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James Moses Quinby (1804-1874) the founder of the firm bearing his name, was born in Orange, New Jersey on October 4, 1804. His family relocated to Newark where he became apprenticed to John C. Hedenberg. Hedenberg was the son-in-law of Robert B. Campfield, one of Newark pioneer vehicle manufacturers. Campfield originally specialized in the manufacture of stage-coaches – huge, unwieldy conveyances with long bodies hung upon massively-constructed iron jacks pulled by a team of four horses. Campfield's principal customer was Gen. John N. Cumming, one of the regions earliest mail contractors. In politics General Cumming was an active supporter of Jefferson and Madison. Such was the extreme zeal of his political partisanship that he allowed it to influence his business conduct. As Campfield was a staunch Federalist, Cumming proscribed him in business, and refused to patronize him any longer, driving Campfield to looks elsewhere for an untapped market. He went to New York, and found one infinitely more satisfactory and profitable than that on which he had heretofore been depending. The cancelled mail-supply contracts proved a blessing in disguise, primarily to Campfield and secondarily to Newark. The work turned out by him and his son-in-law gave wings to the fame of Newark. Such was the celebrity of their handiwork that state carriages, costing two thousand dollars each (a very large sum for those days), for Santa Anna, of Mexico, and Capt.-Gen. Tacon, of Cuba, were made by them upon orders from New York dealers, the work being superintended by John Clark, who afterwards took a front rank in Newark as a master carriage-maker. Concurrent to the reorganization of the firm as Campfield & Hedenberg, young Quinby took a position as foreman with G. & A.K. Carter, three brothers who took over the works of their father, Caleb Carter, another one of Newark's pioneer builders. When that company failed in 1834, Quinby purchased its assets and resumed production under his own name. As the business grew Quinby took in two partners, George M. Spencer and a Mr. Young. Quinby was married on December 12, 1838 to Phoebe Ayres, eldest daughter of Richard and Hannah (Hays) Sweazy of Newark, N. J. (b. Nov. 25 1817-d. May 25, 1859). Their union was blessed with the following children:
Slow and steady progress was made, and his firm soon became not only the largest in the state, but one of the largest in the country, with a large factory at 326 Broad St. in downtown Newark. From the 1820s through the Civil War Newark rivaled New York City as the nation’s carriage building center and as many as twenty factories employed from twenty five to one hundred men each. Quinby’s factory had always been the largest, employing around 200 hands in 1857. Towards the end of the century a new modern 4-story factory was built at 21-39 Division St. in Newark, and a Manhattan showroom established at 620 Broadway in New York City. Quinby was a leading citizen of the community and served as Newark’s mayor for three consecutive one-year terms, 1851 through 1854. In 1860 Quinby was elected as Essex County’s State Senator and served a single three-year term, 1861 through 1863. The firm built up a profitable trade in the south with branch factories in Montgomery, Alabama and Columbus, Georgia. Although the firm's southern trade was lucrative, Quinby was loyal to the Union cause, and for the duration of the Civil War abandoned all trade with his southern outlets. For many years Quinby was a communicant and vestryman of Trinity Church, Newark. He was also one of the original managers of the Newark Savings Institution and chairman of the funding committee and in addition to serving as Mayor was a longtime water commissioner of the city. Soon after the senior Quinby passed away - at Newark on July 20, 1874 - the firm was dissolved and reorganized with his son James Milnor Quinby at the helm. The Harness and Carriage Journal paid an eloquent tribute to his memory, and, on the day of his funeral, the carriage factories throughout the city of Newark were closed as a token of respect and honor. James Milnor Quinby was born on March 27, 1850, at Newark, N. J., and after a course of study at the carriage building institute at Konigsberg, Germany returned to the country were he assisted his father at the family's manufactory. He was married on November 6, 1872 to Mary Veronica, daughter of Jeremiah Darby and Ann (Gilligan) Casey. To the blessed union were born four children:
Two partners, Isaac S. Ayres and John H. Jephson, joined James Milnor Quinby in the new enterprise which continued in the style of his father as J.M. Quinby & Co. The junior Quinby inherited much of his father's business foresight and persevering energy, and all three partners were identified with the old firm in one capacity or another for years with the capable Mr. Ayres taking charge of the firm's drafting department. The firm manufactured every description of vehicles, from a light road wagon to a Clarence, coach, or landaulet, and none but the most skilled workmen were employed. Quinby's carriages were distributed throughout the country and the firm maintained a Manhattan sales office for over a half century. The 1860 New York City directory list the firm at 620 Broadway, the 1880 directory, 6 East 23d Street. At the time of the 1874 reorganization the working force at their Newark factory numbered 100, their weekly wages averaging $1,365. Sales for the year were a pegged at $130,000. After a short illness James Milnor Quinby retired to his home at 24 Elm St., Newark, finally passing away on May 21, 1892. His son, William O'Gorman Quinby embarked upon a career as a physician and elected not to enter the family's business. Upon the death of the junior Quinby, the firm was reorganized, with control of the firm being assumed by Newark’s Ogden family. William W. Ogden became Quinby’s president and his brother Henry, vice-president and treasurer. Walter C. Yelton served as Quinby’s chief draftsman and superintendent through the transition from carriage-building to automobile body building. At the age of fifteen Yelton moved from his native Kentucky to Oneida, New York, where he apprenticed at the shops of J. L. Spencer & Co. Subsequent positions were held with R. M. Bingham, in Rome, New York, the Oneida Carriage Works, in Oneida, New York and the Cortland Wagon Co. in Cortland, New York. In 1893 he attended the Andrew F. Johnson Technical School and went to work for Quinby in July of 1895. Yelton remained Quinby’s chief designer until he left to work for John B. Judkins Co. in 1916. Another noted Quinby delineator was Emerson Brooks, who joined the firm soon after Yelton. Brooks was also an early automotive enthusiast and was an early member of the Automobile Club of America – the predecessor of the modern-day AAA. Quinby sponsored the talented Brooks went he studied design in Europe during 1902 and he would later form the New York coachbuilding firm of Brooks-Ostruk Co. in 1917 with Demarest’s chief designer, Paul Ostruk. The March, 1899 issue of Horseless Age reported: "It is an unfailing sign of the times when one of the oldest carriage-building firms in the country, noted for more than half a century for the excellence of their product, embarks in the manufacture of electric carriages." A stillborn scheme with entrepreneur James E. Hayes to build electric delivery vehicles for the Newark brewer J. Herbert Ballantine made headlines, but in reality only a handful of Quinby Electrics were actually delivered, and those few were built to order using components sourced from the Riker Electric Vehicle Co. of Elizabethport, N.J. Herbert T. Strong, one of Quinby’s talented designers, patented a process for making composite aluminum over wood, automobile bodies in 1902, and this innovation helped launch their body-building business. Quinby’s tulip phaeton became quite popular, and served as a major influence on the much more ornate Roi-des-Belges open tourers which became quite popular in Europe during the early 1900s. The Roi-des-Belges was named after the topless limousines favored by King Leopold II of Belgium, the Belgian Monarch who had a much celebrated affair with the notorious Parisian dancer and post card pin-up Cléo de Mérode. In 1903 Quinby enter into negotiations to body the proposed American Panhard which was to have been assembled by Panhard’s American distributors Smith & Mabley, but Panhard supposedly axed the scheme due to pressure from US Customs who feared the loss in anticipated revenue. Emerson Brook’s long association with the Automobile Club of America led to the firm’s decision to exhibit a Decauville limousine at the December 1905 New York Automobile Show. The following year Quinby’s stand included handsome French-influenced designs on FIAT, Mercedes, Panhard, Renault, and Simplex chassis. A Quinby display with many of the same vehicles was held a few weeks earlier at the competing 1906 Licensed Automobile Manufacturer’s Importer’s Automobile Salon which was held at Herald Square Exhibition Hall during much larger ALAM’s exhibit at Madison Square Garden. The following year it was decided to exclude imported chassis at both the ACA and ALAM New York shows and to exhibit the foreign chassis in a third, totally separate event which would be held at Madison Square Garden following the two American shows at the end of December. For the next few years Quinby’s Salon exhibits consisted of a variety of open and closed body styles on various imported chassis - Benz, Daimler, Decauville, FIAT, Isotta-Fraschini, Lancia, Mercedes, Minerva, Panhard, Renault, and Rolls-Royce. But due to the unwarranted expense of exhibiting at all three shows, Quinby – and others – decided to focus their attention on the Importer’s Salon, where they displayed their creations on both imported and domestic chassis. Subsequent Salons included Quinby creations on the following American made /assembled chassis: American FIAT (assembled in Poughkeepsie, NY), American Mercedes (assembled in Long Island City, NY), American S.G.V. (Charron, Giradot and Voight - assembled in Rome, NY), Crane-Simplex, Jennis, Locomobile, Lozier, Matheson, Packard, Pennsylvania, Pierce (Great Arrow), Pierce-Arrow, Scott, Singer, Simplex, Smith & Mabley and Wick. The 75th Anniversary 1909 J. M Quinby & Co. Aluminum Body catalog offered 27 different styles of bodies for the discriminating customer and a satellite showroom was established in Philadelphia at the corner of Walnut & 12th Street. Quinby also became a distributor for Isotta-Fraschini as well as a distributor and exclusive body-builder for the Bryn Mawr-built Pennsylvania automobile. Advertising for the Pennsylvania car emphasized that its bodies were made by Quinby, "recognized and accepted as America's best." However, in August of 1911 Quinby sued the automaker alleging that Pennsylvania had reneged on its 1909 contract before the full delivery of bodies ordered. The action led to the Bryn Mawr firm’s involuntary bankruptcy in 1911. Emerson Brooks was now Quinby’s vice-president, as well as serving as treasurer for the Automobile Club of America, a position that undoubtedly brought in additional revenue for the firm. Brooks continued to have a hand in the firm’s design work introducing a novel angled footboard on a Simplex chassis that offered the driver additional comfort on long journeys. Two additional Quinby satellites opened in rapid succession, a Simplex and Isotta-Fraschini showroom on Pittsburgh’s Grand Blvd in 1910 followed by another at 1849 Broadway in Manhattan that was headed by H. M. "Deacon" Strong. In January, 1912 the New York Times reported on two imported Benz chassis seen at the Importers Auto Salon with Quinby coachwork:
Despite the fact that Isotta-Fraschini opened their own New York City showroom in 1912, many of the automaker’s chassis displayed at subsequent Salons were still exhibited with Quinby coachwork which was due in no small part to Captain Ugo d’Annunzio, the I-F’s branch’s flamboyant manager who was the son of the infamous Italian Nietzschean poet, black magician, anarchist and aviator, Gabriele D'Annunzio. Quinby's Manhattan showroom eventually moved to 232 Fifth Ave. from it original location at 620 Broadway. When they closed down in 1917, its manager, H. M. "Deacon" Strong, became sales manager for New York’s Wm. Wiese & Co., a major supplier of upholstery for the custom body industry. Quinby, along with Burr, Demarest, Holbrook and Locke were well-represented at the January, 1913 Importer’s Auto Salon which took place once again in the Hotel Astor’s Grand Ballroom. Quinby's 1914 New York Salon exhibit consisted of 9 Isotta-Fraschinis; 2 polished I-F demonstrator chassis, one a 120-130hp, the second a 45-55 hp model, a 120-130 hp Isotta-Fraschini Inside-drive "social limousine, a 120-130 hp I-F runabout, a 70-80 hp I-F collapsible touring, a 35-45 hp I-F collapsible touring, a 25-35 hp I-F special touring, a 25-35 hp I-F limousine and an 18-25 hp I-f inside-drive coupe, all with Quinby coachwork. The 1915 Auto Salon marked the first time in over 10 years that an official Quinby booth was absent from the event. The only European chassis displayed were from Lancia and Peugeot as the Great War in Europe greatly reduced the availability of imported chassis. Italian manufacturers were busy producing chassis for the Austro-Hungarian/German War effort and transportation bottlenecks prevented other chassis from crossing the Atlantic. The only Quinby bodies in evidence were located on the Simplex stand. Following his graduation for the Andrew F. Johnson Technical School in 1914, a young John Dobben was hired by Quinby as a delineator. He had previously worked in the body shops of the Pope-Hartford Co. where he studied design using Andrew F. Johnson’s correspondence course. In 1913 he decided to personally attend Johnson’s classes at New York’s Mechanics Institute. In a conversation with coachbuilding historian Hugo Pfau, Dobbin recalled that in those days, they had no chassis blueprints to work from in laying out the body. He often went into New York City or perhaps out to Long Island to measure a chassis they were to build a body for. This meant not only the superficial items such as wheelbase, but the exact contour of the chassis frame, the shape of the kick-up over the rear axle, the location of each body bolt hole. Then he also had to check such items as the location and size of brake drums, differential housings, and other points for which clearance would have to be allowed when building the body. This was a process that could take many hours of careful measurement, jotting down notes and making small sketches which would later be redrawn in full size before the body draft could be started. Dobben worked at Quinby from 1914-1917, when he left to work for the John B. Judkins Company in Merrimac, Massachusetts, where he was to remain for the next quarter-century. He recalls that the Quinby’s offices were at 342 Broad St, but their advertising still used the factory's 21-39 Division St address. Right before Dobben left, William and Henry Ogden considered the manufacture of another Quinby automobile, this one gasoline powered. A 1916 trade journal reported that "from its position as one of the leading makers of custom bodies in the East," Quinby was planning to "expand into larger existence as a car maker." Among the principals behind this effort was William O. Houck, former vice-president and sales manager for Keeton, and the plan included a stock offering in order to increase its capitalization from $200,000 to $2.1 million. Apparently there was a third Ogden brother who passed away at the same time. He had made a fortune on Wall Street and left a huge trust fund for his two brothers, the principal of which they could not touch. Surprisingly, the plans for the new venture were scrapped and the Odgens decided to retire from the bodybuilding business. Quinby was notably absent from the 1916 Importer’s Auto Salon and a late 1916 NY Times article stated that:
The Hub also announced the firm's withdrawal from business in its March 1917 issue:
The George S. Jephson Co. was organized in 1915 by George S. Jephson and John K. Scott to take over the assets of the failed J.M. Quinby & Co. of Newark, New Jersey. The two principles of the firm were longtime Quinby employees and George's father, John H. Jephson, had worked alongside the founder of the firm, James Moses Quinby, and acquired a share in it upon his 1874 passing. At that time (1874) the original firm dating back to 1834 was dissolved and reorganized with Quinby's son, James Milnor Quinby at the helm. James Milnor Quinby was born on March 27, 1850, at Newark, N. J., and after a course of study at the carriage building institute at Konigsberg, Germany returned to the country were he assisted his father at the family's manufactory. He was married on November 6, 1872 to Mary Veronica, daughter of Jeremiah Darby and Ann (Gilligan) Casey. To the blessed union were born four children:
Two partners, Isaac S. Ayres and John H. Jephson, joined Quinby's son in the new enterprise which continued in the style of his father. The junior Quinby inherited much of his father's business foresight and persevering energy, and all three partners were identified with the old firm in one capacity or another for years with the capable Mr. Ayres taking charge of the firm's drafting department. The firm manufactured every description of vehicles, from a light road wagon to a Clarence, coach, or landaulet, and none but the most skilled workmen were employed. Quinby's carriages were distributed throughout the country and the firm maintained a Manhattan sales office for over a half century. The 1860 New York City directory list the firm at 620 Broadway, the 1880 directory, 6 East 23d Street. At the time of the 1874 reorganization the working force at their Newark factory numbered 100, their weekly wages averaging $1,365. Sales for the year were a pegged at $130,000. After a short illness James Milnor Quinby retired to his home at 24 Elm St., Newark, finally passing away on May 21, 1892. His son, William O'Gorman Quinby embarked upon a career as a physician and elected not to enter the family's business. Upon the death of the junior Quinby, the firm was reorganized, with control of the firm being assumed by Newark’s Ogden family. William W. Ogden became Quinby’s president and his brother Henry, vice-president and treasurer. Walter C. Yelton served as Quinby’s chief draftsman and superintendent through the transition from carriage-building to automobile body building. At the age of fifteen Yelton moved from his native Kentucky to Oneida, New York, where he apprenticed at the shops of J. L. Spencer & Co. Subsequent positions were held with R. M. Bingham, in Rome, New York, the Oneida Carriage Works, in Oneida, New York and the Cortland Wagon Co. in Cortland, New York. In 1893 he attended the Andrew F. Johnson Technical School and went to work for Quinby in July of 1895. Yelton remained Quinby’s chief designer until he left to work for John B. Judkins Co. in 1916. Another noted Quinby delineator was Emerson Brooks, who joined the firm soon after Yelton. Brooks was also an early automotive enthusiast and was an early member of the Automobile Club of America – the predecessor of the modern-day AAA. Quinby sponsored the talented Brooks went he studied design in Europe during 1902 and he would later form the New York coachbuilding firm of Brooks-Ostruk Co. in 1917 with Demarest’s chief designer, Paul Ostruk. In 1915, the George S. Jephson Company was incorporated under the laws of the State of New Jersey by Messrs. George S. Jephson, John K. Scott, Harry H. Lockwood and John Robertson, for the manufacture of high grade motor car bodies, with its factory located at No. 504 Central Avenue, (now an Auto Zone) East Orange, New Jersey. In its March, 1917 issue, The Hub announced the withdrawal from business of J. M. Quinby & Co., one of the nation's most respected custom body builders:
A subsequent news item reported that the large Quinby factory in Newark was on the market for $400,000 and a July 2, 1917 auction disposed of what remained of the firm’s equipment and inventory. John K. Scott, son of John K. and Phoebe (Clark) Scott, was born in Newark, New Jersey, his father a machinist. He was educated in the city public schools, and upon arriving at a suitable age, became an apprentice in the Newark plant of James M. Quinby & Company, carriage manufacturers. He remained with that company through all the changes from carriage to automobile body building until 1915, when they discontinued business. From its inception the company enjoyed a most successful career and was compelled by a constant increase of business to seek the larger quarters at Nos. 24-34 Sterling Street, East Orange. 1918 Industrial Directory of New Jersey:
Jephson is recorded as the builder of a couple of bodies for the Porter Car, which was manufactured in very small numbers between 1919-1922. A list of Porter chassis numbers included below indicates two were built for E.P. Prentice
Following George S. Jephson's retirement, John K. Scott was elected president of the company and under his management the company prospered to such a degree that after driving their plant to maximum production, business during the year 1920 was turned away to the amount of $1,000,000. This led to reorganization and expansion, the old company being succeeded by the Jephson, Scott Body Company, Inc., John K. Scott, president, with a capable and efficient board of directors, including Frederick H. Croselraire, manager of the R. H. Platinum Company, and member of the National Contest Committee of the Automobile Association of America; August Linde, secretary-treasurer of the Linde-Griffith Company, contractors; Robert M. Hillas, vice-president of the Whiting Motor Car Company, and Fred G. Stickel, Jr., judge of the Court of Common Pleas in Essex county. The reorganization was covered in the March, 1921 issue of Iron Age:
In late 1922 a substantial interest in the firm was acquired by the organizers of the Crane-Simplex Co. The latter firm was incorporated in New York on September 20, 1922 for the purpose of resuming production of the famed Simplex automobile, whose manufacture had been suspended in 1917 so that the Company's plant might be devoted to the construction of Hispano-Suiza aeroplane engines for the Entente Powers (aka Allied) War effort. The December, 1922 issue of The Automotive Manufacturer included the following news item relating to organization of Crane-Simplex:
An article in a December 1922 issue of The Automobile, included the following mention of the two firm's (Crane-Simplex & Jephson, Scott) relationship:
Although the Crane-Simplex was a magnificent car, the chassis was little-changed from its pre-War ancestor and proved to be a financial disaster. Production was halted during 1923 and the directors of Jephson, Scott put the firm's plant and assets on the market. An interested buyer was located in the form of Richard H. Long, a wealthy New England shoe manufacturer who had gotten into the automobile body business in 1917 when he purchased the Framingham factory of the Bela Body Co. In 1921 Long introduced the Bay State automobile, a reasonably successful mid-priced car that was produced from 1922 to 1924. The firm produced the assembled vehicle from its headquarters in Framingham as well as a recently constructed factory located nearby in Worcester, Massachusetts. Long's automobile business was reorganized a number of times starting in 1923, and one of the resulting firms, the R.H. Long Motors Co., was headquartered in Newark at 252 Central Avenue, less than a mile away from the Jephson-Scott body works. He saw the purchase of the plant as an economical way to place full custom bodies on the Bay State chassis. Although J.M. Quinby & Co. had withdrawn from business in 1915, the firm's principle owners, William and Henry Ogden, elected to hold onto the name when they auctioned off the firm's assets in 1917. Ernest Kay, Quinby's former treasurer, negotiated a deal with the Ogdens whereby he and Richard H. Long would license the name for their new business. In April 1923 the pair reorganized Jephson-Scott as the J.M. Quinby & Co. To finance the new enterprise, the pair formed the Long, Kay & Company, a brokerage house whose sole business was the sales of shares in the “new” J.M Quinby & Co. Inc. for which they raised $200,000 through a sale of preferred stock. Although it would be illegal today, the pair pocketed $40 for every $85 they placed in the Quinby coffers, a practice that was common in the years before the strict regulations that were made necessary by the stock market crash of ’29. The reorganized J.M. Quinby & Co. Inc. prospered for a short period, but within the year its business took a turn for the worse and Long took over as president to protect his investment. He reduced the workforce and by the end of 1925 its outlook had greatly improved. By that time the Bay State had been out of production for almost two years, however Long found a booming business in the commercial body field, in particular building bus bodies for New Jersey's public transit system. Unfortunately the firm’s output never exceeded 25% of capacity and dividends were never paid out to its shareholders, so in 1926 they took Long and Kay to court over the matter.
The judge found that no wrongdoing had been committed and rejected the shareholders’ petition. The firm lasted for a couple more years but didn’t survive the decade, going out of business for good in 1929. By that time Long had established a successful Cadillac dealership back in Framingham, which remains in business today as the Long auto Group, a multi-franchise, multi-location General Motors dealer group that covers most of Eastern Massachusetts. Quinby’s original Division St. factory was torn down in 1998 to make room for Newark’s Riverfront Stadium which opened in 1999. © 2004 Mark Theobald - Coachbuilt.com
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