PAST IMPERFECT:Mercedes cars were, in fact, named after the daughter of the merchant prince who developed them, writes Bob Montgomery
AN EXCITABLE little man in a pith helmet with muttonchop whiskers and a flowing moustache, Emil Jellinek would have stood out in any crowd at the end of the 19th century. A man of many interests, he was to have a huge effect on the fortunes of the fledgeling Daimler motor company and to give the name to their products which they carry to this day.
Emil Jellinek was born in Leipzig in 1853 and was the son of a Bohemian rabbi. Throughout his childhood and teens he was a problem child, and when he came of age his parents packed him off to the Austro-Hungarian embassy in Spanish Morocco. There, Emil prospered, marrying into one of the country's most prominent families, and becoming a successful tobacco merchant.
Other successful enterprises followed and by the time the family moved to Austria, Jellinek could be considered to be a merchant prince. Jellinek loved high society and within a few years the family was on the move again to fashionable Nice, where he continued to wear his trademark pith helmet.
There, he bought his first cars, a de Dion tricycle, followed by an early Benz four-wheeler. Impressed by the reliability of the Benz if not by its performance, he travelled to the Daimler factory at Cannstatt to order a more powerful car. To ensure he received serious attention he ordered four cars on the condition that they would each be capable of at least 25mph.
Mayback and Gottlieb Daimler produced the cars and delivered them, to Jellinek who now faced the problem of what he would do with the three cars which were surplus to his requirements. A solution soon presented itself. Baron de Rothschild, a fellow-resident of Nice, raced his Panhard up nearby La Turbie hill every morning. On one memorable morning another car passed him with ease, prompting Rothschild to buy the car on the spot from "Herr Mercedes".
Two weeks later, Rothshild was again passed with ease by "Herr Mercedes" (who had in the meantime taken another of the cars to Cannstatt for tuning). Once again, Rothschild bought the car on the spot. Having completed the purchase and with the Baron's cheque safely in his pocket, Jellinek casually mentioned that an even faster car was being developed at the factory. "Would the Baron be interested?" Of course he would.
Thus finding Daimlers so easy to sell, Jellinek ordered a further six from Cannstatt. The first of these was entered in the annual Nice Automobile Week, and Jellinek soon disposed of the six cars to his friends in Nice high society.
Now calling the cars "Mercedes" after his beloved daughter, Jellinek ordered a further 36 cars to his own specification in return for the exclusive agency for Austro-Hungary, France, Belgium and America. Daimler and Mayback built the cars, adopted the name' Mercedes' and the rest, as they say, is history.
But what of the 11-year old who gave her name to what would become one of the world's great makes of motor car?
Mercedes Adrienne Manuela Ramona Jellinek was born in 1890. After a happy childhood, her life was marked by illness and tragedy: her two marriages - each to a Baron - were unhappy failures and she died at the age of 39 while living in a tiny Vienna apartment.
That her immortality should spring from the efforts of her father to sell motor cars is one of the strange ironies of automobile history.