Fast Electric Cars Are Nothing New
Fast Electric Cars are Nothing New - by Mark Gillies
Around the end of the 19th century, fledgling automakers toyed with forms of propulsion other than the internal-combustion engine, including electricity and steam.
Electric cars are back in the news, but they didn’t make it way back at the dawn of the automotive age because of limited range and battery size and weight. (Hey, so what’s new?) But some of the first land speed records were set by electric cars—and one of them was the first automobile to travel at the magic mile-a-minute and 100-kilometer-per-hour marks.
In 1899, Belgian driver Camille Jenatzy clocked 65.79 mph in La Jamais Contente (“Never Satisfied”) at Achères, near Paris. This dirigible on artillery wheels was of Jenatzy’s own design, its aluminum bodywork filled with batteries that powered a pair of 33.5-hp electric motors. Jenatzy was trading records with a Jeantaud electric car driven by the splendidly named Count Gaston de Chasseloup-Laubat.
In 1906, Fred Marriott hit 127.66 mph in a Stanley steamer on Daytona Beach, but that’s one form of propulsion we haven’t seen predicted for our motoring future. —Mark Gillies
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