Great Cars: KAISER
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- Опубликовано: 1 окт 2024
- Almost everyone knows about Kaiser Permanente --- the nationwide HMO but very few have any idea that it sprang from the mind of one of America’s most spectacular entrepreneurs - Henry J. Kaiser. He built the Grand Coulee and Hoover dams, launched more ships than any other builder during World War Two, opened the first steel mill on the West Coast and introduced quilted “Kaiser Aluminum Foil.” In 1945, this legendary California industrialist partnered with automobile executive Joe Frazer to meet the post War demand for cars. The resulting Kaiser-Frazer autos were the last real challenge to the dominance of the Big Three. From 1948 to the mid-‘50’s, Kaiser’s incredible energy created a stir that’s still being felt today. His passenger cars faded away but his transformation of the Jeep from the soldiers’ buddy to an everyday SUV changed the world.
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im 52. my dad is long gone from this world but i remember him mentioning names like keiser, nash frasier, edsel, tucker and on and on...names you dont see or hear anymore. i used to think of them as outdated "old men" cars from a bygone era and i took no interest in them.... after hearing this store i now have profound respect for henry j..... today kids worship elan musk but as i see the accomplishments of this man i muse that elan, though talented and driven can hardly hold a candle
I grew up near Kaiser Steel in Southern California, and my family was a member of Kaiser Permanente when I was growing up. I toured Boulder Dam when I was a kid, and I've always been aware of KF cars. I knew the Jeep Wagoneer was the proto-SUV. The only thing I didn't know, until today: Henry Kaiser was behind all of this. He was an amazing guy. Thanks for the video.
My Grandparents bought a 49 Kaiser, brand new. I had a 1951 Henry J, I bought it in 1965 for $60. It had a rear engine sea leak and needed a clutch. I repaired it and it was a wonderful car1
Used to be a guy in Davenport Iowa who hand 50 or more Kaisers on his property in the 1970s.
Kaiser was definitely the main force behind the venture, but you downplayed Joseph Frazer's role a little. If Kaiser had listened more to Frazer's advice we might see KF cars on the road today. Frazer was the one who secured the Willow Run plant and he even brought Jeep into the company. Without Frazer the Kaiser-Frazer corp would never have had a chance.
An interesting aspect of the story. You're right.
@dogwalkfinds
And had Kaiser heeded Frazer and cut production in 1949 they would not have suffered the massive losses that they did and the money would have been available for the V8 engine they needed to compete in the mid price class.
@@scootergeorge9576 Absolutely correct. I remember this fact when learning the history of this company.
Fraser knew more about automobiles than Kaiser!
Coming back to rewatch this vid, I'm left wondering why more time wasn't devoted to the Kaiser Cj5? It is, by a whole bunch, the most capable Jeep ever mass produced, and I don't care what anyone says to the contrary, I grew up ridin in and watchin my Dad race his 70 Kaiser Cj5 Renegade I at Pismo Beach, Calif, and that little 225 Dauntless V6 would eat chevy 350's for lunch over 80% of the time....
Nice
The Darren was truly a lovely design.
Henry was 100 men in one body. He makes me feel about an inch tall.
Only you can make yourself feel 1" tall
My memories of the Kaiser cars was pretty much as this documentary shows, The Darrin was one of the first American designed sports cars that inspired me at the age of 14 as much as the Jaguar XK 150 did for its looks, though as stated, it was underpowered. So I like most young people of the era, I aspired to the V8 powered cars coming from the big 3. Then a fellow I knew asked a group of my friends if we wanted to go up to the mountains for some tobogganing. He owned a Kaiser Manhattan. Six cylinders, and some of the guys thought it was not going to get us up to the 6000 ft elevation we were headed to with all of us in it. But the owner knew it had a secret that most of the other sixes in sedans of that era just could not match. It had a supercharger run off of the exhaust that was set up to pressurize before the carburetor. Other superchargers used in drag racing were mostly installed after the carburetors so this was unusual for a car.
A standard automotive carburetor, for those who are too young to know, was set up specifically for the altitude at which it was expected to be used. In Denver, for instance it ws jetted differently than for Southern California where I live. Thus a typical Ford or Chevy would lose power going up to the nearby mountains. Not the Kaiser. The carburetor under that Paxton blower never experienced a change in pressure despite our climbing up over a mile. Too little, too late for the Kaiser, and massive TV advertising budgets still aided the 'big 3' in overwhelming even such great old, well regarded car companies as Packard and Studebaker in those postwar days.
Thanks for sharing the deep insight.
The supercharger was a McCulloch belt driven supercharger, it was not exhaust driven. If it was like other McCulloch superchargers of that era it was a two speed model. The pulley would change diameter to slow it at higher speeds to prevent over boosting. Ford used a McCulloch on the 57 model, which was a two speed for sure. The design was a centrifugal supercharger, with an impeller that was similar to a turbo charger, rather than a positive displacement style like the Roots design.
Kaiser, like Ford, used a blow through the carburetor design, which meant the carburetor was housed inside a "box" and that box was pressurized. They had to do it that way because if they just shoved air down the throat of the carb it would force fuel out of the float bowl.
Thanks for your post, I had forgotten Kaiser used a supercharger, and just wanted to clear up an item or two.
Outstanding video on probably the number one industrialist of all time. The only other one in his league would be Mr. Westinghouse.
Thanks. I was really fascinated by him. A real innovator with a big vision.
Damn, I remember when Willow Run was a functioning civilian airport.
About 1946 Mr. Kaiser toured New Zealand, a major US Marines base and support area with outstanding natural beauty and the most friendly people. The car he brought to ride in, broke a gear and he was about to give up and return home.. No said a local businessman. That can be rebuilt here. A short time later his car was driving on wild and spectacular mountain roads. He had been home a year and the engineer who had impressed by his gear skills wrote seeking help to secure further supplies of the welding rod which was made for facing railway tracks. Some months passed and enough rods to outlive his sons were delivered, as a gift.
Thanks for sharing this story.
Mark Rowland
Thanks! That was interesting. Always knew about the cars, but was unaware of his other ventures. Cool!
Where was any reference to Graham-Paige? Kaiser invested in Graham-Paige as an incentive to G-P president Joseph Washington Frazer. The earliest Frazers were badged as Graham-Paige in small letters on the crest.
Henry Kaiser was an inspiration.
I can't remember which movie???
But I think it was like a German u-boat captain that said....
America can make ships faster than we can destroy them!
The Darrin was a beautiful car - beautiful. As a car, it was a dog. So underpowered it really couldn't get out of its own way. So it kind of was the "supermodel" of its day: beautiful; well turned out; and totally impractical for anything other than looking good. Even worse, Dutch Darrin allowed Kaiser to put the car out with side curtains instead of windows, as Chevrolet had done at first with the Corvette. The same side curtains cars from the 1920's had, and just as bad - didn''t go over too well. Want toget caught in the rain in one? Stop the car; get out the curtains; attach them tothe top; get in the car; attach them to the door; drive off soaking wet.
Once Kaiser was done building cars, an entrepreneur in California bought the remaining Darrins and replaced the anemic original drivetrain with 331 cubic inch Cadillac V8s and Hydramatic transmissions, and sold every one.
My first car in high school was a 1954 two door Kaiser Special. A beautiful car with a faux bamboo padded dash and a six cylinder engine that best was suited for the flat prairie of Oklahoma. By far its most appealing feature was a back seat large enough for two teenagers to lie down across it. Many happy memories.
knew about Kaiser cars, but nothing really in any detail or the history of the man behind it. Henry Kaiser, what an inspiring person !
The Kaiser was the first to have seat belts, padded dashboards. The Kaiser was ahead of its time.
I rode many miles in the back of a Henry J when I was a kid. I shared the back with my four siblings and a cat named Cadillac. Good times!
Darrel Carson ,for its time ALL HENRY/J CARS I EVER SAW WERE sort of copper brown,,
Guess it was like FORD’ you can get any colour you want so long as it’s BLACK,, Cheers, from NJ
I think that is fascinating. I learned something about Kaiser.
Too bad Kaiser didn't join forces with Preston Tucker. My Uncle loved his 53 Kaiser.
When I was quite young, I stayed with a family that had a cream colored passenger Kaiser. I was too young to understand the significance of it and thought it was just another car, being that I did not know one car from another at the time!
Nice documentary of a great man of the times, like Elon Musk is today!
Interestingly, and not mentioned in this video, the Henry J was also marketed through Sears and called the "Allstate." It was actually featured in Sears mail order catalogs.
Didn't know that. Thanks for sharing. Kaiser clearly was an interesting character who wasn't afraid of doing something different. I knows Sears had also sold other cars and even houses that could be assembled.
@@KingRoseArchives Sears & Roebuck sold everything back in the day, homes, motorcycles, guns, literally everything. Western Auto was pretty big like that too and JC. Whitney sold about every automotive part or accessory there was. Because of political correctness and lobying gone are the days when you could buy anything from a catalog and have it shipped to your door, even a machine gun. Or walk into a Western Auto as a kid and pull a new .22 rifle from a bin, pay for it and walk out the door with it, no parental permission or nothing. The world has changed NOT for the better. We used to take guns to school on the bus and have safety classes and target practice and there were no school shootings. Imagine that.
King Rose Archives that’s why the name ‘CRAFTSMAN HOUSE’ CAME about, so later with TOOLS, they were known , asCRAFTSMAN TOOLS, so NOW you know the rest of the story, ,, thanks PAUL HARVEY’. CHEERS, FROM NJ
I spent 3 months stripping and repainting a Sears Craftsman house a few years back. It was a Quality old house, and I was proud to have brought the exterior back to mint condition.
@willythewave Amen brother. The world has devolved, those were far better times.
If a car maker didn't have a v-8 by 1955 he was"dead in the water".Kaiser didn't have that v-8.
Kaiser, What a guy!
These videos are awesome! I love that you give the history of the man and the company. Henry Kaiser reminds me of another industrialist, R.G. LeTourneau, mover of men and mountains. I'd love to see a video on him. He didn't make cars, he made earthmovers and a wide variety of purpose built machines, and was full of novel ideas and a can do attitude.
Give the people a reason to make it happen and anything is possible. Remember that, as you're playing us for fools.
Jeeps are still produced today. In a way, Henry J Kaiser's legacy lives on.
We Americans need these fellers back again!!! We’re in trouble folks.
the company may have flourished had it developed a V8 and an automatic transmission.
Amazing Industrialist to bad his car company couldn't survive.
It probably would've been bastardized, like the Cadillac is today... Some landmarks are better left in the past
Too bad Benny...
A Pillar of a Man this person certainly was~!
Thank you for this upload..
Much new background info for me..
Cordialement,
Thanks for watching.
The More You Know... Great Vid.
The Lake Tahoe house in Godfather II was the Henry Kaiser estate in real life.
We had a 1951 Kaiser when I was a kid. The interior was ragged at 40,000 miles. My dad quit driving it at that time, and it sat on the farm until it was used to raise money. People paid to take a swing at it with a sledge hammer at the Maple Leaf Festival in Baldwin City Kansas in the late 1960s.
Was probably a cheaper model I'm guessing. Most entry level "orphan" cars had cardboard door panel sections, etc. Then bake them to a tender but flakey tastey crisp in the boiling Kansas son...bye-bye interior! They didn't have the massive capital of the Big Three, but most were equally, if not more dependable. And some even ahead of their time like the "Step-Down" low bodied Hudsons that were whipping everybody in stock car racing in the early '50s. The other very noteworthy orphan is the '53 Studebaker "Loewy Coupe".
My Uncle worked for Henry Kaiser, My Uncle was a very smart man and i enjoyed very much listening to his stories for years.
Newton Washinton really? Would you tell me a story?
the henry j' makes a great race car..
My Dad loved Kaisers. He had a Henry J and then a Traveler. Good times! Okay, yeah I'm that old!
Lord Edward And BJ was a great call
I had no idea he was so..productive! Extraordinary!
He wasn't, the American worker was. It is easy if with right leadership.
My Great Uncle had a Manhattan. Loved those tail lights.
I didn't know it was related to the HMO. News flash for me. Thanks for uploading.
Nice to know more about Henry Kaiser --like Kaiser Permanente is connected and that after the failure of KF cars, he built up Willys Overland Jeep w vision, etc for Jeep as civilian 4wd and developed the Jeep Wagoneer, first SUV and...
To be fair, Dr. Sidney Garfield was the brainchild of the Kaiser Health Plan. Henry Kaiser provided the initial backing and membership from his shipyard workers.
If not for Henry J Kaiser the war would have taken another year to win , Think of how many lives would have been lost in that year , God bless Henry J !!!
kaiser.png
I had a friend who had a Kaiser car back in the early 1960's. It was pink with a heart shaped windshield. Never saw the like again.
I lived at Laskey and Rambo in Toledo The fifties would see jeeps racing around and it seems our neighborhood was part of the test track
WOW !
Argentina did built them until the middle 50's. Excellent engines and very strong body
Back in the 80s I used to stay at a motel in Parsippany N.J. One day I went for a walk in the woods behind the motel and happened upon an abandoned junkyard. The cars were all in terrible shape and no real remarkable models, except I saw these two smaller cars with a shapely rear window and body. I found the insignia said HenryJ.
I didn't know what a Henry J was till I asked my dad. Even the rusted hulks in the woods made me really want one.
Greith hat mir gestern gesagt das es noch keine Möglichkeit gibt einen anderen Tarif für das Angebot zu bekommen und die Kosten für einen Wechsel zu zahlen
My father had a 1947 Fraser. The styling was ahead of the Chevy & Fords. Most of his 6 boys learned to drive on this dependable vehicle. It was in the family for 8 years.
Kaiser was the first American car that had slab sided construction(no protruding fenders)Detroit followed .In 55 if you didn't have a V-8 engine in the offering you were"dead in the water".Kaiser didn't have one.This man was a genius in a lot of ways.🗽🗽🗽🗽🗽🗽🗽🗽🗽🗽🗽🗽
Nice looking cars.
Wow, what a guy.
In Britain, he is largely unknown, despite building 30 ships for the British war effort. He is as important as anybody, in that his contribution helped defeat the German war machine. A remarkable man indeed.
However, as the saying goes " jack of all trades, master of none" except perhaps for civil engineering and ship building. I find it STAGGERING that he was able to build a ship in 4-5 DAYS, even by modern standards, that is extraordinary.
He was quite the industrialist, and surely must have been an instrumental figure in getting America back on the road to recovery, after Wall Street and WWII.
ASTOUNDING, and OUTSTANDING!
An American Titus Salt, a British industrialist who built a town to give his workforce homes to live in, along with leisure and shopping facilities back in the late 19th early 20th century.
Wow! I remember the automobiles well, but never knew the full story of this man, and never connected the cars with the health-care company, or the foil. Great video!
Great video as always and a Thumbs up liked. Its nice to see the history of great cars you post to your channel. The other day I asked my young son in law what is a Cord and he told me you plug It in and comes in up to 100 FT links . Its sad that lots of young people of today have no knowledge of the great classics. Yes LOL, I am afraid to ask him what a KAISER is because he would probably say its a Dinner Roll ! Anyway great videos as always and Thanks for the history bud.
Cords was some beautiful cars
@@Buzz-vz2js
Yes they were I agree.
My favorite Kaiser is a 1952 Kaiser Manhattan 4 Door
MAGNUM05 beautiful car. Loved it also
My dad had a '53, beautiful car, cream color with a green roof. It was traded in '58.
23:02 Powell had the first SUV with the station wagon model in 1956 having 2 fishing pole drawers and a bait drawer. The roof was made for carrying heavy objects such as a deer or quite a bit of luggage with 4 rails for tie downs. The Sport Wagon had glass all around and 2 bench seats to carry the whole family & more.
Scott from Cold War Motors should see this video! He has 4 kaisers. One is almost restored. He lives in Canada.
Was thinking the same thing! He's a gem.
A plaque on a board in the Vancouver, Wa. industrial park says the prototype Fraiser was built in a building there.
For all you Kaiser fans, google Jay Leno and Draggin Kaiser. Enjoy!
The problem Kaiser faced is he was not able to price his cars so that they would both sell and turn a profit. Between 1946 and 1955, Kaiser made a profit twice; 1947 and 1948. Arguably, the final two years of the post war seller's market.
I didn't know about this guy and I'm into cars and my son is crazy about historical engineering projects including the hover dam.
I guess he is well known in the states but not well known across here in the UK.
Seems like a really cool guy.
Good to know about him.
Thanks.
Luv and Peace.
Good luck with that salutation.
2:21
Kaiser was certainly a great achiever, but what on Earth was he thinking here? Suicide steering. Fine for normal straight line steering, but murder in an emergency/quick maneuver situation. I think I, if I were the present owner, would change that out for a normal Kaiser steering wheel.
A Kaiser was the first new car I ever rode in. This was about 1948. A guy my Dad worked with got us to make a short trip with this guy and his wife. My Dad instructed me and my brother that we would sit with our hands folded in our laps, we were not to touch anything..
Sears sold the Henry J as an Allstate. Sears catalogue carried Allstate parts for many years.
Marvellous travelling story on the works =^_^=
The Buick XP-300 show car was the inspiration for Herb Weissinger's re-style of the Kaiser's front end for 1954. The shoe-string budget refresh was absolutely brilliant.
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@Merrick Benton Instablaster :)
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what an interesting episode.
Imagine if Kaiser had managed to strike a deal to build Panhards under license. They could have saved so much on tooling and it would have been close to Henry J. Kaiser's original vision.
Unlike today, in the 1950’s car buyers were VERY brand loyal. You had “Chevy” men, or “Ford” men and so on, and an independent like Kaiser was at a REAL disadvantage from the start.
oldgysgt
oldgysgt
Happy birthday marine
Jim rosson ; semper fi. 242 and still going strong.
oldgysgt
Outstanding Thank You for that great little movie!
It was excellent wasn't it?
Luv and Peace.
That little sports car was Great , I’d love to have one today ! Cool car !
What a man ... love the Darrin, there is no other car quite like it !!!!
There were huge payoffs back then,just like today actually,only different. And the Big Three crushed all that came there way.Tucker is another example, and many others before and after him,just sayin'
how enlightening to see a guy named 'Kaiser' helped save Britain ; Prince Albert would have been proud
Ironic, isn't it?
albert was a Hitler fan way back, so was Henry Ford.--But things change: The name Windsor was changed from the german house of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, by Elisabeths dad in 1914, the Royals are German. LOL go figure.
You think that's ironic, how about we were bombing fords plants in Germany. Yep, we bombed them and they did the same in England, talk about playing the ends against the middle and making money big time.
@@rayunseitig6367 Actually, the name of the royal house was changed by HRM's grandfather, King George V. Her father, the eventual George VI, was serving in the Royal Navy at the time.
@@WilfBond55 THANKS.
My dad's first car was a '47 Kaiser. Had to give it up in '57 when an axle shaft broke and there was no replacement available. A lot of memorable road trips in that car.
The original hot hatch was Kaiser's invention!
GERMANS SHOULD HALVE SENT SHIPBUILDERS TO HELP BUILD KIESER SHIPS HMM HOW COMPLICATEE THE CONCRETTE LIBERTY SHIPS GOOD FORE BOMBING PRATICE EVEN TODAY
Kaiser was really mr handyman in the us. 😀
I remember seeing a 1954 Kaiser Darrin roadster regularly in the parking lot at San Diego State College (before it became SDSU) and how remarkable it looked. Fact is, I have always preferred a 1954 Chevrolet Corvette as a superior sporty car in every possible way. Nice try, Mr. Kaiser.
My dad had a Kaiser, anytime the temperature got above 90 it would get vapor lock.
Simple fix for that.
>>> Baby in a drawer
My knees are sore.....just thinking about trying to climb into the back of that 'Traveler'. The guy makes me suddenly think of Elon Musk though. That 'can do....go for it' attitude.
So, Musk will exit the car business and turn his attention elsewhere?
@@eddiewillers1 It sounds like he's already having problems with the whole Tesla thing.....but working on his tunnel & space projects.
You'd have trouble also is some nefarious people were buying a lot of your stocks and shorting selling them.
Was a contest to name the Henry j dad tried (my car )but he didn't win one . bought one later didnt last long.😀 neighbor had 49frazer vagabond..
BTW, cool music! 50s.
"His Jeep Wagoneer was really the first SUV"? That's cruel.
Why? That's true.
@@marvinbush5278 It's cruel to tag a practical, useful car with that label. The "SUV" is a monstrosity of a vehicle, a bathtub turned upside down in an atrociously unbalanced design intended to circumvent environmental regulations and soak the public for more profit by foisting these hideously overgrown behemoths on them. The Wagoneer had none of those faults so I think it does the latter a disservice.
@@notvalidcharacters I have no love of SUVs myself but you must call a spade a spade.
i was at a car collectors auction mostly studebaker . but one kaiser looked under the hood it had two huge horns i tried to get the ringman to hook up jumper cables and honk the horns but they wouldn't ..
in my home town, Henry J's were still around, but mostly as hot rods. I don't think I've ever seen one in stock condition.
My sister and brother-in-law had a Frazier and I drove it at times. The linkage to the transmission was a problem. It tended to bind and would not go into gear.
No mention of Henry j
Kaiser = ROACH!!!!!
When I was a kid, in the late 60s early 70s I would get from our public library two books with many colored photos of European cars, most of which I had never heard of. Many, I think fit the orphan car requirements. Wish I could locate these books again. Most of the cars featured were from the 60s.
Interesting! Do you remember Armstrong-Siddeley from those books?
I thought this was gonna be about the car. Any way most have Kaiser insurance.
Jeff Dunham needs a Kaiser Darrin
He'll do fine with his two orphans, both AMC Gremlins.
Impressive
"Large horizontal tail lights?" Looks vertical to me. LOL
Look again; above the vertical section of the taillight is a horizontal one running along the fender line.
@@seikibrian8641 17:39 The tail lights themselves are vertical. The "Safety Glow extensions are just that. Extensions. Horizontal tail lights run the width of the car as in the case of the '59 Chevrolet.
@@scootergeorge9576 The "Safety Glow extensions" are extensions of what exactly? The tail light assembly. Furthermore, there is nothing inherent in the word "horizontal" that specifies an athwart-ship versus a fore-and-aft orientation.
@@seikibrian8641 - Simply a matter of orientation. As viewed from behind, the lights are vertical. From the side, horizontal.
By the way, I once owned a 1954 Kaiser "Special." It was an early series which was a leftover 1953 Manhattan that Kaiser had the entire front clip removed and the 1954 parts substituted, hood, fenders, grill bumper, etc. along with the "Safety glow" '54 tail lights. It retained the non supercharged 226 "Supersonic" flathead 6, three speed and overdrive. Painted black. Kaiser called the color "Onyx" True '54 Specials had the '54 wrap around rear window. The '54 Manhattan used a supercharged 226 flathead. Leftovers were re registered as 1955 models; the only change being a different chrome hood scoop.
@@scootergeorge9576 "Simply a matter of orientation. As viewed from behind, the lights are vertical. From the side, horizontal."
Yep.
But they weren't as good as Tucker!
Kaiser cars and Jeeps were also marketed in Brazil long into the 1960’s -early ‘70’s
Named after boats.
Jeff King Yes, the Manhattan was built just as introduced in 54 into the early 60's, as well as Willys which got a Brooke Stevens redesign and lasted into the early 70's. Srevens had been famous for designing some Studebaker's, and Ford later took over the Willys Aero model and at first changed it's design very little.
When did Ford produce the Willys Aero? Have any proof of this? Makes no sense. Ford had it's own compact with the Falcon and Comet.
Scooter George Well those American compacts were not produced in South America the same way as the state's. And, the Willys Aero was pitched as a luxury car anyway, not a compact. Google 'Willys Aero Ford', and in images you will quickly see that Ford has slapped it's name on the redesigned Willys Aero. I don't just make this stuff up.
"In 1967, Ford took a controlling interest in Kaiser and thereby gained control of Willys-Overland do Brasil. They bought the factory and continued existing production for a time." (wiki) I thought you meant they bought the Aero tooling and moved it to an existing Ford plant.
We had two Kaiser cars. Great cars.