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N0KFQ > TODAY 24.09.14 17:09l 66 Lines 3092 Bytes #999 (0) @ WW
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Subj: Today in History - Sep 24
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Sent: 140924/1450Z 36581@N0KFQ.#SWMO.MO.USA.NA BPQK1.4.60
Sep 24, 1948:
Honda Motor Company is incorporated
On this day, motorcycle builder Soichiro Honda incorporates the
Honda Motor Company in Hamamatsu, Japan. In the 1960s, the
company achieved worldwide fame for its motorcycles (in
particular, its C100 Super Cub, which became the world's
best-selling vehicle); in the 1970s, it achieved worldwide fame
for its affordable, fuel-efficient cars. Today, in large part
because of its continued emphasis on affordability, efficiency
and eco-friendliness (its internal motto is "Blue skies for our
children"), the company is doing better than most.
Before he founded the company that bore his name, Soichiro Honda
was a drifter and a dreamer. He bounced from one mechanic's job
to another, and also worked as a babysitter, a race car driver
and an amateur distiller. Even his wife said he was a "wizard at
hardly working." In 1946, he took over an old factory that lay
mostly in ruins from wartime bombings, though he did not have
much of a plan for what he would do there. First he tried
building what he called a "rotary weaving machine"; next he tried
to mass-produce frosted glass windows, then woven bamboo roof
panels. Finally, after he came across a cache of surplus
two-stroke motors, he had an idea: motorbikes.
Honda adapted the motors to run on turpentine and affixed them to
flimsy cycle frames built by workers at the Hamamatsu factory.
The bikes sold like hotcakes to people desperate for a way to get
around in postwar Japan, where there was virtually no gasoline
and no real public transit. Soon enough, Honda had sold out of
those old engines and was making his own. In 1947, the factory
produced its first complete motorbike, the one-half horsepower
A-Type (nicknamed "The Chimney" because it was so smoky and
smelly). After the company's incorporation, Honda produced a more
sophisticated bike: the 1949 steel-framed, front- and
rear-suspended D-Type that could go as fast as 50 miles per hour.
At the end of the 1950s, it introduced the Cub, a Vespa clone
that was especially popular with women and was the first Honda
product to be sold in the United States.
Starting in the 1960s, the company produced a few small cars and
sporty racers, but it wasn't until it introduced the Civic in
1973 that it really entered the auto market. The car's CVCC
engine burned less fuel and could pass American emissions tests
without a catalytic converter; as a result, the car was a hit
with American drivers frustrated by rising gasoline costs. The
slightly larger, plusher 1976 Accord won even more fans, and in
1989 it became the most popular car in the United States.
More recently, the customer base for Honda's efficient,
environmentally friendly cars has grown exponentially. Its tiny
Fit car is selling well, and the company has plans to introduce a
five-door hybrid model that will compete with Toyota's Prius.
Soichiro Honda was inducted into the Automotive Hall of Fame in
1989. He died two years later at the age of 84.
73, K.O. n0kfq
N0KFQ @ N0KFQ.#SWMO.MO.USA.NA
E-mail: kohiggs@gmail.com
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