Pierce-Arrow — The Buffalo Maker of Presidential Cars

Pierce-Arrow at a glance

Birdcages, bicycles and the Motorette

The firm that became Pierce-Arrow was set up in Buffalo in 1865 as Heinz, Pierce and Munschauer and was best known for delicate, gilded birdcages and other household goods. In 1872 George Norman Pierce bought out his two partners and renamed it the George N. Pierce Company. Bicycles were added in 1896.

The move to cars began with a false start: in 1900 an attempt to build a steam car under licence from Overman failed. In 1901 the company built its first car, the Motorette, a single-cylinder model with two speeds and no reverse. A two-cylinder car called the Arrow followed in 1903, and the name stayed with the company.

The Great Arrow and the Glidden Tour

From 1904 Pierce concentrated on a larger, more luxurious four-cylinder car, the Great Arrow, which became its most successful product. In 1905 it won the Glidden Tour, a 350-mile event from New York City to Bretton Woods, New Hampshire, in which 33 cars took part; Percy Pierce drove the winning car.

Success called for a new plant. Around 1906 Albert Kahn designed the factory complex at Elmwood Avenue and Great Arrow Avenue in Buffalo, which covered about 14 hectares and included a three-storey administration building of 12,353 m². It served as headquarters and works until 1938 and was added to the National Register of Historic Places on 1 October 1974. George Pierce sold his rights in the company in 1907, and in 1908 the Pierce Motor Company was renamed the Pierce-Arrow Motor Car Company. Pierce himself died in 1910.

White House cars and fender headlamps

In 1909 President William Howard Taft ordered two Pierce-Arrows, along with two White Model M tourers, for state occasions. These were the first official White House cars. From 1910 the company dropped its other four-cylinder cars and built only sixes until 1929, among them the 36, 48 and 66 models. Engine sizes were enormous by later standards, from 7.4 litres to 11.7 litres, and the largest engine, with a 5-inch bore and 7-inch stroke, displaced 13.5 litres (825 cu in). The engine size by decade chart shows how far average engines later shrank.

Herbert M. Dawley joined in 1912 and designed almost every Pierce-Arrow until 1938. In 1914 the headlamps moved into flared housings on the front wings, a feature that became the company's signature. In 1918 Pierce-Arrow adopted the Dual Valve Six, a T-head straight-six with four valves and three spark plugs per cylinder, and from 1919 a four-speed manual gearbox. The company also built trucks and, until 1914, motorcycles.

Studebaker, straight-eights and the V12

In 1928 Studebaker gained control of the Buffalo firm, for a planned period of five years, and a Canadian subsidiary built cars in Walkerville, Ontario, from 1928 to 1934. That year Pierce-Arrow built 5,492 cars and 999 trucks. In 1929 a 6.0-litre side-valve straight-eight replaced the six, and production rose to 9,840 cars and 507 trucks.

Production then fell: 6,916 cars in 1930, 4,210 in 1931 and only 2,241 in 1932. A V12 engine was offered from 1931. Studebaker itself went into receivership on 18 March 1933, and its ownership of Pierce-Arrow ended by 1934. The Studebaker catalogue covers the former parent company.

The Silver Arrow and the end in 1938

The Silver Arrow show car appeared at the New York Auto Show in January 1933 with the slogan "Suddenly it's 1940!" It was designed by Phillip O. Wright, a young stylist who had been laid off from the Art and Colour Section of General Motors. The fastback saloon used a side-valve V12 of about 7.6 litres with 130 kW (175 hp) at 3,600 rpm. Five were built by hand and sold at US$10,000 each in 1933; three are known to survive. The production Silver Arrows of 1934–1935 kept the fastback tail but not the radical streamlining. The Pierce-Arrow Silver Arrow article covers the car in detail.

The company tried new products: in 1936 it introduced the Travelodge camper trailers and a redesigned V12 saloon. Pierce-Arrow bodies also lived on in the Galloping Goose railcars of the Rio Grande Southern Railroad. None of this was enough. In 1938 the company declared insolvency and closed. Chief engineer Karl Wise assembled the last car from parts secured by the receiver, and the remaining assets were auctioned on Friday, 13 May 1938. After 1938 the Buffalo complex was divided into space for many small companies. The make's surviving cars are listed in the Pierce-Arrow catalogue, and more cars of the era are in the classic cars section.

Pierce-Arrow timeline

Landmark Pierce-Arrow models

Photo gallery