H&M Body Corporation, Hupp & Mitchell Body Co., H and M Body Company, Huppmobile, Coachbult.com



H&M Body Corp. - 1919-1925 - Racine, Wisconsin

In 1919 a mid-summer strike at C.R. Wilson & Co., their largest body supplier, left the Hupp Motor Car Corp. with a backlog of orders. Wilson had been supplying Hupp with approximately 1,000 bodies per month, and a sudden loss of that many bodies caused a corresponding drop in Hupmobile production and sales.

To ensure that it wouldn’t happen again, Hupmobile and the Mitchell Motor Co. of Racine, Wisconsin joined forces, establishing the H&M Body Corp. on September 14, 1919. A plant was acquired on Sixth Street in downtown Racine and bodies were forthcoming within a few short months. While Hupp continued to purchase special bodies as needed from outside coach builders, most of their production bodies would be built at H&M Body who would ship them “in the white” to their Detroit plant where a staff of 300-400 would paint, trim and mount them to waiting Hubmobile chassis. A few bodies were made for other manufacturers, most notably, the Detroit Electric Co. for which they built production bodies between 1918-1920.

The arrangement suited Hupp so well that on August 1, 1921, they bought out Mitchell’s interest in the H&M Body Corp. and devoted the entire Racine factory to the production of Hupmobile bodies. 1922 production was slated at 10,000, but increased sales of Hupmobiles caused the order to be increased to 20,000. Unfortunately, that was more than the H&M plant could handle, so additional production bodies were sourced from the Auto Metal Body Corp., a subsidiary of the Springfield Coach Works of Springfield, Massachusetts.

As their body plant was located almost 400 miles away in Racine, Wisconsin, the Detroit-based Hupp became interested in establishing a satellite assembly plant in Racine. They tried to purchase the factory of the Mitchell Motor Company at their 1924 bankruptcy auction, but were outbid by Charles Nash, so another plan was devised. Their former body supplier, C.R. Wilson had just been re-organized into the Murray Body Corp., so they approached Murray’s new president, Allan Sheldon, with a proposal. Hupp would sell the H&M Body Corp. to Murray at a great discount, providing that Murray would guarantee to supply Hupp with all of the production bodies they required over the next five years.

It seemed to be a good idea at the time, but Murray soon discovered that the H&M body plant was located too far away to be managed effectively, and when combined with the added costs of transporting the bodies 400 miles to Detroit, the plant never turned a profit and never produced bodies for anyone other than Hupmobile.

For more information please read:

Bill Cuthbert - The Hupmobile Story: From Beginning to End

Beverly Rae Kimes - The Classic Car

Beverly Rae Kimes - The Classic Era

Beverly Rae Kimes - Packard: A History of the Motorcar and Company

Beverly Rae Kimes & Henry Austin Clark Jr. - Standard Catalog of American Cars 1805-1942

Richard Burns Carson - The Olympian Cars

Raymond A. Katzell - The Splendid Stutz

Marc Ralston - Pierce Arrow

Brooks T. Brierley - There Is No Mistaking a Pierce Arrow

Brooks T. Brierley - Auburn, Reo, Franklin and Pierce-Arrow Versus Cadillac, Chrysler, Lincoln and Packard

Brooks T. Brierley - Magic Motors 1930