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Little is known of the history of this New
York City coachbuilder that was founded to build luxury carriages by Richard
Ogden Burr sometime in the 1880s.
Burr & Co. was one of the many Manhattan firms that made the transition
from carriages to automobiles although they did not survive the teens. Their
factory was located at the southern edge of New York’s automobile row,
originally at 1704 Broadway between 53rd and 54th Sts., and later on at 209
W 48th St. (NW corner of Broadway & 48th ).
Burr experimented with automobile bodies as early as 1897 when they built
the body for Henry W. Struss’s 4-cylinder Struss automobile. Burr was listed
as a manufacturer of automobiles in the 1901 Hiscox directory, but it’s
doubtful that complete vehicles were ever produced.
George H. Woodfield, one of the less-well known designers of the classic
era apprenticed at Burr while attending Andrew F. Johnson’s school for
carriage draftsmen at the Mechanic’s Institute in Manhattan. After
graduation, he was hired as the firm’s body engineer and designer. However
Burr was a small family-owned shop, and he eventually left to work for the
New Haven Carriage Co., a much larger concern.
Burr specialized in bespoke bodies for European chassis and constructed
bodies for such New York City notables as Isidor Straus and Diamond Jim
Brady. Coincidentally, Straus’s nephew, Maurice J. Rothschild headed a
coachbuilding business of his own between 1906 and 1912.
Burr & Co first exhibited at the 1911 New York Imported Auto Salon where
they showed a dark green limousine body with gold striping on a 50 hp Benz
limousine. They were also listed as exhibitors at the 1912 and 1913 Salons
as well.
The firm went out of business in 1916 and Richard Ogden Burr became the
sales manager of the Detroit Electric Car Co. of New York.
© 2004 Mark Theobald - Coachbuilt.com |
