Outside of the dedicated classic car fraternity I doubt you'll find one North American in a thousand who'd recognise the name of the 1937 Horch 853 Voll & Ruhrbeck Sport Cabriolet. Indeed, they wouldn't even know that Horch is a car. And yet it has a fascinating history. August Horch and Company was one of three dozen German firms producing automobiles before the turn of the 20th Century. Its founder was a pioneering automobile engineer, for a time manager of the motor vehicle construction department at Benz before that company amalgamated with Mercedes. Ironically all Horch-badged cars built since 1909 had nothing to do with him. He'd left the firm in a management dispute but having failed to take the correct legal protection steps was never again free to build cars bearing his own name.
Ironically those disputes began when Horch insisted on building only large, luxurious automobiles which, as it happened, was exactly what the Horch firm proceeded to do. August Horch then devoted his efforts to Audi until his death in 1951. Never as quick as Mercedes and less involved in motorsport, Horch cars became favorites with the chauffeur-driven class and, dare we say it, the Nazi hierarchy. Other customers had to wait up to nine months for delivery. In spite of the firm's briefly inglorious past (as if it had a choice!) one can appreciate the beauty of designs like this 853 Voll & Ruhrbeck Sport Cabriolet. The 4944 cc straight-eight produced 120 DIN hp when our Pebble Beach winner was built, more than enough for owner Robert M. Lee of Sparks, Nevada, to glide quietly onto the winner's ramp. Proving that if it's August, there must be a Horch.
[Photo Credit: Ron Kimball Studios]
Horch was one of the 4 participants of the pre-war Auto Union racing effort, along with Audi, Wanderer, and DKW.
August 27, 2009 @ 7:19 am