Car-Nation
Car-Nation
Defunct American motor vehicle manufacturer
The Car-Nation (also known as Carnation) was a brand of automobile manufactured in Detroit, Michigan, by the American Voiturette Company from 1913 to 1914.
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The Car-Nation roadster was an 1,100 lb (500 kg) cyclecar costing $495. The vehicle had a four-cylinder Herreshoff "25" engine and a three-speed transmission.
Car-Nation also manufactured a larger four-seat Tourer model with a base price of $520. They also advertised a fore-and-aft tandem; it's not known if more than a few prototypes were produced. Two roadsters and five touring cars are known to survive.
In 1912, former Pope-Toledo manager Forrest Keeton moved his Keeton Towncar Works into a factory in Wyandotte, Michigan, a city south of Detroit on the shore of the Detroit River, and formed the Keeton Motor Company. He began construction of his first “French-like” car, the big Renault-influenced, air-cooled Keeton. It sold well enough to allow Keeton in 1913 to launch a second line of continental-influenced, low priced cars under a new name: Car-Nation. All that activity apparently attracted the attention of oil magnate Charles Schaeffer, and shortly after the introduction of the new car, the short-lived Car-Nation Motorette Co. and the existing Keeton Motor Co. unified under his ownership, reincorporating as the American Voiturette Company in Detroit.
Slow acceptance of the Car-Nation's nonstandard 48-inch (1,200 mm) gauge and reported problems with the Herreshoff engines in the Car-Nation sent the company into receivership in 1914. At a public auction in February 1915, Forest Keeton appears to have bought the assets of the company, including 60 Keetons and 350 Car-Nations, along with machine tools and countless thousands of parts. But while he did supply repairs, he never again built a car.
