If you have an automotive blog or Facebook page and you want to generate more clicks all you need to do is post up a picture like this and make one of the following claims:
a) "More Nazi's were killed in Tatra's than were killed in combat..."And then watch the shit-storm unfold and the clicks come rolling in.
b) "Hitler banned his officers from driving Tatras..."
c) "Ferdinand Porsche stole the idea for the Volkswagen from Tatra..."
d) "Tatra sued Volkswagen and won...."
No truer words have been said about social media than "few people truly crave the truth itself, preferring to impress their groups with perceived wisdom and gain prestige" and the Tatra 'controversy' is a perfect example of this. Tatra is a obscure marque. Very few people have any real experience of them. If they're lucky, they may have seen one in a museum or at a car show, but otherwise most of what they know comes from passing references on the internet and here is the problem. As so few people know anything about Tatra, just about any claim - regardless how ridiculous - can be passed off as truth. This also includes histories written by legitimate motoring writers who, thanks to shoddy research, lack of access to documentation (which is mainly in Czech or German), contradictory and inadequate information, substitute sensationalism in place of facts. There is also the issue of partisanship and prejudice between the fans of Ledwinka who want accentuate his contribution to motoring history against both the fans and the enemies of Ferdinand Porsche. Innocuous statements made by both men over the course of their long careers are twisted into admissions of guilt or claims of primacy. And finally we have the modern phenomenon of click-baiters who make their living from making outrageous - often fraudulent claims - simply to drive clicks and ad revenue on their site, fueled by the ill-informed certainty of the modern social media audience who feel that a casual perusal of a Wikipedia page makes them an expert.
So why get bothered by any of this? The 'experts' who blast the Facebook posts and forums with their ill-informed "common knowledge" aren't really interested in the truth. They've already moved on to the next shiny thing they know nothing about. All this noise however, percolates down into the public consciousness, drowning out the real facts of the matter, diverting the next round of serious scholars, leading to the perpetuating of myths and lies. In 2016 the curator of the Museum of Art of North Carolina wrote to me (among others) seeking to confirm some details about Tatra cars for an exhibition they were putting together. Their summary was a rehash of all the usual myths and needed to be completely rewritten by myself and others. This is a problem, for if these errors aren't corrected, they eventually slip into the official history until eventually the story is transformed into complete nonsense.
The Zeitgeist of Human Ingenuity
"There's no one person who invents anything. There are single people who get associated with an invention, but these inventions are created by the zeitgeist, by the culture, by what is going on at the time and some person, like Thomas Edison, is lucky enough to pick out the light bulb, if in fact he did. That's why there is so much dispute about who invented what, because it's just part of the culture." Daniel L Everett, author of 'How Language Began: The Story of Humanity's Greatest Invention. Einstein Forum Lecture.Hans Ledwinka, Ferdinand Porsche or Josef Ganz all operated within the zeitgeist of their time. None of them invented the central tube chassis, independent suspension, swing axles, the horizontally opposed ‘boxer’ engine or fan-forced air cooling. All these features already existed. What each of them did was bring these ideas together in specific and interesting ways in an effort to advance the concept of a practical budget automobile. So, lets get into the evidence and try and get a glimpse of what really happened.
1. Edmund Rumpler unveils something unusual
In 1921, German aircraft pioneer, Edmund Rumpler, unveiled a new automobile that was radically unlike anything else on the road - the Rumpler Tropfenwagen (tear-drop car). The car's most obvious feature was its nautically-styled streamlining, but it was also interesting from an engineering perspective. It was powered by a 6-cylinder W format engine which was centrally-mounted under the cabin floor, driving the rear-wheels through independently sprung swinging half-axles. Rumpler had patented the swing axle in 1903 but this was its first application in a motorcar. Swing axles would be widely adopted by many car makers, but most notably for this story by Hans Nibel at Daimler-Benz, Hans Ledwinka at Tatra, Josef Ganz at Gutbrot-Standard and Ferdinand Porsche in the Volkswagen. The Tropfenwagen enjoyed only limited sales success, although it did find a market as a taxi in Berlin and Vienna. Only around 100 examples were built. Rumpler Motorwerkes eventually went bankrupt in the late 1920s and their unsold stock of vehicles, parts and machinery was acquired by Daimler-Benz.
https://heinkelscooter.blogspot.com/2021/11/1921-rumpler-tropfenwagen-streamline.html
2. Hans Ledwinka and the revolutionary Tatra T11
Hans Ledwinka was an Austrian engineer who started his career as an apprentice at the Nesseldorfer Wagenbau in 1897. He left Nesseldorfer to become chief engineer for automobile design at Steyr from 1916 to 1921. After the break up of the Austro-Hungarian empire, Nesseldorfer found itself in the newly independent country of Czechoslovakia. The company renamed itself Tatra after the nearby mountain range and in 1921 enticed Hans Ledwinka back to the company as their chief designer. Like so many other engineers of the period, Ledwinka recognized that the motorcar would no longer be a plaything of the rich but could be put to many other uses if it could be made simpler and cheaper. At Steyr he had proposed a budget car project but the board rejected the idea as they could see no money in it. Now, as chief designer at Tatra he was able to put his plans into practice and in 1924 Tatra released the T11, a robust little car designed for central Europe's poor roads and limited mechanic services. The car was built around a torsion resistant central tube chassis with four-wheel independent suspension. The car was powered by twin-cylinder air-cooled boxer engine bolted directly to the front of the chassis tube. Drive was transmitted via shaft through the chassis tube to swing-axles in the manner of the Rumpler Tropfenwagen (Edmund Rumpler had worked at Nesseldorfer before he ventured into aircraft design).
3. Hanomag reintroduces the idea of the rear-engine in a budget car
In 1924, the German tractor manufacturer, Hanomag, entered the automobile market with a small budget car called the 2/10PS, affectionately known as the "Kommisbrot" (army-loaf) or simply the "Bug." The Hanomag Bug was a simple, largely wooden car powered by a single cylinder 400cc four-stroke engine mounted directly above the rigid rear axle, which were driven via a chain. The car officially seated two but a small child could be squeezed onto the rear shelf behind the front seats. Despite it's primitive construction, the Bug handled surprisingly well thanks largely to the traction its rear-mounted engine provided. The decision to place the engine in the rear was a cost saving measure - essential in any budger car of this period - as it dispensed with the differential and drive shaft, thereby reducing both weight and cost. In its advertising Hanomag trumpeted that the 2/10 "is the first German car under 2000RM!" Automotive engineers all across Europe sat up and took notice.
4. Josef Ganz the Motor Kritik
Josef Ganz, a German engineer and editor of the Motor-Kritik trade magazine purchased a Hanomag Bug and conducted a series of extensive test drives. Through the pages of Motor-Kritik he extolled the advantages of rear-engines and streamlining, a technology in its infancy at this time. In 1926 Ganz purchased a Detra 12 (a license-built German copy of the Tatra 12 - photo above) and wrote extensively about it as an example of modern automotive design. Motorcycle company Ardie contracted Ganz to develop his budget car ideas into a prototype. Adapting Tatra's central tube chassis and independent four-wheel suspension as the basis of car's structure, Ganz mounted a single cylinder two-stroke motorcycle engine ahead of the rear axle with chain drive to the swing-axles. Ardie cancelled the project after a single prototype, but the Adler motorcycle company engaged him to build an improved second version. The Adler microcar recieved the nickname "Maikafer" (May-beetle) from its designer, but after assessing the development costs to turn the prototype into a viable car, Adler too opted to cancel the project. Nevertheless, Ganz did a lot of promotion of the May-beetle in the hope of drumming up another contract. Photos of the chassis would appear in the technical press, especially in the pages of Motor-Kritik, where they would come to the attention of the Ringhoffer-Tatra group in Prague who become concerned that Ganz had copied their chassis design and begin an investigation. More would come of this later.
It is hard to believe that people believe this bare-bones microcar is the 'true father' of the Volkswagen.
https://heinkelscooter.blogspot.com/2015/07/standard-superior.html
5. Ferdinand Porsch at Daimler
Ferdinand Porsche, began his career as an electrical apprentice but in 1900 he joined the Austrian Lohner carriage company where he invented the wheel hub electric motor and developed several hybrid-electrical motorcars. He quickly demonstrated an aptitude for motor vehicles and in 1905 joined Austro-Daimler and worked his way up to general director of their motorsport division in the 1920s. Although more famous for the sportscars he built, he became a vocal proponent of developing a budget car for the common man. The Austro-Daimler board however were not supportive and after several years of conflict with the board he moved to German Daimler in Stuttgart. There he joined a team assembled by Hans Nibel who were working on a mid-engined racecar based on the Rumplerwerkes Tropfenwagen. Porsche was involved in designing the engine and suspension for the racer. Several examples were built and tested but the project was eventually abandoned as Mercedes-Benz was already enjoying Grand Prix success with their conventional racecars. Porsche continued pushed for a budget car project, but German Daimler were no more interested than Austro-Daimler, so in 1929 Porsche resigned and moved to Steyr in Austria. Unfortunately for Porsche, Steyr were in financial difficulty and the company went into receivership only nine months later. Daimler purchased the bankrupt company and, considering Porsche a maverick and a troublemaker, made him redundant. Determined to operate without corporate constraint, Porsche decided to set himself up as an independent consulting engineer. One of the first independent projects he would undertake was to design a new engine for a mid-priced car for the Saxon automaker, Wanderer. This would prove to be a career making decision.
1932 Wanderer W21
6. The Influence of the Autobahns on German car design
Construction engineer Fritz Todt had been proposing the building of a national highway network across Germany since the mid-1920s, but Wiemar Germany had little spare capital to invest in such a program. The strategic imperatives for such a program were pressing however. The Versailles Treaty restricted Germany to a peacetime army of only 100,000 men, which was smaller than the police forces of neighboring France and Poland. If Germany was to defend itself it was essential that troops could be moved rapidly across the country in a crisis and this was simply not possible on Germany's poor local road system. In 1929, the average road speed in Germany was only 30 miles per hour! While road speeds were so slow, automakers saw no need to build more efficient cars, but that year the Wiemar government authorized the construction of the first leg of a national autobahn system between Cologne and Bonn (it's actually a Nazi myth that they established the autobahns, they simply expanded the Wiemar program). As this and other routes began to snake their way across the country, car companies began a frantic effort to develop modern cars to drive on them. This meant a greater focus on more efficient engines, lower-slung chassis for better road holding, better brakes and above all streamlining. These developments would also give a boost to the idea of a 'people's car' - if only the engineering could be simplified and costs cut through mass production techniques.
7. Daimler Benz gambles on a rear-engine budget car... and fails
Hans Nibel at Daimler-Benz began working on a rear-engine budget car, informally called the 120H in 1931, The car had a central tube chassis, independent four-wheel suspension, and was powered by a four-cylinder air-cooled boxer engine driving through swinging half-axles. However the boxer engine's performance proved to be poor, being noisy and under-powered. The project was subsequently reworked to accommodate a 1.3 litre Mercedes-Benz' four-cylinder inline water-cooled engine, which was also used in a conventionally laid out sedan. Josef Ganz was engaged to work on the design of the independent front suspension but he would win himself no favors from Daimler-Benz management after he began vocally criticizing the decision to mount the engine 'outboard', far in the rear of the car, in the pages of Motor-Kritik. Nevertheless, his observations were correct and the 130H proved to be tail-heavy. Hans Nibel engaged Ferdinand Porsche to improve the car's swing-axle suspension, but Porsche's corrections could not be implemented in time for first generation of cars, which went on sale in February 1934. Careful instructions for handling while cornering and maintaining rear tyre pressure, minimized adverse handing, and the second generation of cars proved to be much more stable, but the model's reputation had been tarnished and the 130H and its siblings would never become a mass-production car.
The Mercedes-Benz 130H with its water-cooled engine.
8. Tatra takes the concept of a rear engine car to the next level
In the meantime, over at Tatra, Hans Ledwinka assigned a project to his son Erich and German designer, Erich Uberlacker, to develop a replacement for the Tatra T12, which by now was rather dated. Ledwinka Jnr and Uberlacker replaced the twin-cylinder engine with a four-cylinder, but otherwise the car they designed looked identical to its predecessor. The T57, as the new car was designated, would go on to become Tatra's most successful and well-loved car, but Hans was very disappointed in their conventional thinking, telling the two Erichs they would need to come up with something more original if they wanted to keep their jobs. Under pressure, Ledwinka Jnr and Uberlacker presented a second prototype with a rear mounted engine (photo above). This concept would go on to form the basis of the V570 project, which would be carried out in great secrecy.
At least that's the traditional story. It has all the hallmarks of a piece of corporate myth making and is of dubious credibility. It is much more likely that Ledwinka and the Tatra design team had been observing the mood of the market and had begun experimenting with the rear-engine concept earlier. The experimental prototype (above) was little more than a T12 body with the twin-cylinder engine moved to the rear, it was in no way a revision of the four-cylinder Tatra T57. The rear-engine prototype was not particularly improved but it did prove that rear mounting the engine saved a substantial amount of weight, which would ultimately reduce manufacturing costs. It also demonstrated that the rear-engine concept needed a significant amount of design work if it was to be anything more than a microcar. A significant amount of effort was put into fan-forced air-cooling solutions, which the company went on to patent. In its final form, the V570 would receive a semi-streamlined body designed by Austro-Hungarian aerodynamicist, Paul Jaray, consulting out of Switzerland. The V570 underwent extensive road trials, but ultimately it was deemed too expensive and technically complex to be viable as budget car, especially as the conventional T57 was already proving a strong seller. Tatra made the brave decision to completely redevelop the project as a big, luxury limousine. The resultant T77 with its expensive price tag, would allow the company to recoup some of its substantial development costs. Tatra also expected to recoup some of its costs through the sale of licenses for use of their forced air-cooling patents.
The T77 would be kept secret until it was unveiled at the Prague Motor Show in January 1934, where it caused a sensation. The two pre-production prototypes would be showcased at all the big European motor shows that year, drawing crowds and winning design awards everywhere they went.
9. Standard introduces a rear-engine 'volkswagen'
In 1932, Gutbrod-Standard, a motorcycle and agricultural machinery company, purchased a license from Josef Ganz to develop his Adler cycle-car prototype into a two-seater fully enclosed sedan. The Standard Superior was a small wooden-bodied car built around a central tube chassis, with four-wheel independent suspension and powered by a 400cc water cooled twin-cylinder two-stroke motor placed ahead of the rear axle. The Standard Superior was unveiled at the 1933 Berlin Motor Show but unfortunately the little car did not sell particularly well. In 1934 the car was completely restyled and improved. https://heinkelscooter.blogspot.com/2022/08/1933-standard-superior-road-test-das.html
The Standard Superior Mk 1 and the Porsche Type 12 by Zundapp. Not anything alike.
10. Ferdinand Porsche becomes a German national hero on the Grand Prix circuit
Between 1930 and 1932, the Porsche design studio was contracted to develop a new engine for a middle-class car for Wanderer (see 5 above). Porsche developed a four-cylinder and six-cylinder engine, which would go on to power Wanderer's range until 1940. Although Wanderer had successfully navigated through the tumult of the Great Depression, the State Bank of Saxony forced the company into a merger with budget car and motorcycle maker, DKW, and the insolvent Audi and Horch companies to form Auto-Union AG. In order to put the company on the map, the new board decided to make its name in motorsport. Thanks to his work with Wanderer, Porsche was offered the position of head of Auto-Union's motorsport division. Porsche would revive the Benz Tropfenracer concept from his days at Daimler and develop it into the mid-engined Silver Arrows that would come to dominate the Grand Prix circuit in the mid-to-late 1930s.
11. Porsche's budget car projects
While Ferdinand Porsche was working for Auto Union, Porsche's design studio was working on other projects. The Zundapp motorcycle company had contracted Porsche to develop a budget car for them. Three prototypes would be constructed, each with a different bodies and engines. The first car was hand-built in the Porsche workshop and powered by a four-cylinder boxer designed by the Porsche studio (above). The second car received a pressed steel, semi-streamlined body and was powered by a five-cylinder radial of Zundapp’s design (below). The third car was constructed of wood and leatherette and powered by a proprietary air-cooled twin-cylinder two-stroke motor. None of the engines proved satisfactory so Zundapp decided to cancel the project.
NSU in Neckarsulm built Fiat cars under license between 1929 to 1931. When the license agreement expired, NSU began shopping around for a new vehicle and picked up the Porsche project from Zundapp. Three more prototypes were built in 1932, but the Porsche-designed boxer engine and trademark torsion bar suspension continued to be the weak points of the design resulting in catastrophic suspension and crankshaft failures. Clearly, far more development time was going to be required to iron out these problems. In the meantime, Fiat in Italy had gotten wind of the project and wrote to NSU reminding them that under the terms of their earlier joint-venture, NSU were prevented from developing their own motor car. NSU subsequently stopped the Porsche project and renewed its licensing agreement with Fiat. The lessons learned from the Zundapp and NSU projects was that the development costs of a modern rear-engine car were more than a small company could bear.
https://heinkelscooter.blogspot.com/2012/03/volkswagen-world-beating-peoples-car.html
12. Framo Stromer - Germany's cheapest car
Josef Ganz had calculated that for a car to be affordable to a German wage earner, the vehicle could not cost more than 1000RM. There was simply no way a modern, steel car could be built in Germany for that price at that time. Nevertheless, several companies attempted to service the bottom end of the market with an assortment of three-wheelers and wood-bodied microcars. Jorge Rasmussen, formerly the owner of DKW (he was sacked by the Auto Union board in 1934 in an internal coup) unveiled the Framo Stromer three-wheeler in 1933, followed by the four-wheeled Framo Piccolo in 1934. The Piccolo was advertised at the 1934 Berlin Motor Show as the cheapest car on the German market at 1295RM. It was powered by an anemic 200cc single-cylinder DKW two-stroke motor, mounted in the rear, driving the fixed rear axle via a chain. The car was entirely constructed out of plywood, had no chassis with only a single door opening on the right hand side. Instrumentation on the dashboard consisted solely of a speedometer. Rasmussen presented the car to Hitler as the fulfillment of his 'volkswagen' concept, much to Hitler's disdain.
https://dkwautounionproject.blogspot.com/2019/10/framo-piccolo-motor-und-sport-2.html
13. Carl Borgward's Hansa 400 - virtually identical to the Standard Superior but never mentioned in the 'Volkswagen' story
Similar in concept, technical design and appearance to the Standard Superior, Carl Borgward of Hansa-Lloyd-Goliath also unveiled his Hansa 400 at the 1934 Berlin Motor Show. Like the Framo Piccolo, the Hansa 400 was developed from an earlier three-wheeled vehicle, the Goliath Pioner, but enlarged and given a fourth wheel. The car was powered by a 400cc air-cooled twin cylinder two-stroke engine mounted far in the rear of the car where vents in the engine cover allowed a modicum of cooling airflow. The Hansa 400 had better fittings than the Standard Superior, but it too failed to find much of a market. Also appearing at the 1934 show was another Ganz design - the Bungart Butz, which was an even more primitive version of the Standard Superior. None of these microcars found much favor with customers, being too primitive, too slow and too small.
https://heinkelscooter.blogspot.com/2021/10/1934-hansa-400.html
14. DKW says no
One rear-engine budget car development of this period was not showcased at the 1934 Berlin Motor Show - the DKW Streamliner. DKW had tackled the budget car challenge by adopting front wheel drive, but with everyone looking at rear-engines, DKW felt they needed to test the concept too. In 1933 a single prototype was built with a streamlined wooden body, powered by a twin-cylinder water-cooled two-stroke motor. After testing they determined the rear-engine car offered no advantages over their front-wheel drive range and the project was cancelled. The project had been conducted in great secrecy and it was only after a photo of the test vehicle was surreptitiously published in the trade press as "DKWs new car" that Auto Union's marketing department had to print a formal denial.
https://dkwautounionproject.blogspot.com/2017/07/dkws-1933-rear-engine-streamliner.html
15. The 1934 Berlin Motor Show and its impact
After a speech opening the 1934 Berlin Motor Show, Adolf Hitler was taken on a tour of the exhibition. His handlers were keen to focus his attention on the Daimler Benz stand where the new rear-engine Mercedes-Benz 130H was being debuted. Hitler was a big fan of Mercedes, but his attention was soon drawn to the Tatra stand. where two examples of the brand new T77 were on display. The T77 was unlike anything at the show and Hitler had a very long conversation with Hans Ledwinka. Both men were German-speaking Austrians and conversed comfortably. Hitler was impressed and reputedly told Fritz Todt from the Ministry of Works that the 'Tatra is the car for Germany's autobahns.' There is considerable doubt about the authenticity of this quote as it has been variously attributed to Hitler, Todt and Todt's success, Robert Ley. The context, whether myth or not, is 1930s modernism. Tatra were the first company to decisively split with traditional vehicle design and styling in favor of modernism and streamlining (although most of Tatra's range remained firmly conventional). The development of the autobahns had spurred car markers to lift their game and develop advanced designs. Tatra was at the cutting edge of this movement and so were exactly the kind of cars that belonged on the German autobahn. Both Todt and Ley would purchase Tatra T87s in the late 1930s.
What we can say for certain is that Tatra profoundly influenced Hitler's thinking when it came to the 'people's car', especially after he compared it to the flimsy contraptions presented by Framo, Hansa and Standard. The German people would not make do with motorcycle-engined baby cars and three wheelers - they would have a modern, steel car capable of carrying a family of four in comfort at speeds of up to 100 kilometres per hour and it's purchase price would not exceed 1000RM. "I will not hear excuses that it cannot be done!"
Despite promoting the ideals of rear engines, low-slung chassis and streamlining for many years, Josef Ganz, had little complimentary to say about the T77's appearance at the Berlin Motor Show. In his review in the Motor-Kritik, he wrote petulantly about the insufficient credit Tatra's designers had paid to German rear-engined predecessors Mercedes, Standard and Hanomag, but his disdain probably stemmed from Tatra's lawsuit against him for infringing their patents. More on that later.
https://tatrat600.blogspot.com/2021/04/1934-motor-kritik-berlin-motor-show.html
16. Porsche reaches out for State sponsorship
After the failure of the NSU project, Porsche finally recognized what Tatra already understood - the cost to develop a modern, steel-bodied budget car was prohibitive for all except the biggest companies - and they had no interest in that market. lt was too technically challenging for the smaller players and would only result in microcars of dubious quality, like the Standard, Framo and Hansa 400. In January 1934 he wrote directly to Hitler with a proposal seeking state funding to build three prototypes of a 'people's car' (the Volkswagen Manifesto - January 1934 https://heinkelscooter.blogspot.com/2021/02/the-volkswagen-manifesto.html). Hitler never replied to Porsche's letter, but Porsche shortly received notice that the funding he requested had been made available. Two cars were built by Daimler-Benz to Porsche's designs and one cabriolet was built by the Porsche design studio. All three cars experienced problems during trials, with both the boxer engines and the torsion suspension causing regular breakdowns. Nevertheless, funding to construct a second generation of improved cars for testing was approved. The problems inherent in the boxer engine would ultimately be solved by Porsche engineer, Franz Reimspiess, by shortening the piston stroke and lowering the engine compression.
17. The Ringhoffer's sense an opportunity...but it comes with grave conditions
In 1937 the technical details of the Volkswagen began to be published in the technical press and lawyers from Ringhoffer-Tatra began looking over the specifications. From their reading, they suspected two of their patents could possibly have been infringed, being:
1. Patent DE601577 relating to a vehicle chassis frame consisting of a longitudinal central beam and a fork-like extension connected to the central longitudinal beam by two transverse beams, registered in 1934 in respect to the Tatra T77 engine mounting, and;
2. Patent DE636633 relating to the placement of the drive unit in motor vehicles using a central, e.g., tubular support frame, registered in 1937 in respect to revisions made to the engine mounting design in the Tatra T87 and T97.
The engine mounting in Porsche's Volkswagen was very similar to that described in the Tatra patents. The Volkswagen also used forced air-cooling, over which Tatra held many different patents. Porsche himself is said to have commented that some elements of his design infringed upon Tatra patents, however, all of this was largely immaterial. The 1933 Enabling Act in Germany effectively placed all private property, including patents, under the control of the state. If the state was to determine that Tatra's patents - which were registered in Germany - were in the national interest, then the state was authorized to use them as it saw fit (1). It's important to note that Ringhoffer-Tatra were not seeking to sue or sabotage the state run Volkswagen project. The question of patents was simply a negotiating tool that could be used to possibly obtain a slice of the pie through the payment of a license or a commission. At any rate, Ringhoffer-Tatra did not raise any patent dispute with the national car project.
Czechoslovakian President H.L. Masaryk (left), Hanus Ringhoffer (centre) and Hans Ledwinka (right) at the Prague Salon in 1934.
Regardless of whether Ringhoffer-Tatra had concerns about patent infringement (or not), managing director, Dr Hanus Ringhoffer, had reason to be cautious. After the Standard Superior went on sale in 1934, the Ringhoffer's initiated a long-running patent case against Josef Ganz. The case had veered across the courts in Germany with findings in favor of Ganz, followed by appeals and reversed decisions and then more counter appeals. Given the mediocre sales of the Standard Superior, Wilhelm Gutbrot, owner of the Standardwerkes, had retired the model in September 1935 to avoid further liability. However, in 1938 following the German Anschluss with Austria, the political landscape changed significantly. All strategic industries were nationalized within the Greater Reich through Nazi front companies, such as the Reichwerke Hermann Goering AG. Although more famous as the head of the Luftwaffe, Hermann Goering, was also prime minister of Prussia, head of the Gestapo secret police and Reich economics minister. Using the Reichwerke, Goering had amassed a vast industrial empire under his control. Ringhoffer-Tatra Group may have been headquartered in Prague, but had significant businesses in Austria and the pressure was turned on Hanus Ringhoffer to bring the company under the Reichwerke's control. Hanus Ringhoffer did not consent to surrender to such pressure, so the Nazis sent them a message through the courts, reversing the earlier finding against Ganz in the patent case and forcing Tatra to to pay a hefty fine, which the state promptly confiscated as Ganz was a Jew living in exile in Switzerland (2). The political nature of the decision obvious to all. Hanus Ringhoffer understood the message and got with the program, dutifully joining the Nazi Party in Austria.
18. The Tatra T87 and T97
In 1936 Tatra introduced two new streamlined cars, the T87 powered by an air-cooled V8 and the slightly smaller T97, powered by a 1.7 litre 4-cylinder boxer. The T97 was an attempt to bring streamlining to a wider audience than the exclusive T87, but the T97 could in no way be considered a budget car, being only marginally cheaper than its V8 brother. In addition to these two cars, Tatra continued to offer two conventional front-engined cars - the T75 as their mid-range car and the T57 as their budget offering. The T97, T75 and T57 were all powered by four-cylinder boxer engines of varying capacities. The T97 was never anticipated to be a big seller - indeed Tatra was always a very low-volume manufacturer - and only 508 examples were built between 1936 and 1939.
When the Tatra T97 was exhibited in Berlin in 1937, it drew the unwelcome attention of the Nazi authorities. Although the T97 and Volkswagen are entirely different in concept and construction, the Nazis did not want people to draw unfavorable comparisons between the luxurious Tatra and the spartan Volkswagen and Tatra were instructed to remove the T97 from their exhibition stand, even though there was no Volkswagen on display. The following year, due to the political disfavor of the Ringhoffer's and international tensions with Czechoslovakia over the Sudetenland, Tatra was not invited to attend the Berlin Motor Show. They returned again in 1939 but limited their display to the Tatra T87.
20. Germany annexes the Sudetenland and takes over Tatra
When Germany seized the Sudetenland in 1939, the border was drawn along the boundary fence of the Tatra factory in Koprivince. Agents from the Reichwerke Hermann Goering AG rushed to the Tatra factory and forced its shut down. Following the maneuverings with the Hermann Goering AG in 1938, Hanus Ringhoffer had joined the Nazi Party as he was required to and permitted some of his company's Austrian businesses to be bought under the Reichwerkes. Now, recognizing he had little choice, he permitted the group to be fully incorporated. However, using his significant political influence (he was also chairman of the Czechoslovakian National Bank) he secured for himself a seat on the supervisory board of the Reichwerkes, responsible for railway and automobile production in the east. He was thus able to ensure preferential treatment for Tatra.
All vehicle production in Germany was regulated by the Schell Plan of 1938. This plan bought all vehicle plants under central control and 'surplus' types were removed from the market. Under the plan, Tatra recieved approval to manufacture the T87 streamline limousine, the T57 budget car and the T82 3-ton truck. All other lines, including the T97 and T75 were withdrawn. There was no place in the new Germany for two rear-engined streamlined limousines.
21. Tatra at War
Ringhoffer-Tatra Group was tightly integrated into the German war economy from 1940. The rationalization of their product line allowed Tatra to focus on truck production, which ramped up significantly with military contracts. The Group's rolling-stock and locomotive business also boomed with war production. Hanus Ringhoffer, in his position overseeing industrial production in the eastern territories secured for Tatra permission to continue civilian car production - an extraordinary concession only granted to Mercedes-Benz and DKW (DKW were exempted from restrictions because their wood-bodied, two-stroke cars were considered to have no military use) - although the market for civilian cars during the war years was negligible. Military versions of the T57 light car were built for army use, but a staff car contract for a convertible T87 was denied. Standard model T87s were purchased by some SS and Luftwaffe units however. Tatra began building copies of standard German military trucks, tank engines, armoured cars and industrial machinery.
22. Hans Ledwinka remains at his post during the war
Hans Ledwinka continued at Tatra's Koprivince works as factory manager, but as the company was primarily given over to military production, he found himself increasingly sidelined. He supervised the next generation of Tatra heavy trucks and oversaw improvements to the T87 with technical and styling updates each year until 1944. Tensions between the Czechs and Germans rose through the war years until in 1943 when the Nazis moved to seize full control of the Czech industries. Hanus Ringhoffer was removed from his position on the board of Reichwerke Hermann Goering AG and forced into retirement. After German administrators arrived at the Koprivince plant, Ledwinka too chose to retire, although he continued to consult on special projects.
Despite having retired midway through the war, German-speaking Ledwinka was imprisoned by Czech authorities after the war for collaboration. Like Ferdinand Porsche and Carl Borgward, he languished in jail for two years without charge until he was convicted and sentenced to six years with hard labour. His health suffered during his imprisonment but he was still permitted to consult for the design team at Tatra. From his prison cell he reviewed and revised the detailed designs of the T600 Tatraplan in 1948. Upon his release in 1951, Tatra sought permission to reinstate him to the managing directorship, but this was deemed to be politically unacceptable. At any rate, Ledwinka was now 73 years old and chose to retire, first to Vienna in Austria and later to Munich, Germany.
Hans Ledwinka with his personal Tatra T87 in retirement in Munich. He donated the car to the Munich Technical Museum where it can be seen today. https://heinkelscooter.blogspot.com/2009/10/deutsche-museum-munich.html
23. Ferdinand Porsche also pays the price
Ferdinand Porsche was also imprisoned after the war by the French after being lured to the French Occupation Zone to ostensibly provide consultancy for Renault. Porsche had known Louis Renault during the war and the two had discussed budget car plans. For two years the French tried to force him to sign over the Volkswagen designs to them, but he stubbornly refused. He was eventually released on condition that he help the Renault design team with their 4CV budget car. The car was virtually complete by this time and he advised them there was nothing more he could add. The Renault 4CV would go on to become a great success. Porsche returned to Austria in 1948 and died in early 51.
24. The Allies seize German patents and technology
One of the first acts of the Occupying Powers was seize all the German technology they could get their hands for evaluation. All German patents were confiscated from their owners without compensation. This would result in a number of interesting developments, such as the DKW RT125 motorcycle being copied in Britain as the BSA Bantam and Royal Enfield Flea, in the USA as the Harley-Davidson Hummer, in the Soviet Union as Moskva 125 and in even as far away as Japan as the Yamaha YHA1. It also resulted in notable missed opportunities, such as the British, French and Americans all refusing to take over the Volkswagen plant in Wolfsburg. Eventually the British signed the factory over to the State of Bavaria as they could find no private buyer willing to take it on.
25. Hanus Ringhoffer's heirs and the desperate gamble to make some cash
Hanus Ringhoffer was arrested at the end of the war for collaboration and was held under house arrest in Prague until he was handed over to the Soviet NKVD in 1946. He died in the NKVD Special Camp 1, near Muhlberg sometime in late 1946 or early 1947.
In 1946, the new Czechoslovakian nationalist government expropriated the assets of the Ringhoffer Group. Legally, this move was approved under the terms of the 1945 Potsdam Agreement, allowing the Allies and occupied nations to recoup losses from the seizure of Nazi assets. As Ringhoffer-Tatra had been incorporated into the Reichwerke Hermann Goering AG in 1939, it could be safely claimed as war reparations, and with Hanus Ringhoffer conveniently dead, who was around to argue? Hanus Ringhoffer had no children of his own and left his estate to his sister's children, Counts Anton and Hans Serenyi-Ringhoffer, who were living in exile in Switzerland and Germany. They inherited the group's surviving assets in Austria, Germany and elsewhere, but neither had any direct involvement with any of the Group's businesses and worked in other fields.
Apart from property, the most substantial part of their uncle's empire to survive in their hands was Austro-Tatra in Vienna. This small plant was used to assemble Tatra cars and trucks in the prewar period when Austria and Germany were under the restrictions of the Versailles Treaty. During the war the plant assembled Tatra and Steyr trucks for the German war effort. Despite the nationalization of Tatra in Czechoslovakia, Austro-Tatra continued its association, mostly acting as a selling agent for Tatra cars and trucks into western markets. This relationship would become very important for Tatra after the communists came to power in Czechoslovakia in 1948 and the country came under a western trade embargo. Austria remained neutral and benefited from trade with both sides. Austro-Tatra therefore became an important gateway to western markets.
Tatra production however was very slow so Austro-Tatra sought contracts with other companies, including one with Volkswagen to assemble Beetles! Then, in 1951 Czech government instructed Tatra to stop manufacturing cars and concentrate on trucks. The Tatraplan assembly line was relocated to Skoda in Mlada Boleslav, but continued in production only until late 1952. Skoda had a separate export dealership network through the state-owned Motokov company, which cut the Austro-Tatra association. This was a severe blow to Austro-Tatra as there was a limited market for Tatra trucks in the west.
With the relationship between Tatra and Austro-Tatra now effectively over, Count Anton and Hans began to push back against Tatras claimed exclusive ownership of the Tatra patents. Many - but not all - were registered in the name of Dr Hanus Ringhoffer personally across multiple jurisdictions outside Czechoslovakia, including Germany, France, Belgium and Switzerland. Between 1953 and 1954 courts in those countries agreed that the Czechoslovakian nationalization of Tatra's patents had no legal force outside Czechoslovakia. As Tatra were no longer manufacturing cars, they decided not to appeal the decision and in 1955 surrendered their interest in the patents to Anton and Hans Serenyi-Ringhoffer. And there the matter rested. The Ringhoffers did not do anything to assert their rights or raise any patent disputes and all the patents expired in 1961.
What was left of the Ringhoffer Group continued to decline until the company went into receivership in 1960. It was the insolvency administrators who, after working their way through the company records, saw an opportunity to exploit the patents. Against all expectations, Volkswagen had become an automobile juggernaut and Porsche's 'funny little car' was selling as fast as it could be built. Although the Tatra patents had expired, a nuisance case could result in a financial settlement.
The case was pursued through three patents, all relating the the chassis and engine mounting, being:
1. Patent DE601577 relating to a vehicle chassis frame consisting of a longitudinal central beam and a fork-like extension connected to the central longitudinal beam by two transverse beams, registered in 1934 in respect to the Tatra T77 engine mounting;
2. Patent DE636633 relating to the placement of the drive unit in motor vehicles using a central, e.g., tubular support frame, registered in 1937 in respect to revisions made to the engine mounting design in the Tatra T87 and T97, and a later patent;
3. Patent DE746715, registered in 1944 and covering the chassis frame and/or box frame.
The administrators sought to recover license fees and royalties from Volkswagen for every Beetle sold between the start of civilian production in 1946 and 1961, when the patents expired, amounting to some 6 million Deutschmarks. The Dusseldorf court was suspicious of the merits of the case and insisted the Ringhoffer's put 250,000 Deutschmarks against costs, something they struggled to do given the company's insolvency.
Hearings commenced in late 1961 and Ferdinand Porsche's son Ferry, daughter Louise Peich and Hans Ledwinka were all asked to provide testimony. If it were actually true that Ferdinand Porsche had stolen his ideas from Hans Ledwinka and Tatra, Ledwinka needed only to say so on the record, but he did not. He acknowledged that this period was one of great fervent in the automotive field and all designers were keeping an eye on what their contemporaries were doing. The remark "he may have looked over my shoulder when I looked over his" belongs to Ledwinka, not Ferdinand Porsche, because Porsche was dead at the time of the lawsuit. Ledwinka and the Porsche children exchanged many letters on this matter and all believed a settlement of some sort was warranted.
The Dusseldorf court examined the patents for the chassis and engine mountings against Volkswagen's designs and on 12 October 1961 determined "On all accounts, the action, as far as it is based on the contested patents DE746715 and DE601577, turns out to be unfounded." Patent DE636633, the earliest patent for the chassis design and engine mounting from 1934, was felt to have some merit, but was nevertheless 'stayed.' This effectively rejected the Ringhoffer's lawsuit. The case now moved from the courts of law to the courts of public opinion. The Ringhoffers' alternately elevated their claim to primacy over the rear-engine concept and fan-forced air-cooling in the press, while discretely walking back their damages claims from 6 million DM to 1 million DM in private. Ledwinka and the Porsche children wrote often to Volkswagen managing director Heinrich Nordhoff recommending Volkswagen settle and bring the matter to a close as journalists working on behalf the Ringhoffer's lawyers were actively smearing both Porsche and Volkswagen in the press. 1 million DM was nothing to Volkswagen, but Nordhoff remained steadfastly opposed to any settlement, viewing the Ringhoffer's claims as little more than extortion. Several times the opposing lawyers reached a compromise for a settlement in the vicinity of 1 million DM, but negotiations always foundered on the subject of costs. In 1964, the case simply disappears from the record. There is no official record of Volkswagen paying the Ringhoffers' anything, except a handwritten note in the Volkswagen archives noting that the matter was settled. Hans Ledwinka would later advise his biographer that a settlement was agreed between Volkswagen and the Ringhoffer's.
Tatra itself was never involved in the Volkswagen lawsuit, although the case was mentioned in the Tatra archives. In the early 1950s, Czechoslovakia had considered whether a patent claim could be made against Volkswagen, but after consideration, abandoned the idea. They adjudged any such claim would have little chance of success in German courts and would undoubtedly open a can of worms about the legality of the nationalization of Ringhoffer-Tatra.
This section has been expanded upon reading the research by Halgard Stolte of Biefield University. Her dissertation of the Ringhoffer vs Volkswagen lawsuit can be found here (in Czech):
https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Halgard-Stolte
From the above summary I hope you can see that real history is extremely complex. Dumbing the argument down to "this car looks a bit like that car so someone copied someone else" is nonsense. Everyone in this story was working within the zeitgeist of the moment when rear engines, central tube chassis and budget cars design was a fiercely contended space. There is only so much scope to innovate and everyone looked over someone else's shoulder. As Paul Niedemeyer in his analysis observes, there are many fathers to credit.
The claimed Bela Barenyi design appears in 1934 Motor-Kritik Nr 6 but without any explanatory text:
https://motor-kritik.blogspot.com/2021/04/1934-motor-kritik-nr-6.html
The development of the Volkswagen Beetle:
https://heinkelscooter.blogspot.com/2012/03/volkswagen-world-beating-peoples-car.html
Tatra streamliners: https://tatrat600.blogspot.com/2020/09/tatras-streamliners-yesterdays-car-of.html
Paul Niedemeyer's excellent detailed analysis. Very worth the effort:
https://www.curbsideclassic.com/automotive-histories/automotive-history-whos-the-real-father-of-the-volkswagen/
(1). The Extraordinary Life of Josef Ganz. The Jewish Engineer Behind Hitler's Volkswagen, by Paul Schilperoord. RVP Publishers, New York. Second Edition 2012. Pg.227
(2). Ibid. Pg.231
