlights to Connolly leather and Varta batteries. Most marques are included, be it Selva, Hitler's first car, or more famous and still vibrant makes like Jaguar, Mercedes and Porsche. But this book is less about cars than it is about those who built them - their birthplaces, places of work, graves and homes. Famous and scenic roads, including the one used by the first Porsche car, are covered, as are race tracks and over 280 museums. While a book form is in the planning stage, arrangements for the cd may be made by emailing me at burn@cybertours.com or burnsided@yahoo.com
France
Ay Champagne, near Epernay S of Riems. Home of many important Champagne producers, including Bollingers, one of the few full bodied champagnes and a favorite of the 1970s Jet Set and James Bond; and Deutz, headquartered in Breisach, Germany. Deutz has been associated with Porsche cars, the winery producing a Cuveé Porsche.
Colmar On the German border 28 miles west of Freiburg, Germany, Colmar surrounds the Lauch river which provides for canals giving Colmar the name Petite Venise (Little Venice).
Charlemagne built a residence, Villa Columbaria, here in the late 700s. By 1226, it was a major trading city.
Martin Schongauer, influenced by the Dutch masters and known for his altar paintings and copperplate engravings, was born in Colmar about 1450.
Louise Agathe Marie von Goetz, wife of Field Marshal von Rundstedt, was born in Colmar on 6 November, 1878.
The 1910 Prinz Heinrich Fahrt, a six day auto rally, was decided here. Franz Heine's Adler hit a soft shoulder and went off the road killing his chauffeur and controller. Heine was seriously injured. Ferdinand Porsche, driving his own Daimler Prinz Heinrich, averaged 81.7 mph at Colmar. He eventually won the race, defeating 13 Benzs and 9 Mercedes. It was to be the beginning of a long string of major victories for Porsche.
Hitler's train passed through Colmar at the end of WWI, in August, 1918. "I remember, it was before we arrived at Colmar." he was quoted in his Table Talks of 22/23 January, 1942, "The railway employee who coveted Fuchsl came again to our carriage and offered me two hundred marks. "You could give me two hundred thousand, and you wouldn't get him!" When I left the train at Harpsheim, I suddenly noticed that the dog had disappeared. The column marched off, and it was impossible for me to stay behind! I was desperate. The swine who stole my dog doesn't realize what he did to me."
Colmar was liberated by the US 3rd Infantry Division and the 5th French Armored Division in 1945. Lt. Audie Murphy earned his Medal of Honor during the battle of Colmar.
Sights: Statue of General Rapp, Dominican Church (13C) with altarpiece by Schongauer, St. Martin's Church with 18C organ by Johann Silbermann, Musée d'Unterlinden with Art gallery with 16th century Issenheim Altarpiece by Matthias Grünewald, Musée Bartholdi in the family home of Fréderic Bartholdi, sculptor of the Statue of Liberty, now in New York harbor.
Germany
Stuttgart
Feuerbacherweg 48-50
By 1923, while Hitler was speaking in one beer hall after the other in Munich, Ferdinand Porsche and his family had moved into their new house at 48-50 Feuerbacher Weg - quite a luxury as most Germans were suffering from a severe depression. It's not an ostentatious place, looking more like a large New England cape with its two steep-roofed dormers. Hiding behind a low limestone wall, the place is well-landscaped with a secluded, shaded but small front yard complete with small pond and statues.
Ferdinand Porsche sketched the plans for the house while architect Prof. Bonatz completed the project with some help from Fritz Scholer. As is common in Germany, the house is made of insulated concrete block covered with white stucco. Wooden houses remain a novelty for Germans, partly because such houses tend to burn, and partly because Europe is not exactly bulging with trees.
The attached two car garage between the main house and smaller guest house is hallowed ground for VW fans as the first Bugs were built behind the large white doors.
Porsches lived on Feuerbacher Weg between 1923 and 1928; 1932 and 1943; and since 1949. During the first five year period, Ferdinand bathed Daimler in glory, first with the 1924 28/95 PS Targa Florio car (the first supercharged race car), then the 1926 200 Stuttgart, 3.1 liter 12/55 Mannheim, 4.6 liter 8 cylinder 18/80 Nürburg, a diesel truck and an aircraft engine.
After Daimler and Benz officially merged in 1926, Porsche had some problems with Benz managers but still developed the 1926 Mercedes 630 24/100/140 and, from that, the Mercedes K Sportwagen, the 'K' standing for Kurz ('short') or, possibly, for 'kompressor.' Porsche used this car to design the 1927 Mercedes 680 26/120/180 HP 'S' ('Sport'); the 1928 SS ('Sportwagen Super') with a 7.022 cc, 160/200 hp engine; and the SSK (Super Sport Kurz, one of which was purchased by Arthur Conan Doyle in January, 1928) ) with 170/225 hp. Credit for development of S types after 1928 should go to Max Wagner, who built the 1922 Benz Tropfenwagen, and Hans Nibel, who created the 1909 Blitzen Benz and leased Porsche's house after Ferdinand and the family moved out in 1928.
Unhappy with Daimler-Benz marketing types who were not too pleased with his expensive designs and who failed to support his idea of a inexpensive people's car, Porsche left Feuerbacher Weg for Steyr, Austria in 1928. When Porsche found that Steyr and Daimler-Benz planned to merge, he left Steyr for Stuttgart where he began his own company on 1 December, 1930. Porsche opened a design office on Kronenstrasse and lived on Schoderstrasse until Nibel moved out of the Feuerbacher Weg house in 1932. As Schoderstrasse is only a few blocks east of Feuerbacher Weg, Porsche seems to have had a definite affinity for living on the heights of Feuerbach.
The garages at Feuerbacher Weg weren't quiet for long as NSU's General Director Fritz von Falkenhayn, faced with a slump in motorcycle sales, approached Ferdinand Porsche (or vice versa) regarding the building of a small car in 1932. Porsche started design studies in August, 1933, and sent out plans in December of that year. The resulting NSU type 32 featured a air-cooled four cylinder 1.5 liter boxer engine similar to Porsche's 1912 aircraft engine. After engines were built by NSU in Neckarsulm, about 20 miles north of Stuttgart, three prototypes were assembled at Feuerbacher Weg with bodies from Reutter. First test drives, marked by broken torsion bars, were carried out on 27 July, 1934. Noisy and with a top speed of about 70 mph, NSU 32 production was never begun as NSU could not come up with the 10 million Reichsmarks required to get things started. To top it off, in 1935, NSU merged with FIAT, a venture which prohibited NSU from producing automobiles.
Only one NSU 32 survived the war, spending most of that period hiding out at NSU's depot in Friedrichsruh, 4 km north of Öhringen and about 50 km north of Stuttgart. It's now on display at Wolfsburg's VW museum.
While working on the NSU project, Porsche's design firm built another small car for another motorcycle manufacturer, Zündapp of Nürnberg. The five cylinder, star shaped engines were built at Zündapp's Nürnberg facility; the bodies by Reutter in Zuffenhausen; and assembly, as far as I can tell, on Feuerbacher Weg - at least one of the three prototypes had its picture taken (see Porsch AG photo below) there when it was completed in March, 1932. Porsche kept one of the type 12s but it was destroyed during a 1944 bombing raid.
Since Zündapp, like NSU, decided not to manufacture Porsche's car - motorcycle sales picked up for Zündapp - it would be up to a powerful and dangerous man to produce the successor to these cars, both of which are quite similar to the VW Bug and vaguely like that ultimate VW, the Porsche 911.
Porsche had barely settled into his old house when Hitler became chancellor on 30 January, 1933. Hitler lost no time in looking for someone to build an inexpensive people's car, a pet idea since 1924 when he read Henry Ford's books in Landsburg prison.
Der Führer was given three possible designers: Joseph Ganz, Edmund Rumpler and Porsche. As the first two were Jews, and since Porsche had designed many of the Mercedes-Benz cars Hitler loved, Porsche was selected to build the VW. Hitler and Mercedes-Benz salesman Jacob Werlin met with Porsche at Berlin's Kaiserhof on 17 January, 1934, to discuss Porsche's people's car. According to historian Nitske, the meeting was prompted by a long letter from Porsche to Hitler.
Hitler wanted a 100 km/hour car with seating for four because, "we can't separate the children from their parents." Fuel consumption was to be no more than 30 miles per gallon and the engine was to be air-cooled as most Germans lacked heated garages. Hitler set the car's price at 900 Reichsmarks, about $215 - the price of a good motorcycle in those days, and $50 less than Americans paid for a new 1925 model T roadster.
Porsche built three VW prototypes, type 60s, in 1935. Using two lathes, a drill press, milling machine, grinder and twelve men, Porsche assembled two cars, a convertible and sedan, in the double garage at Feuerbacher Weg. Daimler-Benz, even with Hitler putting on the heat, was reluctant to develop what they saw as competition, so Porsche had to make do with his garages. Don't ask me where the third prototype was built - I'm still trying to figure that one out.
The three prototypes were followed by three more, series V3 cars, also built at Feuerbacher Weg, but VWs weren't the only big doings on Feuerbacher Weg in 1935. After Ferry Porsche married Dorothea ("DoDo") Reitz, a native Stuttgarter, on 10 January, 1935, Ferdinand gave the new couple a whole floor in his house. On 11 December, 1935, another splendid event graced Feuerbacher Weg - the birth of Ferdinand Alexander ("Butzi") Porsche, the man most responsible for the model 911 though the car can trace its pedigree to the old man, Ferdinand Porsche.
Ferdinand turned his three series V3 prototypes over to the German government for testing on 12 October, 1936. Ferry Porsche led other engineers in putting 50,000 km on each of the cars between 12 October and 22 December. The cars were tested in all conditions, but particularly on the twisting steep roads of the Black Forest southeast of Stuttgart. Several routes were used, including Stuttgart - Karlsruhe or Bruchsal - Darmstadt - Frankfurt - Bad Nauheim - Stuttgart (305 miles); and Stuttgart - Pforzheim - Baden-Baden - Offenburg - Kneibis - Freudenstadt - Stuttgart (253 miles);Feuerbacherweg to Dobel, Baden-Baden, Offenburg, Biberach, Harmersbachtal, Oppenau, Alexanderschanze, Freudenstadt, Horb, Tübingen and back to Stuttgart. Teh photo below is a painting showing the first three VWs in front of Porsche's house in 1936, with Ferdinand being in the middle foreground.
By May, 1937, another thirty VW prototypes, type 38s, were built, but not at Feuerbacher Weg. These cars were assembled by Mercedes-Benz in Untertürkheim, then delivered to newly-built Ludendorf Kaserne in Kornwestheim, a town five miles north of Stuttgart. Unfortunately, all of these cars were destroyed on orders of the government in 1942. In 1938, another thirty Bugs, this time with doors opening forward, were built at the new Porsche factory, now Werk 1, in Zuffenhausen.
The Porsches remained on Feuerbacher Weg until 1943, although Ferdinand and Ferry spent much time at Wolfsburg, Steyr, Berlin, Peugeot factories in France, various military vehicle test facilities and at Hitler's headquarters. In 1943, the family moved to Zell am See, Austria as bombing raids on Stuttgart were becoming increasingly deadly. Porsche's house was damaged by bombers who were being shot at by friendly folks in the adjacent house - anti-aircraft personnel with control over 88 mm and 105 mm anti-aircraft guns, some of which were positioned on the Killesberg, a hillside below and north of Porsche's house. Living in Stuttgart in 1943 seems to have about as peaceful as living in certain American cities today.
In 1949, Ferdinand was allowed to return to Germany, in a VW with Ferry and Kaes. It was while living at Feuerbacher Weg that he spent the last months of his life, dying at Stuttgart's Marien-Hospital on 30 January, 1951. Abbot Johannes of the Benedictine monastery at Nerescheim and prison chaplain at Dijon when Porsche was incarcerated there, read the requiem mass. The funeral, attended by Dr. Hordhoff, Stuttgart mayor Dr. Arnulf Klett and other dignitaries, was held on 4 February, 1951. The next day a long procession of cars led the long way from Stuttgart to Zell am See where Ferdinand Porsche was laid to rest.
Ferry Porsche lived on Feuerbacher Weg until his death in 1998, though I suspect he spent more time in Zell where I once spotted him in his green four-door 928. The house is only about ten minutes from Zuffenhausen where many customers pick up their new Porsches. Much of the drive is uphill as the house sits on very high ground across from the Messe, Stuttgart's exposition facility where something always seems to be going on.
References
Books which most Porsche fans may find exceptional include:
Ludvigsen, Karl, "Porsche, Excellence Was Expected". This huge book, about 900 pages filled with photographs, was sponsored by Automobile Quarterly and published by Princeton Publishing in 1977. While the book is pretty much limited to the 356 and later Porsche cars (ignoring Ferdinand Porsche's huge efforts prior to 1945), and has a few problems with dates and places, it is a fine book though quite expensive. It is, as far as I know, out of print, but Amazon.com will attempt to find copies.
Links
Adolf Hitler's Europe
BMW, A Travel Guide
Pure Mercedes Tour of Germany
Richard Wagner's Europe
Achtung Panzer - German Armor of WW II
Porsche Club of America
Official International Porsche AG Homepage
Audi AG Home Page
Audi USA Home Page
Grand Prix History
Porsche Club Vienna
VW Museum, Unoffical site
Vintage VW Club of America
Volkswagon Classic and Vintage Club of Australia with Tons of VW links
Cars Sales, many rare types
Internet 181 Club - VW thing, Kübelwagen, etc.
Porsche Museum
