Auto industry
Jules Haltenberger
1885–1985
· automotive engineer and inventor, member of the Model T design team
Kassa-born engineer who worked beside Galamb and Balogh in Ford's closed Model T room at Piquette, later Briscoe's chief engineer and a lifelong auto inventor.
- Born
Kassa, Kingdom of Hungary (today Košice, Slovakia)- Died
- Birth name
- Haltenberger Gyula
- Also known as
- Haltenberger Gyula · Gyula Haltenberger · Julius Haltenberger · Gyula Hartenberger
- Detroit years
- 1907–1908
- Field
- Auto industry
01 / The Detroit story
The Detroit story
Gyula Haltenberger, son of Béla Haltenberger, was born in Kassa, today Košice, in 1885. When Eugene Farkas first reported to Ford at the Piquette Avenue Plant in 1907, he found three Hungarians behind the door of the experimental room: József Galamb, Károly Balogh and Haltenberger. Historians count him among the small team that turned Henry Ford's ideas into Model T drawings in 1907–1908. The Hungarian crew was not always at peace. Farkas later admitted the two of them did not get along, a note kept among Galamb's papers even speaks of a duel, and both men lost their Ford jobs. In 1915 Haltenberger became chief engineer of the Briscoe Motor Corporation in Jackson, Michigan, and designed its 1920 model. Based for decades in Indianapolis, he kept patenting engines, suspensions, steering and body parts into the 1960s; two of his sleeve-valve engine patents went to Detroit's Continental Motors.
Highlights
- Member of Ford's Model T experimental-room team, 1907–1908
- Chief engineer of Briscoe Motor Corporation in Jackson, Michigan, from 1915
- US patents on engines, suspension and body parts from 1914 into the 1960s
- Sleeve-valve engine patents assigned to Continental Motors of Detroit
02 / Their Detroit places
Their Detroit places 1
Where they lived, worked, performed and liked to hang out. Closed and demolished places stay here too, because they are part of the city's history.
Worked here · 1907–1908
Ford Piquette Avenue Plant
Ford's plant, where he worked in the closed experimental room on the Model T; today a museum.