automobile

     

An automobile (via French from Greek auto, self an Latin mobilis moving, a vehicle that moves itself rather than being moved by another vehicle or animal). A motor car is a wheeled passenger vehicle which carries its own engine also known as a motor. Most definitions of the term specify that automobiles are designed to run primarily on roads, to have seating for one to eight people, to typically have four wheels, and to be constructed principally for the transport of people rather than goods. However, the term is far from precise because there are many types of vehicles that do similar tasks.

Trivia about automobile

  • Visitors to the 1889 World's Fair in Paris could see Karl Benz' display of one of the first of these
  • In 1922 Warren Harding said that this "gauges the speed of our present-day life. It long ago ran down simple living"
  • Late 19th C. invention that caused unemployment for blacksmiths & wagon & buggy whip producers
  • This word comes from the French for "self-movable"
  • German engineer Carl Friedrich Benz develops the first working one of these powered by a gasoline engine