 | |
| Industry | Automotive |
|---|---|
| Founded | 1905 |
| Founder | Ransom E. Olds |
| Defunct | 1967 |
| Fate | Vehicle manufacturing division merged with Diamond T to form Diamond Reo Trucks, remainder transformed into Nucor |
| Successor | Diamond Reo Trucks Nucor |
| Headquarters | Lansing, Michigan |
| Products | Cars, buses, trucks |
The REO Motor Car Company was a company based in Lansing, Michigan, which produced automobiles and trucks from 1905 to 1975. At one point, the company also manufactured buses on its truck platforms.
Ransom E. Olds was an entrepreneur who founded multiple companies in the automobile industry. In 1897 Olds founded Oldsmobile. In 1905 Olds left Oldsmobile and established a new company, REO Motor Car Company, in Lansing, Michigan. Olds had 52% of the stock and the titles of president and general manager. To ensure a reliable supply of parts, he organized a number of subsidiary firms, like the National Coil Company, the Michigan Screw Company, and the Atlas Drop Forge Company.
Originally the company was to be called "R. E. Olds Motor Car Company", but the owner of Olds' previous company, then called Olds Motor Works, objected and threatened legal action on the grounds of likely confusion of names by consumers.[1] Olds then changed the name to his initials. Olds Motor Works soon adopted the popular name of its vehicles, Oldsmobile (which, along with Buick and Cadillac, became a founding division of General Motors Corporation).
The company's name was spelled alternately in all capitals REO or with only an initial capital as Reo, and the company's own literature was inconsistent in this regard, with early advertising using all capitals, and later advertising using the "Reo" capitalization.[2] The pronunciation, however, was as a single word. Lansing is home to the R. E. Olds Transportation Museum.
- ^ "Reo Motor Car Company Plant (Designation Withdrawn)". National Historic Landmarks Program. National Park Service. October 14, 2014. Retrieved 10 July 2017.
In August 1904, Olds organized the R.E. Olds Motor Car Company, a name that was soon changed to Reo in order to avert a threatened lawsuit from the Olds Motor Works.
- ^ "Gallery of vintage magazine advertisements". SoOldSoGood.com. Archived from the original on July 11, 2004. Retrieved July 10, 2017.