Extra Information From Quiz Committee: In the Fall of 1911, the Company moved into a vacant portion of a large furniture factory at the south-east corner of Mill and Main (on the site where the Farmers’ Market is now). Claude E. Ferguson was then manager. Both civic and Board Of Trade officials encouraged the company to go ahead with tooling up, promising to do everything possible to ensure that a necessary bylaw would pass without opposition from the local citizens. A few cars were produced at the new site for the 1912 season. However, the bylaw was not presented until after the Civic Election of Jan. 1, 1912.
Unfortunately, the bylaw then failed to pass and by mid-1913 the factory was empty, the company defunct.
Woodstock Automobile actually began operations in 1904, ‘in the old tannery building’ on Main (exact address uncertain). Charles Evans was in charge of the works and William Myers was office superintendent. With a staff of 25 me n, in its early days Woodstock Automobile Ltd. made all the parts needed and then assembled them into one and two-seater autos. These it shipped to Hamilton, and presumably also to local dealers. In 1904, its 2-seater,
4-wheeled ‘surrey’ class of automobile retailed for $1400. Another of its products was a truck with chain-driven rear wheels and solid tires.
Sources:
- Sentinel Review, May 7, 1904
- Woodstock directories for 1912, 1914
- W. Stewart Lavell,” The Early Industries of Woodstock,” (Oxford Historical
Society, Volume ‘Industries’, Section BC165.03)