White Motor history

On 4 July 1905, a racing steam car named "Whistling Billy" and driven by Webb Jay set a record of 73.75 mph (118.69 km/h) on the Morris Park Racecourse.

A 1907 White steamer was one of the early vehicles in the White House when Theodore Roosevelt, the 26th President of the United States, allowed the Secret Service to use the car behind his horse-drawn carriage.

White canvassed existing gas manufacturers and licensed the rights to the Delahaye design for the "gas car", showing a chassis at an English auto show in December 1908.

The last steam car was built in January 1911 as the company made a transition to gasoline-powered vehicles.

The company continued to show them in their catalogues as late as 1912.

The White Model 706 chassis emerged as the winner of a four-way competition with Ford, REO and GMC, held by the National Park Service in 1935 at Yosemite National Park.

White entered the transit bus market in 1937 with the 700 series, available in 30-and-35-foot (9.1 and 10.7 m) lengths.

A White semi performed a role in the 1949 James Cagney film White Heat.

In 1953, White purchased Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania-based Autocar Company.

In 1967, White started the Western Star division to sell trucks on the west coast.

Production was somewhat limited as White did not have a lighter range (13,330 units built in 1978), leading to several attempts at linking up with various European manufacturers.

By 1980, White was insolvent, filing Chapter 11 bankruptcy case 80-13361 in the Northern District of Ohio on September 4 of that year.

The Skagway Street Car Company assembled a fleet of eight buses starting in 1987, naming each bus for the location from which they were acquired.

In 1997, Volvo purchased the stake of General Motors in their joint venture and rebadged White-GMC vehicles under the Volvo and Autocar nameplates.

A former White subsidiary, White Farm Equipment, produced farm tractors until 2001.