Cheerful idiots and road trips seem to go together. That was the conclusion derived at by a writer for Outing magazine in March 1905.

The book Motoring West: Volume 1 Automobile Pioneers 1900 to 1909 edited by Peter J. B;odgett is a treasure. It is also a time capsule filled with snapshots from the dawning years of the great American road trip.

The accounts of early automobile owners and their road trip adventures are an endless source of fascination. We will be sharing a sampling of these stories in a new series on Coffee With Jim on Podbean.

An Adventuresome Spirit

This is a bit of a generality but historically Americans are an adventuresme people. From the first colonists (Spanish, French, and English) to early bicyclists and automobilists adventure has been a theme in the American story. Lewis and Clark, Sacagawea, Daniel Boone, Floyd Clymer, Alice Ramsey and Bessie Stringfield all wrote chapers in this story.

But it is the early automobilist that blurs the line between past and present. They were using futuristic machines on roads and trails that were often little different from those used by wagon trains heading for California in the 1840s.

The modern concept of services was nonexistent. Gasoline was not a common commodity. Blacksmith and machine shops often had to serve as garages since dealership facilities were a rarity in rural America.

The Story Begins With Bicycles

In a 1952 interview Elmer Lovejoy recalled, “I got a job right away on the Gillette ranch (North Park, Colorado) over there. Made pretty good money, too, for those days. I got $30 a month and my room and board. I was always foolin’ with machinery, so they put me to work repairing the ranch machinery, and I never did a bit of regular ranch work.”

While working at the ranch, the 20 year old man decided to visit the Chicago World’s Fair as it was to be a showplace for modern machinery. So he bought himself a bicycle for the trip with his ranch earnings. On September 19, 1892 his epic adventure began. His goal was to travel at least 80 miles each day.

That adventure inspired Lovejoy to open a bicycle repair and sales shop in Laramie, Wyoming! But as was a talented mechanic as well as repairman, and as bicycles provided a limited income on the western frontier, he advertised the enterprise with “We Repair Everything in the Home.” He also organized the Laramie Bicycle Club.

Dawn of A New Era

On May 7, 1898, something new and startling rolled from Lovejoy Novelty Works. It was a steam powered carriage that was proclaimed to be the first automobile built west of the Mississippi River.

In 1907, Lovejoy established the first automobile rental business in Wyoming. An innovative steering mechanism he developed was traded to the Locomobile company for $800 cash and a new car. Then in 1905 he became the regional dealer Franklin Motor Car Company, a manufacturer of air cololed automobiles.

When it was announced that were plans to build the first transcontinental road for automobiles, Govenor Bryant Brooks asked Lovejoy to represent Wyoming at the Good Roads Convention in Buffalo, New York. That road was the Lincoln Highway.

Imagine This

Imagine this, in 1893, Charles and Frank Duryea establsihed the first American automobile manufacturing company in the United States. On November 28, 1895 the first official automobile race took place in Chicago. In November 1900 the Automobile Club of America sponsored the first auto show with forty manufacturers displayed at Madison Square Garden in New York City.

Horatio Nelson Jackson made the first successful transcontinental drive across the United States in 1903. Sponsored by Maxwell-Briscoe, Alice Huyler Ramsey became the first woman to drive an automobile across the United States in 1909.

In 1908 a 22,000-mile automobile competition started at Times Square in New York. The finish line was in Paris, France.

Road Trips Inspired

At Jim Hinckley’s America we tell people where to go, and we inspire road trips. And we encourage people to discover America with road trips.

In this new Coffee With Jim series we will be doing all of this as we share the stories of folks like Elmer Lovejoy and Alice Ramsey. And we will also tell the story of Louis Chevrolet, Alexander Winton, and the amazing Effie Hotchkiss.

Join us for these shared adventures. And you might also want to share more modern adventures through the Decade With Jim series on Substack or Visits With Jim on the Jim HInckley’s America YouTube channel.