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Earlier this year, Autocar published a popular feature on ‘Groundbreakers’ – the first production cars that featured important new technology.
Nash’s cars featured heavily, heralding in-car air conditioning among much else. But what was Nash, what were its most important cars, and what on earth happened to it? Let’s find out.
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1913 Jeffrey/Nash Quad
Not a car, but notable for its four-wheel drive, four-wheel brakes and optionally, even four-wheel steering, making it one of World War 1’s best trucks, and America’s most-produced. Launched by the Thomas B. Jeffery company in 1913, the Quad became Nash-branded when Charles Nash, formerly boss of General Motors, went solo, buying Jeffrey in 1916.
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Mitchell Ajax (1926)
The Mitchell Ajax was a moderate seller among the shoals of young American car marques, but sold a lot better after Nash bought Mitchell and rebranded it as the Nash Light Six. Thoughtfully, Nash sent out free badge conversion kits to protect the Ajax’s residual values, a pioneering example of exemplary customer service. PHOTO: Christopher Ziemnowicz
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Nash 400 Series (1928)
Nash was the first maker to fit two spark plugs per cylinder, to the benefit of power and economy if not maintenance bills. Overhead valves, a rarity at the time because they cost more to produce, also featured in the company’s first engine, a six cylinder. The twin plug layout was also used for the 1934 straight eight engine. PHOTO: Greg Gjerdingen
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Nash Advanced Eight (1930)
Nash was not alone in offering a straight eight for its most luxurious models, but it was unique for providing it with twin plug ignition, overhead valves and a nine-bearing crankshaft, which provided 100bhp, impressive refinement and the promise of durability from a marque known for providing more than expected for the money. It was developed into a magnificent 4-door convertible, the Advanced Eight, pictured here, its name not inappropriate. PHOTO: Christopher Ziemnowicz
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Nash Ambassador (1932)
The luxury Ambassador was a large or even larger car, riding on 133in or 142in wheelbases. Powered by a 125bhp version of Nash’s twin ignition 5.3 litre straight eight, it also featured a synchromesh gearbox, a luxurious interior and a presence sufficient for it to be legitimately compared with the high-luxury Duesenberg. Royalty were among its buyers, helping Nash to become one of only two car-makers - GM was the other - to turn a profit in 1932 during the Great Depression. PHOTO: Christopher Ziemnowicz
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Nash Bed-in-a-Car (1936)
Sleeping in your car rather than in a hotel would have been quite attractive for travelers in the Great Depression. Nash’s original idea here was a folding rear seat backrest, the bed’s occupier(s) folding their legs into the boot, an idea the company would gradually refine.
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Nash merges with a refrigerator company (1937)
In 1937 Charles Nash was keen to install a trustworthy successor before retiring at aged 72, recruiting Kelvinator home appliance boss George Mason. Mason insisted, however, that Nash take a controlling interest in his company, resulting in the creation of the Nash-Kelvinator Corporation on January 4, 1937. This apparently crackpot corporate combination would in due course have a revolutionary impact on the car world.
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Nash Weather Eye system (1938)
Nash was first to develop a heater, ventilator and windscreen defroster in one unit. Developed by Finnish engineer Nils Eric Wahlberg, this was the first automotive through-flow ventilation system. Stale air was exhausted via vents at the rear of the cabin, providing both a flow of air and a means of equalizing air pressure. This system is the basis of the heater and fresh air unit in almost every car since, for which we should be warmly grateful.
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Nash 600 (1941)
The Nash 600 was the first mass-produced monocoque-bodied car made in America, though not the world. Nash reckoned the 600’s unibody construction increased rigidity, improved refinement and reduced weight by 500lbs (227kg). The 600’s slightly optimistic name stemmed from its ability to travel over 500 miles on a tank, partly because of that low weight. PHOTO: Motacilla
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Nash 600, Ambassador Custom (1948)
These cars debuted the work of Helene Rother, designer and artist, at Nash. A refugee from Nazi Germany, she was a jewellery designer who turned to car interiors when she got to America in 1941, joining the General Motors interior design team after a spell at Marvel Comics. Her work at Nash was notable for the use of fine, carefully coordinated fabrics, and was influential on the entire American industry. Deserving to be better known today, Rother died in 1999, aged 91.
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Nash Ambassador Airflyte (1949)
‘No more ugly fender openings’, was how Nash trumpeted the semi-enclosed wheels of its 1949 Airflyte sedan, whose design was dominated by the results of chief engineer’s Nils Wahlberg’s war-time access to a wind tunnel.Those fulsome fenders, smooth flanks and fastback tail gave the Airflyte the look of an inverted bathtub, but Nash had the University of Wichita calculate that compared to an average of ‘all the leading makes’, the Airflyte produced 20.7% less drag. Its dealers, however, soon calculated that the design made the Airflyte a hard sell.
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Nash Ambassador Airflyte (1949)
Windtunnel sculpted bodywork wasn’t the Airflyte’s only novelty. It was an early adopter of monocoque construction, and came with a ‘Nash Twin Bed’ facility, both front and rear seats folding flat to create it. Optional flyscreens kept the bugs out when the car’s windows were open.The Airflyte was built at El Segundo, California, just south of Los Angeles International Airport. The factory was later sold to Howard Hughes, and today is used as a satellite development center for Boeing.
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Nash Ambassador Airflyte (1949)
In an effort to keep the driver relaxed in the Airflyte’s ‘Super-Lounge’ cabin, the important instruments including those measuring speed, fuel level, and engine temperature were grouped together within a large, steering column-mounted pod dubbed ‘Uniscope’, which placed them closer to eye level in quite a pioneering piece of ergonomics. The first heads-up display? Well not quite, but heading in the right direction.The controls for the Nash ‘Weather Eye Conditioned Air System’ were hidden behind a panel.
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First Optional Lap-Belt (1950)
Saab may have been first to standardize seat-belts on its GT 750 in 1958, but Nash was first to offer a lap-belt option in 1949 on its Ambassador, Ford following with this extra in 1955. The modern three-point seatbelt was introduced as standard by Volvo in 1959. Nash was thus well ahead, seat belts not widely fitted until the 1960s.
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Nash Rambler Custom Landau Convertible (1950)
North America’s first so-called compact car, this Rambler established an important market segment. Shrewdly launched as an upmarket convertible in a successful ploy to avoid it being seen as ‘a cheap little car’, the Pininfarina-facelifted, longer wheelbase sedan didn’t arrive until 1954, preceded by the 1951 pillarless Country Club coupe. The Rambler triggered the arrival of the Chrysler Valiant, Chevrolet Corvair and Ford Falcon compacts by the decade’s end, the Falcon then spawning the Mustang.
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Nash-Healey (1951)
A transcontinental creation spawned from a chance meeting on Cunard’s Queen Elizabeth ocean liner, the Nash-Healey was America’s first post-war sports car. The chance meeting occurred in 1949 between Nash-Kelvinator boss George Mason and Briton Geoffrey Healey, the latter heading home after a failed attempt to have Cadillac supply engines for his Healey-Silverstone.Mason and Healey struck up a friendship over their interest in photography, spending the rest of the voyage product planning.
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Nash-Healey (1952)
The Nash-Healey’s high price and standalone styling soon prompted a Pininfarina redesign. The cars were now finished in Turin after the US running gear had been shipped to Britain for installation in the Healey chassis. So much shipping swelled the price to $5908, at a time when a new Corvette cost $3513.This picture features Battista "Pinin" Farina (left) with Nash boss George Mason.
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Nash-Healey Le Mans Coupe (1953)
A racing version came third in the 1952 Le Mans 24-hour race, and Nash launched a Le Mans coupe in celebration. However, both models were ditched in 1954 due to poor sales, having pioneered a convoluted transatlantic assembly operation that ought to have warned Cadillac off doing much the same with its ill-fated Allante decades later. 507 production Nash-Healeys were built. PHOTO: Nakhon100
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Nash-Kelvinator Merges with Hudson (1954)
The friendly takeover of Hudson – maker of grand limousines like this Super Six - in 1954 created the American Motors Corporation (AMC), a persistently under-resourced minnow fighting Detroit's Big Three with innovation and ingenuity, often bizarre. Its oddest product, the Pacer, was 20 years off away when all Hudson production was moved to Hudson’s Kenosha, Wisconsin plant to save money.
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First fully integrated Heating and Ventilation System (1954)
Nash was first to develop a fully integrated heating, ventilating, and air-conditioning system mounted in the forward half of the car. Packard had offered a system in 1940, but the evaporator and blower took up half the boot. Chrysler got closer with an optional air conditioner for the 1953 Imperial.
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First fully integrated Heating and Ventilation System (1954)
But it was Nash that was first with the fully integrated system we know today, capitalizing on its merger with the Kelvinator refrigeration company in a rare example of successful cross-industry synergy, fitting it to the 1954 Ambassador. As the ad explains, now six passengers could now happily smoke inside, keeping all the windows closed.
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First fully integrated Heating and Ventilation System (1954)
This advertisement and the previous one illustrate an interesting story about American demography. At around this time, fully 57% of the US population lived in the Northeast and Midwest, where the cold weather is generally more of a problem than the hot, while the warmer West and South represented 42%, hence the focus of Nash's ads. By 2010, the Northeast and Midwest figure had dropped to 40%, while the West and South was now 60% - a major structural change accelerated by, yes, the widespread availability of air conditioning in homes, offices and automobiles.
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Nash Metropolitan (1954)
America’s first sub-compact, although this categorisation had yet to be devised. The Austin-built Metropolitan was fleetingly the second best-selling imported car in America, after the Volkswagen Beetle, its creation the result of research into economy cars by Nash. Tooling up for and building the car domestically would be prohibitive, Nash knew, which pitched the job to several European manufacturers, the British Motor Corporation (BMC) winning.
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Nash Metropolitan (1954)
The Metropolitan was not only made by BMC’s Austin factory in Birmingham but engineered to take Austin mechanicals, too, consisting of a 1200cc four cylinder and three-speed transmission. Gathering doubts over the fitness of this drivetrain, and the absence of trunk-lid, would doubtless have been quashed by amazement at the styling of this tiny 150-inch (3.8m), miniaturized American car.
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Nash Metropolitan (1954)
Austin’s first 10,000-strong batch of Nash Metropolitans sold reasonably well in the US and Canada, prompting a second order. It was gradually improved, gaining two-tone paint and a 1500cc engine for the Series 3, the Series 4 indulging customers with an opening bootlid, luggage previously accessed by tilting the tiny rear seat. The Metropolitan was also sold as a Hudson from 1954, and in other territories, including Britain, as an Austin. When Nash and Hudson were dropped in 1957 Metropolitan became a one-model brand, sold through Rambler dealers.
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Nash Rambler Hardtop Wagon (1956)
The Rambler was relaunched as an all-new model in 1956, on the longer wheelbase introduced with the 1954 sedan. It was the first ‘new’ model to be built on the platform of its predecessor, establishing a widespread industry trend, and more arcanely, the Hardtop Wagon was the first pillarless estate.
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Quad Headlights (1957)
Nash was first to provide two pairs of headlights on its cars, an innovation that would eventually become widespread, but this advance was far from enough to reverse the fortunes of the by now struggling company, whose fragile finances had been adversely affected by a series of disasters such as the Nash-Healey.
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Nash killed Off (1957)
Nash CEO George Mason died in 1954, to be replaced by George Romney (above) who favoured developing Rambler as a low-cost brand rather than persisting with Nash and Hudson. Those marques were killed off in 1957, leaving American Motors with only Rambler and until 1962, Metropolitan. Rambler itself was snuffed out in 1965 and replaced by the AMC nameplateDoes this photo look oddly familiar? George Romney is the father of Mitt, the 2012 Republican US presidential candidate. Romney the elder quit AMC in 1962 to turn to Republican politics, becoming governor of Michigan the following year, and later working in the Nixon administration. AMC exited the home appliance market in 1968; AMC became part of Renault and then Chrysler in the 1980s, the name itself dying in 1987.Despite its many inventions, Nash was never able to fully capitalise on them, and would-be unique-selling-point technologies were quickly developed by better-resourced competitors. Nevertheless, we all drive cars featuring technology pioneered by Nash today, and for that reason we should remember it.
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