Four–Wheel Drive

In this machine shop in 1908, Otto Zachow and William Besserdich developed and built the first successful four-wheel drive automobile. Their first car, the “Battleship,” soon proved that it “could go anywhere a team of horses could go” and led in 1909 to the founding of The Badger Four Wheel Drive Auto Company, with “Badger” dropped in 1910 and the name changed to FWD Corporation in 1958. Government interest in motor vehicles and the success of four-wheel drive in early military tests caused the company to shift from cars to manufacturing motor trucks. In two World Wars, U.S. and Allied armies won the battle of transport with military vehicles of four-wheel drive design. As civilization moved on to new horizons, transportation and progress were served by trucks invented and built in this community using the Zachow-Besserdich principle of applying power to all wheels of a vehicle.

Clintonville, Wisconsin · United States