The Mercedes-Simplex

Mercedes-Simplex 40 PS from 1903, photographed on the road from Nice to La Turbie at the start of the 20th century, the destination of the hillclimb in Nice Week. April, 2017.

At the beginning of April 1900, businessman and motorcar enthusiast Emil Jellinek, concluded an agreement with Daimler-Motoren-Gesellschaft (DMG) in Nice on the distribution of Daimler cars and engines. Emil Jellinek, who lived in Baden near Vienna and in Nice, insisted on greater performance and more innovative technology from Daimler-Motoren-Gesellschaft in the closing years of the 19th century, which resulted in the development of the modern motorcar. From 1899 on, he competed in car races on the Côte d’Azur in high-performance Daimler cars under the pseudonym “Monsieur Mercedes”, the first name of his daughter, who was born in 1889.

The decision to develop a new engine, which was to bear the name Daimler-Mercedes, was a further ground-breaking step: it meant that the name that Jellinek had been using as a pseudonym for several years became the product name. On 22 December 1900, DMG delivered the first car equipped with the new engine to Nice, a 35 PS racing car.

The vehicle was not only the newest and most powerful model produced by DMG – it has since come to be recognized as the very first modern motorcar. The Mercedes 35 PS was systematically designed for performance, weight savings and safety, its key features including a lightweight high-performance engine, a long wheelbase and a low center of gravity. With these attributes and the honeycomb radiator organically integrated into the front, it gave the motorcar its own distinct form: it was a new construction which had been systematically designed from scratch for the innovative new type of drive. Experts were immediately aware that this vehicle marked a profound change in the field of automotive engineering. Paul Meyan, the founding member and secretary-general of the motorcar Club de France (A.C.F.), is on record as having commented: “We have entered the Mercédès era.”

During Nice Week (“Semaine de Nice”) in March 1901, at that time arguably the most important international motorsport event, the Mercedes cars entered were unbeatable. This helped Jellinek and Mercedes to achieve exceptional publicity. “Clearly, French designers have nothing comparable to offer at present,” wrote the “La Presse” newspaper on 30 March 1901. In March and August 1901, the sister models, the 12/16 PS and 8/11 PS, were launched. Jellinek's business was booming: in society’s most exclusive circles, it was the done thing to drive a Mercedes or, even better, to be driven in one. The Daimler plant in Cannstatt was hardly able to keep up with the production demand.

Following the ground-breaking motorsport and market successes of Mercedes cars, the name “Mercédès” was applied for as a trademark on 23 June, 1902 and legally registered on 26 September. Emil Jellinek took this a step further one year later, and in June 1903 he received permission to change his name to Jellinek-Mercedes from then on. He commented on the decision thus: “This must in all probability be the first time that a father has borne the name of his daughter.”

Easy operability: the Simplex model family

Even in France, where the motorcar enjoyed particularly early success, cars remained conspicuous by their absence in everyday life at the turn of the 20th century. The registration statistics for France nevertheless show 4,427 luxury passenger cars in 1901, plus 959 motorcars for commercial use. However, the product was continuously being developed and was becoming more widespread.

The first Mercedes and its less powerful sister models designed according to the same principles gave rise in 1902 to the Mercedes-Simplex model family, which initially comprised three models. The "Simplex" designation alluded to the vehicles' ease of operation by the standards of the day. The most powerful variant in 1902 was the Mercedes-Simplex 40 PS, the direct successor to the Mercedes 35 PS. The Mercedes-Simplex vehicles were equally successful as innovative racing cars and as sporty everyday luxury motorcars.

They also triumphed at Nice Week: in 1902 the Mercedes-Simplex 40 PS won the Nice-La Turbie race, followed in 1903 by the 60 PS model which set a new record time. A particularly memorable feat was the victory by Camille Jenatzy in a Mercedes-Simplex 60 PS in the 1903 Gordon Bennett race, which was the leading international motorsport event of the day. The original plan was to field the markedly more powerful 90 hp racing cars, but these were destroyed in a fire at the DMG factory in Cannstatt three weeks before the race. DMG thus raced the privately owned near-series Mercedes-Simplex 60 PS. The vehicle belonging to American millionaire Clarence Gray Dinsmore won the race with Jenatzy behind the wheel.

The final models bearing the Mercedes-Simplex designation appeared in 1904. These included the 28/32 PS model, a more advanced variant of the 28 PS model from 1902. The “Simplex” designation disappeared from the model names of the Mercedes motorcars in 1905. but the unique, global success story of the series production vehicles and racing cars which began with the Mercedes 35 PS in 1901 continues to this day.