Chevrolet, Louis

Louis Chevrolet, (born December 25, 1878, La Chaux de Fonds, Neuchâtel, Switzerland—died June 6, 1941, Detroit, Michigan, U.S.), automobile designer and racer whose name is borne by the Chevrolet Division of General Motors, an enterprise from which he derived little profit and of which he was a minor employee in the last years of his life.

He emigrated to the United States from France in 1900. Five years later, in his first automobile race, he defeated the great American driver Barney Oldfield, and thereafter he set records on every important track in the United States. His time for the measured mile, 52.8 seconds, was, in 1905, remarkable.

In 1911, with William Crapo Durant, he built the first Chevrolet car, but he had little confidence in it, and in 1915 he sold his interest to Durant, who, the next year, brought the Chevrolet Motor Company into the General Motors organization. Other cars designed by Chevrolet won the Indianapolis 500 in 1920 (a Monroe driven by his brother Gaston Chevrolet) and in 1921 (a Frontenac driven by Tommy Milton).

Louis Chevrolet Memorial

Subsequently, Chevrolet was active in motorboat racing, worked for the Stutz Automobile Company in Indianapolis, and established an unsuccessful aircraft factory in that city. In 1936 he returned to the General Motors division named for him.