It is likely that no invention affected the everyday lives of all Americans in the 20th century more than the automobile. The industry’s growth spurred an economic revolution across the United States as hundreds of entrepreneurs took advantage of the fact that people were transitioning from horse-drawn carriages to transportation powered by the internal combustion engine. One such company was C.R. Patterson & Sons Company of Greenfield, Ohio, makers of the Patterson-Greenfield automobile from 1915 to 1918.
Little has been confirmed about the Patterson family and their plantation life. The 1850 census provides evidence that the family settled in southwestern Ohio in the 1840s; others suggest that Patterson alone escaped in 1861. What is known is that Patterson, a natural mechanic, brought his blacksmithing skills with him from Virginia. He developed a reputation for building a high-quality product while working in the carriage-making trade for Dines and Simpson, a company that built carriages.
In 1873, Patterson partnered with J.P. Lowe, another carriage-building company based in Greenfield. The partnership thrived as a successful manufacturing business for 20 years. In 1893, Patterson bought J.P. Lowe’s share of the business, subsequently renaming it C.R. Patterson & Sons Company. With 10 to 15 employees, the company built 28 different types of horse-drawn vehicles. Patterson & Sons successfully marketed its
equine-powered carriages and buggies, but it was becoming evident that cars would soon replace carriages.
In 1910, Patterson passed away and left the business to his son Frederick. Fredrick converted the carriage company into a car manufacturing business. In 1915, the first Patterson-Greenfield car was launched and sold for $850. The car had a four-cylinder Continental engine very similar to that of Ford’s Model T. Even though Patterson & Sons could not match Ford’s manufacturing capabilities, the Patterson-Greenfield was a more advanced automobile. Approximately 150 of the model were produced.
By the 1920s, the Midwestern schools began switching from horse-drawn to internal combustion vehicles. School buses were becoming popular. Patterson decided to convert to manufacturing buses, trucks, and the bodies of other utility vehicles using the chassis produced General Motors and Ford. This change in the business led to another restructuring of the company: the Greenfield Bus Body Company. After 10 years of average but steady growth, the company showed decline during the Great Depression.
In 1932, Frederick Patterson passed away; Greenfield Bus Body continued to have problems. In 1938, the company moved to Gallipolis, Ohio, changing its name to the Gallia Body Company. Efforts to revive it proved unsuccessful, forcing the company to close its doors in 1939. Facing the same dilemma as the other small-size car manufacturers, Gallia Body was unable to compete with General Motors, Ford, Chrysler, and other major car manufacturers.
None of the Patterson-Greenfield cars survived, but some C.R. Patterson & Sons buggies and carriages are still in existence. The important facts here are that Charles Richard Patterson, who was born into slavery (1833), founded the business, which remains to this day the only African American–owned and operated automobile company of record; and that Patterson built his vehicle before Henry Ford. It has been said that had Patterson “been a white man, Greenfield, Ohio, could have been another Detroit.”