The Kenworthy: an assembled luxury six, Mishawaka, 1920

1920 · Mishawaka

The register line and the trade book: Doyle's third Mishawaka entry is the slightest of the three — "Kenworthy.* — Kenworthy Motors of New England, Inc. — Boston; Mishawaka, Ind." — a company of New England incorporation with two seats named, Boston and Mishawaka, and Doyle's asterisk on the marque name as he prints it. The trade's own data book is fuller, and it is decisive about the place: the Auto Data Book of 1922 (copyright 1921) carries a full specification entry headed "KENWORTHY — Mishawaka, Ind.," of the kind the book gives to cars in the trade, with serial-number locations, a used-car value, and a model history. On that entry the Kenworthy of record is the model 6-55 of 1920, and no other model year is listed for the marque.

The car, from its specification sheet: The Kenworthy was an assembled automobile, and its specification sheet is the proof of the kind: nearly every major component is another maker's catalogue article. The engine was a Continental six, L-head, cast in block, of 3½ by 5¼ inches, rated at 29.4 horsepower; the carburetor a Stromberg, the ignition Bosch, the starting and lighting Westinghouse, the battery Exide, the clutch a dry disc, the rear axle a Columbia three-quarter-floating unit with a 4.1 ratio. The chassis stood on a 130-inch wheelbase, weighed 3,500 pounds, and rode on 32 by 4½-inch tires with Rudge-Whitworth and Distel rims named. It was priced in the luxury field: the book's model table gives the 1920 6-55 roadster and touring at 3,950 dollars, and its current list carries the seven-passenger touring and the four-passenger roadster at 4,250 dollars, with sedan and coupe also offered. Serial numbers began at 1900 and were stamped on the right side of the front frame. By the time the book was compiled, the trade valued a used 1920 Kenworthy at 400 dollars.

The local and trade press: The company advertised in its home city in the marque's documented year. The South Bend News-Times of 17 August and 16 September 1920 carries, in its Mishawaka industrial pages under the heading "AUTOMOBILES," the line "KENWORTHY — Kenworthy Motors Corporation, Mishawaka, Ind." The component trade treated the corporation as a manufacturer in the same season: the Perfection Spring Company's advertisement in The Literary Digest of 4 September 1920, listing the manufacturers who equipped all or part of their products with Perfection springs, names the Kenworthy Motors Corporation among them. Against that, the National Automobile Chamber of Commerce's Handbook of Automobiles for 1922 — a members' book — carries no Kenworthy entry; the marque does not appear in its index of gasoline passenger-vehicle manufacturers. The absence is printed at its strength: the chamber's book lists its own members, and by 1922 the Kenworthy's documented trade life is a single model year, 1920.

What the record does not hold: No founder, officer or plant address for the Kenworthy Motors Corporation was found in the sources reached; where in Mishawaka the cars were assembled, how many were built, and when the corporation ended are all unstated in the record read. The Boston seat in Doyle's entry is likewise unexplained there — whether the New England corporation sold from Boston and built at Mishawaka, as the Auto Data Book's heading implies, the sources reached do not say outright. The gaps are named, with their settling sources, in this section's pass note: the Kimes Standard Catalog tradition's Kenworthy entry, the Indiana corporation records of 1919–1921, and the Mishawaka press of those years. What stands documented is the marque itself: a Mishawaka automobile of 1920, in the register, in the trade's data book, in the home press and in a supplier's manufacturer list, in a single season.

Sources:

1. Doyle, The World's Automobiles, full text read first-hand — "Kenworthy.* — Kenworthy Motors of New England, Inc. — Boston; Mishawaka, Ind."
2. Auto Data Book, 1922 edition (City Editor Publishing Co., copyright 1921), full text read first-hand (Internet Archive) — the KENWORTHY entry, "Mishawaka, Ind.": the 1920 model 6-55, Continental six of 3½ × 5¼ in rated 29.4 hp, Stromberg carburetor, Bosch ignition, Westinghouse starting and lighting, Exide battery, Columbia axle, 130-inch wheelbase, 3,500 lb, the $3,950 model-table price and the $4,250 list, serial numbers from 1900, the used value of $400, and the parts-interchange listings that carry the marque through the book's service sections.
3. South Bend News-Times, 17 August 1920 and 16 September 1920 (Hoosier State Chronicles), read first-hand — the Mishawaka industrial pages' "AUTOMOBILES / KENWORTHY / Kenworthy Motors Corporation, Mishawaka, Ind."
4. The Literary Digest, 4 September 1920 — the Perfection Spring advertisement's list of manufacturers equipping their products with Perfection springs, naming the Kenworthy Motors Corp'n.
5. National Automobile Chamber of Commerce, Handbook of Automobiles, 1922, read first-hand — the alphabetical index of gasoline passenger-vehicle manufacturers, in which no Kenworthy appears, printed above at members'-book strength.