André Citroën

Biography

André-Gustave Citroën was born in Paris on 5 February 1878 and graduated from the École Polytechnique in 1900. That year, on a visit to Poland, he saw gears cut in a fishbone pattern that ran more quietly and efficiently; he bought the patent for very little and built a business on double helical gears.

From 1908 he chaired the car maker Mors, and during the First World War he organised the mass production of armaments. In 1919 he founded his own car company. Its first model, the Type A, was built in Paris from June 1919 to December 1921 — 24,093 cars at a rate of 100 a day, which made Citroën the first mass-production manufacturer in Europe.

By 1932 Citroën was the fourth-largest car maker in the world. The cost of developing the Traction Avant and rebuilding the factory broke it: in 1934 the company went bankrupt and Michelin, its main creditor, took over. The Traction Avant went on to sell well and stayed in production until 1957, apart from the war years. André Citroën died in Paris on 3 July 1935; the city later named a quay (1958) and a park (1992) after him.