The period between 1890 and the beginning of the First World War laid the technical, logistical, and economic foundations of the modern automobile industry. The world at that time was in a state of effervescence. Production was shifting from artisanal and small-scale to industrial and standardized. It was also a period of intense technological innovation. People experimented and invented. The automobile would quite literally lay the groundwork for modern society, bringing about infrastructures adapted to individual mobility and new cultural trends such as mass consumption.
Following the creation of the Benz Patent-Motorwagen in 1886 by Carl Benz—considered the first combustion-powered car—the path was now open for the development of an entirely new industry. Here, in chronological order, is a portrait of the automotive pioneers who helped shape the world as we know it today.


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