Automobile

Karl Benz, Gottlieb Daimler

Dual drive for all

Finally, freedom of movement. The idea for a vehicle that would permit rapid, independent locomotion came to two German inventors almost simultaneously. In the year 1886, Karl Benz and Gottlieb Daimler made humankind mobile: with a motor-driven tricycle and a motorized carriage.

At first, Germans were unenthusiastic about the new invention. “Too loud, too fast, too dangerous” was the judgement. Despite that criticism, the automobile conquered the world in the 1920s.

(Information taken from German Stars – 50 innovations, produced by the Federal Foreign Office, the Press and Information Office of the Federal Government, Invest in Germany and the Goethe Institut.)