America’s First EV Is Way Older Than You Think

The Tesla Model S may have elevated the electric vehicle (EV) from obscurity and thrust it into the limelight, selling millions of cars, but Tesla is far from being the first American electric vehicle.

Tesla

Tesla, Inc. is an American electric vehicle manufacturer largely attributed to driving the EV revolution. Through the Model S and subsequent products, Tesla has innovated and challenged industry conventions on numerous fronts, including over-the-air updates, self-driving technology, and automotive construction methods. Tesla is considered the world’s most valuable car brand as of 2023, and the Model Y the world’s best-selling car in the same year, but the brand’s greatest achievement is arguably the Supercharger network of EV charging stations.

Founded

July 1, 2003

Founder

Martin Eberhard, Marc Tarpenning

Headquarters

Austin, Texas, USA

Owned By

Publicly Traded

Current CEO

Elon Musk

The first American electric car was actually created by Scottish immigrant William Morrison, in 1890. This is his story, as well as the story of how the electric vehicle arrived on the scene, was forced to retreat, made an attempted comeback, was again forced to retreat… and finally went mainstream with Tesla.

In The Beginning…

Robert Anderson from Scotland was, according to most accounts, the first man to strap a rudimentary electric motor to a moving vehicle. It was 1832.

Anderson used an ox wagon. The contraption was immensely slow, unreliable and the range it could achieve on a charge did not even exceed a rock’s throw. But the theory had been proven: the electric motor can power a vehicle.

After that feat, inventors all over the world set about creating a more practical electric car. The issue was not so much the electrical motor. The basic technology was there. The big challenge, for many decades, would prove to be creating batteries that could hold a sufficient charge to make the car even remotely practical to use. It’s an issue that still exists, with the industry now waiting for solid-state batteries to arrive.

It was only in 1888 that a German called Andreas Flocken, 56 years after Anderson’s EV powered ox wagon made its debut, revealed the Flocken Elektrowagen – universally considered to be the first electric car.

The wooden Elektrowagen had an electric motor with the power of one horse, and said power was transferred to the rear wheels via leather belts. It had a top speed of 9 mph, and a rechargeable lead-acid battery.

Meanwhile, In America And Germany

William Morrison, a Scottish chemist and immigrant, settled in the Des Moines area in 1880, and began experimenting with storing chemical energy and converting it to electricity.

His aim was to combine power with a compact design, creating a portable battery. By 1887, his experiments led to his own electric car – the first American-made electric car had been born.

Morrison combined a carriage supplied by the Des Moines Buggy Company with his own, new battery pack, and an electric motor that powered one rear wheel. Morrison’s battery pack reputedly lasted 10 hours, which was quite an achievement. On the downside, it took more than 13 hours to recharge, so it was not very practical.

In 1890, Morrison created a six-seater electric car with a top speed of 14 mph. After the initial hype around his new EVs, Morrison apparently sold his fledgling automotive company in 1891. The six-seater’s new owner, Harold Sturgis, modified the vehicle and entered it in some car races.

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Over the next 15 years, there was a clear focus on the development of practical electric vehicles. Some major players got in the game too. This included serial American inventor Thomas Edison, who counts electric power generation, mass communication, sound recording and motion pictures among his list of inventions.

Ferdinand Porsche also got a piece of the EV action. In 1898, the 23-year-old Porsche built his first car, the Egger-Lohner C2 Phaeton. The car was powered by a 5 hp octagonal electric motor and could reach 16 mph.

In 1899, the young Porsche joined a well-established carriage maker in Vienna, where he developed the electric wheel hub motor. The Lohner-Porsche Electromobile had two electric 2.5 hp wheel hub motors, and could do 23 mph.

Porsche also designed the world’s first functional hybrid car, combining electrical and international combustion technology long before the 911 GTS arrived. Called the “Semper Vivus”, Latin for “Always Alive”, the Lohner-Porsche system had great potential. The car had no battery. Instead, the combustion engine was used to drive a generator, which in turn provided the wheel hub motors with electricity.

The future of the EV and hybrid car was looking bright indeed. Well, that is until another American called Henry Ford came along.

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The Model T Enters The Game

In 1900, Henry Ford and Thomas Edison worked together on developing a low-cost electric vehicle that would revolutionize the car business.

But it was Ford’s own Model T, introduced in 1908, that would deal the electrical vehicle a mortal blow. Powered by a 2.9-liter four-cylinder gasoline engine, the Model T, mass-produced on Ford’s revolutionary new assembly line, was cheap and reliable, offering mobility to the masses.

Combined with a crude oil boom in Texas, ensuring that gasoline was as cheap as chips, the Ford Model T transformed transport in the USA – and it effectively put the brakes on any potential EV development. With affordable gas stations springing up all around the US, the costly infrastructure required to support EVs no longer made any financial sense. The Model T also got significantly cheaper as the years went by. During its final years, it was selling for the equivalent of $13,000 today.

Essentially, the development of a mainstream EV concept became redundant. The EV was basically mothballed.

EV Cometh Again! Oh Wait, No… It’s Not

Besides a few fringe projects which had no impact on the greater car market, the EV segment was dormant until the 70s.

With oil costs soaring, combined with fuel shortages, peaking in 1973 with the Organization of Arab Petroleum Exporting Countries (OAPEC) implementing a total oil embargo on some countries, the concept of a practical EV emerged again. With a new focus on finding alternative forms of propulsion to ensure that the US would not be dependent on foreign powers, Congress passed the Electric and Hybrid Vehicle Research, Development and Demonstration Act of 1976, which freed up Energy Department budgets for research and development.

General Motors got into the act with the XP 512E Concept. The tiny little bubble car, rather impractical to use on American roads, had a curb weight of 1,250 lb and came with an 84V battery pack.

It had a Delco-Remy electric motor, and ‘lightweight’ Delco-Remy lead-acid batteries, which GM claimed allowed a range of 58 miles at a constant speed of 25 mph. A full recharge would take 7 hours. Cool and cute as it was, the 512 did not offer a practical alternative to normal cars with combustion engines.

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AMC also had a go. In 1974, the US Postal Services ordered 350 electric AMC Jeeps, called Electrucks, to deliver mail. Cool as the concept may have been, the Electrucks had a range of only 29 miles, and on colder days they lost so much power the drivers had to avoid any type of hill. Its top speed was 33 mph and, importantly, it cost double the price of a Jeep with a combustion engine. The Electrucks nevertheless remained in service until 1983.

NASA’s lunar rover, the EV buggy that transported astronauts around on the moon, also captured the imagination of people around the world.

Still, EVs’ extremely limited range, a complete lack of suitable public infrastructure and performance that reduced vehicles to short, inner-city trips, saw this supposed revival of the EV crash and burn before it could even get out of the starting blocks (or charging station, if you will).

GM Comes To The Rescue Again! Or Not

During the 1970s and 80s, it is estimated that more than 80% of new American cars were sold with V8 engines. Great news for the gearheads.

But new winds of change were gathering strength. That change called for lower emissions. By 1990, federal and state regulations shifted towards lower emissions. In California, strict new emission regulations sparked a new interest in electric propulsion. And General Motors was again leading from the front, introducing its GM Impact concept car at the 1990 Los Angeles Auto Show.

At the time, most other brands experimented with EV adaptations of existing models. GM went all in, spending a reputed $350 million developing a purpose-built electric vehicle, called the EV1.

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The 3,000 lb EV1, retailing for a steep $34,000, went on sale in 1996. With a 137 hp electric motor, it could sprint from 0-60 mph in around 9 seconds, reach a top speed of 80 mph, but with lead acid batteries, the real-world driving range remained a major challenge: in ideal conditions, driving at a constant speed, it could do about 50 miles. Push on a bit, and the range was depleted much sooner.

With a target of 100,000 units per annum, reality soon hit home: American motorists were not ready to make the switch to EV. Not with this type of range, at least.

When GM canceled the EV1 in 1999, just 1,117 cars had been made. By 2003, GM recalled all the EV1s, and crushed most of them.

Tesla… To Infinity. And A Little Beyond!

Following the EV1’s demise, two American engineers saw a gap in the market. They soon got Elon Musk involved. Musk not only invested his own money in the upstart Tesla company, he managed to raise the capital that would eventually turn a vision and idea into a realistic, practical production vehicle. It also included a $465-million loan from the US Department of Energy that also helped to get Tesla’s first factory off the ground.

The rise and success of Tesla is worthy of a book all by itself, but suffice to say that the company has provided American consumers with practical, real-world EV options. This includes a feasible infrastructure to support EV vehicles. EV companies such as Rivian and Lucid, and most mainstream car companies are now offering EVs on their showroom floors.

The process that William Morrison started in 1880 has now gone full circle. The American-made EV has landed. And it is changing the EV landscape forever.