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The Introduction of Diesel Power in the United States, 1897–1912

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 June 2012

Richard H. Lytle
Richard H. Lytle
Affiliation:
University Archivist, Washington University, St. Louis
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Abstract

The international migration of the diesel engine provides a valuable case study in the interrelationships of entrepreneurship and innovation. As Mr. Lytle demonstrates, however, the introduction of the engine into the United States was far from efficiently managed and the process of technological diffusion was much slower and strained than it might have been.

Type
Research Article
Information
Business History Review , Volume 42 , Issue 2 , Summer 1968 , pp. 115 - 148
Copyright
Copyright © The President and Fellows of Harvard College 1968

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References

1 This article is based in part on the author's Master's thesis, “History of the Busch Diesel Companies, 1897–1922” (Washington University, 1962).Google Scholar The thesis was written from the archives of the Busch-Sulzer Division of the Nordberg Manufacturing Company, St. Louis and Milwaukee. The Busch-Sulzer archives presently are in Milwaukee.

2 Dictionary of American Biography, XXI: Supplement I, 141–43; Fortune Magazine, “Anheuser–Busch” (July, 1935), 42 ff.

3 National Cyclopaedia of American Biography, XXIII, 103–104; Diesel, Eugen, Diesel: der Mensch, das Werk, das Schicksal (Hamburg, 1937), 232.Google Scholar

4 Meier, E. D., “Diesel's Rational Heat Motor,” Sibley Journal of Engineering, XIII (1898–1899), 173–77Google Scholar; Typescript text of lecture prepared by E. D. Meier, May 18, 1898; Information on American Diesel patents from Allen, James T., Digest of U.S. Patents of Air, Caloric, Gas, and Oil Engines (Washington, 1906).Google Scholar

5 Diesel, Rudolph, Theorie und Konstruktion eines rationellen Wärmemotors (Berlin, 1893).CrossRefGoogle Scholar

6 Nitske, W. Robert and Wilson, Charles M., Rudolph Diesel: Pioneer of the Age of Power (Norman, 1965), 85–123Google Scholar; Diesel, Eugen, Goldbeck, Gustav, Schildberger, Fredrich, From Engines to Autos (Chicago, 1960), 206Google Scholar; Diesel, Rudolph, “The Rational Heat Motor,” Progressive Age, XVI (1898)Google Scholar; This American printing of Diesel's lecture also included the “Tests Made with Diesel's Rational Heat Motor” by Professor M. Schröter of the Royal Polytechnic School at Munich.

7 Diesel, “The Rational Heat Motor,” 19.

8 Meier to Busch, October 4, 1897; Engineering News, XXXIX (March 17, 1898), 174.Google Scholar

9 Copy of contract between Rudolph Diesel and Adolphus Busch, October 9, 1897, original German and translation. Dollar value computed at one mark/23.8 cents: United States Government, Consular Reports, 55th Cong., House Document 294. Initial patents 542846 and 556059.

10 Certified photostat of Certificate of Incorporation of the Diesel Motor Company of America, January 4, 1898.

11 National Cyclopaedia of American Biography, XVI, 342–43.

12 E. D. Meier, typescript text of lecture, “Diesel's Rational Heat Motor,” May 18, 1898, and list of stockholders and officers of the Diesel Motor Company of America, 1898.

13 E. D. Meier, “The Diesel Motor,” Journal of the Association of Engineering Societies (February 2, 1898), 86.

14 Meier, E. D., “The Diesel Motor,” Journal of the American Society of Naval Engineers, X (1898), 181–82.Google Scholar

15 Diesel Motor Company of America pamphlet, February 1898.

16 Meier, “The Diesel Motor,” Journal of the American Society of Naval Engineers, 182.

17 Diesel, Eugen and Strössner, George, Kampf und eine Maschine: die ersten Dieselmotoren in Amerika (Berlin, 1950), 62–63Google Scholar; Report of Professor Denton on Fuel Oil Tests, September 1, 1898.

18 Diesel and Strössner, Kampf, 84.

19 Ibid., 68–71; Clerk, Dugald, The Gas, Petrol, and Oil Engine (2 vols., New York, 1909), II, 715Google Scholar; Diesel, Goldbeck, and Schildberger, From Engines to Autos, 251–54; Engineer (July 8, 1898), 26–27.

20 Copy of a contract between the Allgemeine Gesellschaft für Dieselmotoren, A. G., and Rudolph Diesel, September 17, 1898 (translation); Allgemeine to the Diesel Motor Company of America, January 11, 1899. For a brief time Busch was a director of the company: Busch to Meier, April 2, 1900. See also, Meier, “The Diesel Motor,” Journal of Association of Engineering Societies, 103–104.

21 Diesel to Busch (copy), October 18, 1898.

22 Meier, “Diesel's Rational Heat Motor,” 187.

23 Ibid.; Diesel and Strössner, Kampf, 58–62.

24 Diesel and Strössner, Kampf, 101, 112; Busch to Meier, January 22, August 20, 1900.

25 Diesel and Strössner, Kampf, 60–62; Busch to Meier, January 22, 1900; Regenbogen, C., The Building of Diesel Engines at Krupp's Germania Shipyard (London, 1913), 5.Google Scholar

26 Busch to Meier, April 2, 1900.

27 Meier to Busch, January 5, 1901; Notes of a conference among J. H. Hoadley, Walter Knight, and E. D. Meier, February 1902; conference called to discuss causes for the 1900 engine failures.

28 Busch to Meier, October 9, 1899; Meier to Busch, August 20, December 15, 1900. This account has been drawn from correspondence about Diesel's report on the American engine. See also, Diesel and Strössner, Kampf, 95–103, 117–18, 123–24.

29 Busch to Meier, August 20, 1900; Busch to Diesel Motor Company of America (telegram), January 11, 1901; Meier to Busch, January 5, 1901; Diesel and Strössner, Kampf, 121.

30 Busch to Meier, August 20, September 9, 1899, August 20, 1900; Meier to Busch, January 8, 1901.

31 Notes of a conference among J. H. Hoadley, Walter Knight, and E. D. Meier, February 1902.

32 Busch to Meier, October 9, 1899, January 22, 1900.

33 Busch to Meier, March 17, 1901.

34 Moody's Manual, Industrials, 1908, 1912. Engineering News, XXXVII (January 14, 1897), 17.Google Scholar Allen, Digest, 2009–2010. Joseph Hoadley had at least two brothers, George and Alfred, who appear as directors of his enterprises.

35 Moody's Manual, 1902, 1912; Simpson, Air and Water as Stored Powers, 7–10. Form letter from Diesel Motor Company of America to its stockholders, October 1, 1901.

36 Certified copy of Certificate of Incorporation, December 2, 1901, New York; Copy of certificate of merger of the Diesel Motor Company of America with the American Diesel Engine Company, January 20, 1902. The manufacturing contracts are not in the company archives, though reference to them is found in a copy of minutes of an Executive Committee Meeting, November 12, 1904. The main contract was dated January 8, 1902, with a supplementary contract dated November 10, 1902.

37 Busch to Meier, March 11, April 4, 23, 1902; Busch to stockholders of the American Diesel Engine Company, April 24, 1902.

38 New York Times (May 1, 1902), 5.

39 Busch to Meier, May 2, 4, 1902; Moody's Manual, Industrials, 1919.

40 Busch to Meier, June 12, 1902.

41 This engine, called the “A” design, was exclusively for stationary applications. It was a four–stroke cycle, single–acting, trunk–piston type, air–injection engine built in 1, 2, or 3 cylinder sizes, developing 65, 120, 170, and 225 horsepower. Schneider, “Busch–Sulzer Engines” (processed), 1–2.

42 Meier attempted to sue Hoadley for losses caused by poor workmanship: Meier to Busch, September 8, 1908. At least one other manufacturer, the Power and Mining Machinery Company of Cudahy, Wisconsin, manufactured engines for the American Diesel Engine Company. See also, special report on engines sold, January 10, 1913, and record of a conference between Meier and Hoadley, 1906; Meier to Busch, April 7, 1905.

43 Allgemeine to ADE Company (translation): May 18, 20, 1903.

44 Allgemeine to ADE Company (translation), May 18, 1903, and Meier to Allgemeine, June 4, 1903; Allgemeine to ADE Company, August 17, 1903; ADE Company to Allgemeine, September 2, 1903 (translation); Allgemeine to ADE Company, September 15, 1903, and December 19, 1903. The Allgemeine claimed to be fulfilling patent reciprocity while reserving patent ownership for itself. Busch and Meier held this to be an outright violation of contract obligations for reciprocity: Meier to Allgemeine, September 21, 1903.

45 Copy of the settlement contract between the Allgemeine, Adolphus Busch, and the ADE Company, September 26, 1905. Busch guaranteed the settlement payments personally.

46 Copy of the contract (translation) between Rudolph Diesel and the Allgemeine, March 30, 1905 and January 12, 1906; activation of the 1905 contract severing ties between Diesel and the Allgemeine depended on stock disposition, which was agreed upon finally in the 1906 contract. Busch did not know of the March 1905 agreement when he made the settlement with the Allgemeine in September 1905: Johannes Junck to James R. Harris, translated by Meier, July 12, 1910.

47 Company archives contain two special files: (1) Allgemeine Correspondence, May 1903–January 1908; (2) Documents and settlement agreements, 1903–1908. The following letters are especially important: Diesel to Busch, September 28, 1906 (translation); ADE Company to the Allgemeine, October 29, 1906; Allgemeine to the ADE Company, November 9, 1906.

48 Ibid.; Diesel to Meier, November 17, 1906 (Diesel suggests plan for undermining the Allgemeine); Diesel to Busch, September 28, 1906; ADE Company to the Allgemeine, December 24, 1906; Heinrich Buz to Busch, September 18, 1907; Meier, Memorandum of an interview with Buz and Guggenheimer (Officials of the Allgemeine), Augsburg, January 17, 1908.

49 Diesel to Busch, February 28, 1908 (translation).

50 Agreement between Diesel and Busch, September 8, 1908. Meier explained the intentions of Busch and Diesel–Sulzer in a letter dated May 25, 1909 to James R. Harris.

51 Busch to Meier, February 18, 1908; Diesel to Meier, July 17, 19, 1908; Meier to Busch, September 8, 1908, March 22, November 10, 1909; Meier to Diesel, January 4, 1909.

52 Special report on engines sold, Company archives, January 10, 1913; Record of conference between Meier and Hoadley, 1906; Meier to Busch, March 1, 3, April 7, 1905.

53 Busch to August Busch, 1908. Also, Meier to Harris, May 25, 1909, regarding the syndicate plans of Busch and Diesel–Sulzer in 1908.

54 Meier to Diesel, February 2, November 9, 1908; Busch to August Busch, 1908. Also, for August's attitude, memorandum by Meier on a conference with Adolphus and August Busch, New York, November 4, 1909.

55 Busch to August Busch, 1908.

56 Meier to Busch, March 22, 1909; Busch to Meier, May 3, 6, 1909. Busch received most of his payment for the company's assets back from the receiver as dividends. Copy of contract releases, November 11, 1909 and cablegram from Busch to Berthold Bing, November 10, 1909. This settlement relieved Busch of the 6 per cent royalty on engine sales specified in his 1897 contract with Diesel, subsequently transferred to the Allgemeine.

57 Junge, F. E., “Recent Progress in Diesel Engines,” Power, 34 (August 15, 1911), 248–50Google Scholar; Steinheil, George T., “The Evolution of the Nobel Diesel Engine,” Institute of Marine Engineers, XXXIV (1922–1923), 279–335Google Scholar; “Fifty Years of Sulzer Diesel Engines,” Diesel Power, 25 (November, 1947), 68, 89–91Google Scholar; Mesurier, L. J. Le, “Twenty Years of Diesel Engine Building,” Motorship, 8 (April, 1923), 290–92.Google Scholar

58 Meier to Harris, May 25, 1909.

58 Diesel to Meier, July 10, 1909.

60 Diesel to Meier, December 8, 1909 (translation).

61 In 1909, Charles Nagel, the Busch Company's legal counsel, became Secretary of the Department of Commerce and Labor. Apparently this advantage was never exploited.

62 Meier to Busch, March 22, 1909; Busch to Meier, May 3, 6, 1909.

63 Meier to Diesel, February 8, 1909.

64 Meier to Harris, February 11, 1910; P. Rieppel (M.A.N.) to August Busch (cable–gram) and August Busch to P. Rieppel, March 10, 1910; Meier to Harris, March 29, 1910; Meier to Busch, April 12, 1910; ADE Company to the Electric Boat Company. Although the Electric Boat Company officials did seem to be impressed with Meier's argument, the Busch officials did not press the matter, probably because they were negotiating with Diesel–Sulzer. By 1912 Busch officials did not believe their patent position was strong enough to force the Electric Boat Company to license from them and the matter was dropped. Fuel regulation American patent 651,140.

65 Meier to Busch: May 11, 25, 1909; Meier to Diesel, May 28, 1909.

66 Meier to Busch, March 22, 1909; Meier to Harris, June 23, 1909; Diesel to Meier, June 8, 1909.

67 Copies of contracts: Adolphus Busch, Rudolph Diesel, Gebrüder Sulzer, December 10, 1910. A second contract of the same date between Busch and Diesel provided for Diesel's release from his original 1897 contract with Busch if the new company were established.

68 Harris to Rotter, February 17, 1911.

69 Certified Copy of Certificate of Incorporation of the Busch–Sulzer Brothers–Diesel Engine Company, State of Missouri, February 1, 1911.

70 Rotter to “Diesel USA,” cablegram, April 20, 1911; Rotter to Harris, April 25, May 11, May 27, 1911. Also, comparison of 1910 contract and final contract (July 1911).

71 Harris to Rotter, June 22, 1911; Harris to Nagel, July 23, 1911.

72 Rotter to “Diesel USA,” cablegram, July 15, 1911.

73 Meier, Memo on a conference with Adolphus and August Busch, New York, November 4, 1911.

74 Meier to Busch, February 28, 1909; Meier to Diesel, March 12, 1909; Meier to Harris, May 25, 1909.

75 Diesel to Meier, March 1, 1910.

76 Berthold Bing to Busch, January 6, 1911.

77 Harris to Nagel and Kirby, March 28, 1911; Gebrüder Sulzer to Busch–Sulzer, June 5, 1912; Diesel to Busch–Sulzer, December 5, 1911; Harris to Diesel, December 31, 1911.

78 Diesel to Harris, April 11, 1912 (translation).

79 Diesel to Busch–Sulzer, March 20, 1912.

80 Diesel to Busch, April 11, 1912 (translation).

81 Diesel, Rudolph, “The Present Status of the Diesel Engine in Europe, and a Few Reminiscences on the Pioneer Work in America,” Journal of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers, XXXIV (January–June 1912).Google Scholar

82 Diesel to Busch, April 11, 1912 (translation).

83 Diesel to Busch, May 6, 1912.

84 Diesel to Busch, May 6, 1912 (translation).

85 Diesel to Busch, July 13, 1912 (translation). The only other mention of the combine is in a letter from Lewis Nixon to Diesel, April 10, 1912, seeking Diesel's cooperation against Busch–Sulzer in return for $250,000 worth of stock in the new company. Diesel declined and the combine against Busch–Sulzer evaporated.

86 Diesel to Busch, May 6, July 13, 1912 (translations); Harris to Gebruder Sulzer, April 29, July 31, 1912; Harris to August Busch, July 25, 1912; Gebruder Sulzer to Busch–Sulzer, June 5, 1912.

87 Engine design information from Schneider, “Busch–Sulzer Designed Engines,” unit number and horsepower production and installation analysis from a report “The Diesel Engine,” Busch–Sulzer Brothers–Diesel Engine Company, St. Louis, 1913, pp. 44–45. Engine production data is not available for 1909 and 1910, but the total of 260 engines includes those years.

88 Figures for 1906 and 1912 are official profit statements by the company. The $100,000 deficit accumulated by January 1901 is mentioned by Busch in a letter, as quoted by Diesel and Strössner in Kampf, 121. All other figures are very rough estimates based on Meier's statement that 12,000 horsepower production per year would earn a net profit of $40,000.