Abner Doble

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Abner Doble (March 26, 1890 – July 16, 1961), was an American mechanical engineer who built and sold steam-powered automobiles^[1]. His father was William Ashton Doble, inventor of the Doble water wheel.

During the years between 1906 and 1909, while still attending high school, Abner Doble and his brothers John, Warren, and Bill built their first steam car in their parents' basement. It was composed of parts taken from a wrecked White steamer, but reconfigured to drive an engine of their own design. Though it did not run well, the Doble brothers went on to build a second and third prototype in the following years. Abner moved to Massachusetts in 1910 to attend MIT, but dropped out after just one semester to work with his brothers on their steam cars.

In 1915 Abner drove his Model B from Massachusetts to Detroit in order to seek investors, and managed to acquire $200,000, which he used to open the General Engineering Company. In January 1917, Abner's new car the Doble Detroit, caused a sensation at the National Automobile Show in New York and over 5000 deposits were received for the car, with deliveries scheduled to begin in early 1918. However, the Dobles had not entirely worked out various design and manufacturing issues, and although the car received good notices and several thousand orders were received, very few were actually built, estimates ranging from 11 to as many as 80. Abner Doble blamed his company's production failure on the steel shortages caused by World War I, but the fact was the Doble Detroit was mechanically unsatisfactory.

The Doble brothers were divided by Abner's insistence on taking credit for the company's technical achievements, and John Doble ended up suing Abner for patent infringement, whereupon Abner left Detroit for California.

John Doble died of lymphatic cancer at the age of 28 in 1921, and the surviving brothers reunited in Emeryville, California, setting up under the name of Doble Steam Motors.

In 1924 the State of California learned that Abner had helped to sell stock illegally in a desperate bid to raise money for the company, and though Abner was eventually acquitted on a technicality, the company folded during the ensuing legal struggle. Fewer than fifty of the amazing Model E steam cars were produced before the company went out of business in April 1931, the total being reported variously as 24, 42, and 43.

Abner went on to work as a consultant for other engineering companies all over the world. For the remainder of his life, he maintained that steam-powered automobiles were at least equal to gasoline cars, if not superior.