This rather complex name reveals something of the origins of the chassis and body of this handsome drophead. The Essex Terraplane was introduced by the Hudson Motor Car Company of Detroit in 1932 and was made until 1938. In 1934 the Essex name was dropped and the cars became simply Terraplanes.
Hudson had built the Essex from 1919 as a lower-priced car that was one of the first to make an enclosed car an affordable model. The Essex was credited with achieving a remarkable recovery of Hudson in 1922.
Sales of the Essex declined just at the time of the Great Depression and Hudson had to do something radical: create a re-designed model with lower manufacturing cost and thus selling price. The Essex Terraplane was born. The Terraplane name was chosen to tap into the great public interest in aviation at the time, and the company brought in the famous aviator Amelia Earhart to help with the launch. The small but powerful car, with a 3.3-litre six-cylinder engine, was built to high standards, convincing another rather well-known aviator, Orville Wright, to buy an early example.
Essex Terraplanes were also built outside the USA in Canada, England, Australia, New Zealand and South Africa. Which brings us to the second part of this car’s name. In 1922 Hudson-Essex Motors of Great Britain Limited was formed, with new premises on Dordrecht Road in Acton Vale. In 1926 a factory was built on 4½ acres of ground on the recently opened Great West Road in Brentford. It opened in 1927 and a year later a three-story building was built as a service department for Hudson and Essex vehicles. The factory assembled the chassis locally but the bodies were imported as complete units from Detroit. From 1932, the bodies came over from the United States in sections to be assembled at the Great West Road factory. But British coachbuilders also built bodies on the Essex Terraplane chassis – and Windovers of Hendon in northwest London made the Windoverette drophead body on the car in our Snapshot. It is believed to be one of only three surviving Essex Terraplane bodied by Windovers. 50 of the cars were bodied in the Windoverette style. This car was used by Sir Guy Dornville to win the Baronets Challenge – a standing half-mile competition – at Brooklands in 1933.
Photo by Peter McFadyen. See his website: http://petermcfadyen.co.uk
Leave a Comment