Early Auburn is an original pre-war survivor
For many, the name Auburn will conjure images of the supercharged Speedster model that was so popular in the USA in the late 1920s and early ’30s. But Auburn as a car maker can trace its history back to 1900, and before that it was the Eckhart Carriage Company. It marketed its first car in 1904, but by 1924 the company was in trouble and only building six cars a day. It was bought by Errett Lobban Cord, who had previously been with Moon Motor Cars of St Louis and later assembled the Auburn, Cord, Duesenberg consortium.
Dragone Classic Motorcars of Orange, Connecticut, has a 1931 Auburn 8-98 Brougham for sale. In that same year Auburn also offered a closed coupe, sedan and the Speedster. Manny Dragone had known of this car for many years; it was owned by Bob Tuttle of Maine from the 1940s until he died in 2012. “Bob was an avid collector of early automotive literature,” says Manny’s son Alex. “He used to frequent many swap meets and shows, including the fall meet at Hershey.” After Tuttle died, the car passed to a friend who did nothing with it except store it away, uncared for, until Dragone was recently able to acquire the Auburn.
“It is a super-good, original car,” says Dragone. “The odometer reads just 66,000 miles. Many of these closed Auburns were later rebodied into boat-tails because the entire nose of the car is the same, so very few examples like this are still in existence. It was last registered for the road some 25 years ago.”