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Grand Valley State University Special Collections
Kent County Oral History collections, RHC-23
Mr. Lowell Blomstrom
Interviewed on 4 August 1977
Edited and indexed by Don Bryant, 2010- bryant@wellswooster.com
Tape #56 (1:06:10)
Biographical Information
Mr. Lowell Blomstrom was born on 22 March 1893 in Grand Rapids, Michigan. He was the son
of Carl Herman Blomstrom and Anna A. Berglund. Mr. Blomstrom died on 4 July 1979 in East
Grand Rapids, Michigan. He married Signe M. (surname not found) about 1922. Mrs.
Blomstrom was born in 1890 in Michigan and died in Grand Rapids on 21 February 1959. Both
Lowell and Signe were buried in Greenwood Cemetery in Grand Rapids.
Carl H. Blomstrom was born in April 1867 in Lisbon, Ottawa County, Michigan. He was the son
of Carl G. Blomstrom and Elizabeth ―Elles‖ Carlson. Carl died in 1923. He married Anna A.
Berglund on 17 September 1890 in Muskegon, Michigan. Anna was born in December 1865 in
Sweden and died in 1923. Both Carl and Anna were buried in Greenwood Cemetery in Grand
Rapids.
___________
Interviewer: Lowell Blomstrom, 559 Lakeside Dr., S.E. Grand Rapids, Michigan; on the 4th day
of August, 1977.
Mr. Blomstrom and his father have been pioneers in the automobile industry for perhaps close to
seventy-five years. I‘ve asked Mr. Blomstrom to tell us a little bit about his background and why
don‘t you just start talking and tell me about your, where you were born and how long, you did
say you born in Grand Rapids? Is that correct?
Mr. Blomstrom: Oh yeah, yeah.
Interviewer: May I ask you what year?
Mr. Blomstrom: Ninety-three, eighteen ninety-three.
Interviewer: How long did you stay here?
Mr. Blomstrom: We moved to Marquette in eighteen ninety-seven, just about the time the
Spanish-American War started. And, oh did you have that on?
Interviewer: That‘s alright.
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Mr. Blomstrom: And father built his second automobile there. His first was built in Grand
Rapids. I have no record of that; I have pictures of course of the one in Marquette. That was
started in eighteen ninety-eight and finished in nineteen hundred. And then in nineteen one we
moved to Detroit where he started the Blomstrom Motor Company. To build the Queen car.
And...
Interviewer: May I, let me go back to Marquette for just a minute. What was the car called that
he built in Marquette?
Mr. Blomstrom: There was no name assigned to it.
Interviewer: No name assigned to it?
Mr. Blomstrom: No it was just the one car.
Interviewer: How many, how many were built?
Mr. Blomstrom: Just the one.
Interviewer: Just one
Mr. Blomstrom: Like that yeah.
Interviewer: And then you went to Detroit in nineteen one?
Mr. Blomstrom: Went to Detroit in nineteen one and he got backing from some millionaires in
Marquette. They financed it and, and they built about almost 2 thousand Queens one cylinder
first, just a few, a handful of them the first year. Then he went to a two cylinder post flat engine,
you know what we call a pancake engine. And then he made a four cylinder in nineteen six and
prices were of course quite high for those days, the four cylinder was twenty-two fifty ($2,250),
the car like the similar to the one in Grand Rapids Museum was twelve hundred dollars. And the
first original one like that one up there on that picture that was seven hundred and fifty dollars,
pardon me, seven hundred, fifty dollars. And he had trouble with his partners and he left in
nineteen six and started the Blomstrom Thirty, it was called. Thirty was horsepower based on the
formula they had at those days, the old SAE formula which we don‘t use today. England still
uses it. And they built the Blomstrom car; that was the runabout, they made a touring car. And
that was quite a car for its day. And I have one of those.
Interviewer: What year was that?
Mr. Blomstrom: That was nineteen two when the company was formed, but the first year they
made small boats, fifteen and a half foot long, selling for a hundred dollars. It was an inboard
three-quarter horse motor. And they sold thousands of those. Then he started the car in nineteen
three, one cylinder, in nineteen four he switched to two cylinders, course he made those right
through to six. The company continued on after he left but in two years it was gone.
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Interviewer: How many cylinders does the car have that we have in the public museum?
Mr. Blomstrom: Two cylinders,
Interviewer: That‘s two cylinders
Mr. Blomstrom: Two cylinders yeah.
Interviewer: And you say what was that built?
Mr. Blomstrom: nineteen four.
Interviewer: nineteen four.
Mr. Blomstrom: Yes and the car continued on until nineteen eight. He left in nineteen six and
then the Detroit Deluxe was put in there and backers from Marquette got the people that
designed the Willis Overland, Willis hadn‘t bought into it was Overland, in Grand Rapids or in
Toledo. And that was beautiful car and eight thousand dollar car then which was tremendous,
most beautiful car you ever saw. But they didn‘t last long. And company was sold and that‘s
where the Studebaker comes in to build a car, one of their earliest cars not the earliest but one of
the earliest.
Interviewer: I see.
Mr. Blomstrom: You know South Bend?
Interviewer: Yes.
Mr. Blomstrom: They‘re the wagon people.
Interviewer: But your father did continue in the motor car business?
Mr. Blomstrom: Well then he, he built a Rex, a small car, I don‘t see it here on these pictures; it
was a front drive car, small, they were called, what did they call them? They didn‘t call them
compact cars, that was something later that Romney, Mr. Mason, who was the head of, later on,
American Motors. Why, I don‘t recall just exactly what they called them, cycle cars, they called
them cycle, they were real small. Well that lasted a while. Then he went to Camden, New Jersey,
Grenloch just outside of Camden and built this Frontmobile. See that car here? That was a front
drive car. And in my opinion they‘re all going to go to it within the next ten years, every last car
will be a front drive, in my opinion. And then of course the war came on and they were rationed.
Everybody was rationed. General Motors, Ford and everybody. And of course you had to base on
the number of cars made in nineteen thirteen; see the war started in fourteen in Europe; it started
in sixteen for us. And the big company got zero material based there was no car built in thirteen
see, Frontmobile. And so he went to work and he made two-wheel or two front drive and four
wheel drive trucks for the government for the ordinance till their money ran out. They had a
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beautiful building on the Horseshoe Pike going from Philadelphia-Camden to Atlantic City. Still
there, the building and they, the money ran out so that faded out of the picture. Then he quit
making cars and he didn‘t live very long; he died quite young, fifty-six. And his name was Carl
Herman Blomstrom; in Swedish Carl of course is Charles in this country he was known as
Charlie or CHB, CH they called him in the...
Interviewer: When was he in Adrian? You mentioned before we began…
Mr. Blomstrom: Well Adrian the Lion Car was built from nineteen eight to nineteen eleven when
fire destroyed the building.
Interviewer: That was in Adrian?
Mr. Blomstrom: That was in Adrian.
Interviewer: The Lion car?
Mr. Blomstrom: yeah it was named after the Old Lion Fence Company. They were bought out
they moved to Philadelphia or where they were near the source of steel wire see. They were all
wire fences you know. And so the company that was [Fred] Postal and [Austin Elbert] Morey
who had a big cigar plant in Florida and they owned the Griswold Hotel in Detroit. Father knew
them real well. And they were directors and quite a few Adrian people were in on it, directors.
So they wanted him to design a car and come out there and build it. It was a beautiful car, there
is only one in existence in a museum out near Rushmore you know where the, in the mountain
out there in where is it the Dakotas? Somewhere? The only one in existence.
Interviewer: Yeah I know what you mean.
Mr. Blomstrom: Near Rushmore-Rapid City, South Dakota I believe it is.
Interviewer: South Dakota.
Mr. Blomstrom: Yeah I think so. I‘ve never been out there but I understand they have the only
one in existence. And I‘ve located 7 Queen cars of that 2 cylinder variety less similar to the one
in Grand Rapids museum and I‘ve got one of them of course. That‘s I found that down near
Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, in a farm yard. It‘d been out there for 50 years and the chickens were
roosting on it when I saw it at night, just at dusk you know. A fellow told me about it and I
inquired. I got it. It was fully restored; it was in the antique tours a couple years. My cousin, who
restored it, drove it in there.
Interviewer: I see. What, where do you keep it?
Mr. Blomstrom: Where did I keep it?
Interviewer: Where do you keep it?
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Mr. Blomstrom: Oh it‘s in the museum.
Interviewer: Oh that‘s the one in the museum?
Mr. Blomstrom: Yes, that‘s the red one in the museum. He restored it, did a beautiful job. He
won prizes at Ford, Dearborn, Milwaukee and Fremont had their centennial you know.
Interviewer: How many Queen cars were built?
Mr. Blomstrom: Close to two thousand, around two thousand. That‘s pretty good for those days.
Course Olds was the big producer you know. That was before Ford really got going, you know.
Olds was the big producer up until nineteen six, seven when Ford come out with the forerunner
of the Model-T.
Interviewer: Now the Queens were all built in Detroit, it that correct?
Mr. Blomstrom: Oh yes, yeah all from Detroit; yeah, on the west side. At the foot of Clark
Avenue right by the river. Because he leased the old Clark Dry Dock for his boats you know.
Right across the street; that there was the river.
Interviewer: What did he do after he went out of the car business?
Mr. Blomstrom: Well he and I designed a steering gear reversible, irreversible steering gear for
Ford Model-T‘s and we sold thousands of them. I had the patents and I signed to the company.
And I still have one in the basement in my store room down there. And you know the Ford was
throw it out of your hand, they‘d tip over on you the Model-T‘s. I‘ve seen them tip over. You
couldn‘t have no control, no resistance see? It was too direct. And we made, we sold thousands
of them; had a company make them for us. And we had a lock on it and it would tilt up you
know so it would get in and out easy. Then it had a Yale lock on it so you lock your steering you
couldn‘t steer, it someone broke in. Well they were all open cars in those days. Pretty near all
open cars, very few closed cars. Well I don‘t know what else
Interviewer: What did people do for protection, who rode around in those early cars didn‘t have
any tops?
Mr. Blomstrom: Well, we‘d stop of course, uh we have umbrellas still we got to a place where
we could under a tree or something which was a foolish thing to do probably in a thunderstorm.
But we had umbrellas with we had raincoats of course, dusters you know like Cravanet or what
do you call it, brown duster. Had gauntlet gloves you know went way up the elbows. But we‘d
stop at a farmhouse and go in. Usually our coil which was on the dash got wet so it had we‘d
take it in the stove and borrow their oven and light it up to dry it out cause it couldn‘t run without
the coil. So we‘d go in and we had a lot of punctures. We usually drove up to the Sparta where
my grandfather lived on the farm he was a blacksmith and it would take us two days, better part
of two days you know we only made six miles an hour. We‘d stop at Lansing or one of the
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Williamston out here overnight you know. Come in the next not the full day but. Take us pretty
near two days. They made father made it once one day. He left at four o‘clock in the morning
and got to Grand Rapids at three in the afternoon. The roads were, there were no roads you
know, no paved roads. The first pavement in Michigan as I recall, outside of cities, was the four
miles from Howell this way. It was a tavern there called the Four Mile House. That was the first
pavement between Detroit and Grand Rapids. That‘s Howell, Michigan coming this way four
miles; and all the rest were muddy when it rained of course they were all terrible. No they, we
had a lot of fun in those days, although we ran into a lot of troubles. Mostly tire troubles,
sometimes the tires would go twenty-five miles, sometimes three hundred, no more.
Interviewer: No more than that?
Mr. Blomstrom: No they‘d blow out. They were clincher tires you know, hooked in not straight
side like yours and mine today. They were, were clincher tires and they would get rim cuts you
know. And then they‘d get cut on the ruts on the road when they dry you know it‘s just like
emery rubbing on the tires. They‘d blow out most of the time. We had punctures of course. We
carried our own patching, rubber patching stuff; what we call cement patch, gasoline patch you
know. We cleaned them with gasoline; cut it off with the shears, a piece out of its sheet you
know rubber? Then paste it on.
Interviewer: By what year were highways as we know them today, becoming more a part of the
landscape?
Mr. Blomstrom: Well it‘s hard; I‘d have records of it of course. The first piece of pavement in
the world is claimed, was put in front of Heinz, he was a road commissioner in Wayne County,
near Detroit, which includes Detroit. He had a farm outside, near Dearborn there, and he put a
mile of concrete pavement in front of his house, the farm house, that was the first piece of
concrete road as I understand it in the United States and probably the world.
Interviewer: When was this?
Mr. Blomstrom: About nineteen…well I don‘t know exactly. That was in I would say about
nineteen ten around in there. Then the city of Detroit ordered two one mile between Six and
Seven Mile Road on Woodward Avenue. And that was ten feet wide. And they had tollgates then
you know; the farmers had to pay a toll. We had to pay a toll there was one at Six Mile, there
was one at Eight Mile, Nine Mile, one at Birmingham, what‘s Birmingham now; and then one
out by Pontiac and towards Orchard Lake. So that first mile road that was put between Six and
Seven Mile on Woodward, Palmer Park if you‘re familiar, starts at Six, and this went to Seven. It
was 10 feet wide, if you met a farmer with a load of hay coming in or something you had to get
off. Two couldn‘t pass on ten feet. So the next year they made it twelve, and the next year after
that fourteen, then you could just about pass. It was a progression of two feet per several years.
And that was the first mile pavement in the World as far as I know. And then of course it started
to come in, there wasn‘t any, I don‘t, I would say close to the first World War before there was
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any amount of mileage and paved roads. Course we had what I call macadam roads you know,
that‘s gravel you know. And it was all just like some of the country roads today you know,
they‘re dirt roads. There was no pavement to speak. Just that four mile from Howell this way
was the first pavement other that the cities. Leaving Detroit, when we first started coming up to
Sparta, was a plank road. And finally that got so bad that they tore it all up. That would be on
Grand River Avenue going out to Farmington. (Doorbell rings) Pardon me.
Interviewer: There now we can resume.
Mr. Blomstrom: Well I guess we completed the roads about, didn‘t we as far as you‘re
interested.
Interviewer: Yes. Let me ask you a question. When did you become associated with your father?
Mr. Blomstrom: Well I was never actually in any of the plants that he was interested in. I
associated with him in the helping designing.
Interviewer: I see.
Mr. Blomstrom: And even when I was quite young I got out some patents you know in that way
and I helped in his figuring. Cause he, he went to grade school up here by the Marmrelund
[Lutheran] Church you know where it is? [Kent City]
Interviewer: I know where it is, yes.
Mr. Blomstrom: Well, my grandparents were charter members there in eighteen sixty-five. They
met in homes you know, first. That was the first building that they had, the wooden one, it‘s a
brick building now, was built in seventy-two I believe.
Interviewer: Do you remember a family up there by the name of Bloomer?
Mr. Blomstrom: Yeah I know where they were; the Bloomer Hill which was a real hill to climb.
We used to go up and father would drive and my brother and I would each have a stick of wood
and we‘d block the wheels. Could only go a little at a time.
Interviewer: That‘s my Mother‘s family.
Mr. Blomstrom: Is that right? You know the old Bloomer Hill? Course it‘s cut down now.
Interviewer: Yeah, I don‘t really know it.
Mr. Blomstrom: Well it was a steep hill, a terribly steep hill; they took off the top and filled in
the bottom down there where Kline, not Kline, what‘s his name? I know them, the family; I
know most of the family.
Interviewer: Klenk?
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Mr. Blomstrom: Klenk yeah. They‘re down in the hollow, by the Bloomer Hill.
Interviewer: I see. Well my grandfather and my grandfather‘s brother kept the farm until his
death in nineteen twenty-three. His name was Abel Bloomer.
Mr. Blomstrom: Well I don‘t know any of them. I just know the association with the Bloomer
Hill.
Interviewer: Do you remember the hamlet of Lisbon?
Mr. Blomstrom: Well my father was born there
Interviewer: He really was?
Mr. Blomstrom: Yeah on the other side, he was born in Ottawa County you know that‘s the
dividing line. That‘s Ottawa Kent. And he was born there, they didn‘t have any records but he
was because my grandfather had a blacksmith‘s shop there. It was called the BlomstromGrumback. John Grumback who was the head of the printing company at one time, he was his
first cousin you know. His Grumback‘s father and my grandfather Blomstrom were partners
there. They made wagons and did steel work, forging you know.
Interviewer: How many people lived in Lisbon in those days?
Mr. Blomstrom: Well I have a book on it that published in 1879. It was the biggest town around
there except Grand Rapids, of course. It was bigger than Sparta, [which] was called Nashville
you know originally.
Interviewer: No I never knew that.
Mr. Blomstrom: Well the creek is the creek going through there over to the Rogue River you
know. And the Rogue of course runs into the Grand here near Belmont. And so this was called
Nashville. He [J. E. Nash] was the first settler there. I have pictures of his home.
Interviewer: Were you born in Grand Rapids?
Mr. Blomstrom: On the west side. Near that St. Adelbert Church, a block away, in that Polish
settlement. That‘s quite Polish. It was the old church. This is a new one. This was built in
nineteen eight. The other one faced south, this one faces west on Davis I think is the cross street.
Near McReynolds, I don‘t know. Yeah the house I was born in was the corner of Davis and
McReynolds and Third Street. You see the freeway goes through there now; it took all of the
south side of Third Street there. The house I was born in is still standing over there, on the
corner.
Interviewer: Oh really?
Mr. Blomstrom: And they moved it around the corner and built a bigger house on the corner.
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Interviewer: What‘s the address?
Mr. Blomstrom: I don‘t know.
Interviewer: You don‘t know.
Mr. Blomstrom: It‘s still there. I drove by there a couple of years ago and I saw the house
Interviewer: Did you get up into the northern part of the county quite a lot to see your
grandfather?
Mr. Blomstrom: Oh yeah we used to go up there every year from nineteen three on, every year
we‘d go up there. Father would leave a car for us, he‘d take a tester along so he‘d drive back see?
And he‘d leave a car for my brother and I, we drove it, it was the only car; people would come
from hundreds of miles to see the car you know. Up at grandfather‘s they had heard of the car
you know, it was quite a rarity. You didn‘t see cars; well there were only eighty-two cars in the
state of Michigan, when I started driving, in the whole state.
Interviewer: when was that?
Mr. Blomstrom: Nineteen three, yeah, there was only eighty-two...
Interviewer: You were about ten years old when you started to drive.
Mr. Blomstrom: Yeah , yeah I was ten. I‘ve been driving ever since, never been without a car.
Interviewer: What did you, what were your business associations later on?
Mr. Blomstrom: Well, of course I helped father but I didn‘t work for the companies. I got some
of the patents. He only had eighth grade, he took an ICS; you know International
Correspondence Schools? At Scranton, Pennsylvania? He took drafting, I have some of his
drawings; they‘re beautiful drawings. He took correspondence courses in engineering; he‘s got a
diploma, which I have, in mechanical engineering of the ICS schools. And he was a prolific
inventor you know what I mean? One of these fellows who comes to work every morning and
has a new idea; never stops to make a nickel you know. And, well Henry Ford is the same thing.
I don‘t give him credit for the Ford motor at all. I give it to Jim Couzens and he ran the office
you know, the money, the Senator you know later on.
Interviewer: What sort of schooling did you have?
Mr. Blomstrom: High school
Interviewer: Where was that?
Mr. Blomstrom: Western High in Detroit. There were only three high schools in Detroit. Eastern,
Western, and Central. Western burnt down there‘s over thirty now, I know a few years ago there
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was twenty-six, probably thirty now. There was only three, Eastern, Western, and Central. The
Western burnt down twenty some years ago; there‘s a big new building there, much bigger of
course. The building that I was in was built around nineteen hundred. I was there from nineteen
six to nineteen ten, when I graduated. And I was going to MIT in Boston. And the principal got
me free entrance without an examination because I was fairly good in mathematics- high school
mathematics and college algebra too. And that‘s really what‘s helped me in most of my jobs.
Interviewer: Did you go on to MIT?
Mr. Blomstrom: No I had what they called some kidney ailment and they said I wouldn‘t live.
One time the doctor said a week and here I am almost 85 years old, but all the doctors are gone.
And well they didn‘t know. I grew up like a weed you know. I was six foot five only weighed a
hundred and forty pounds. You know just a hardly a shadow. And I played tennis, of course
those days we were, everybody called us sissies you know playing ping-pong out on the grass
you know. And when the city wouldn‘t give us a, had any courts, public courts those days, they
gave us a space in Clark‘s park. We had a roll it and stripe it on a clay court. They gave us a
space for clay on the green court. And so it was, we were the forerunners. My partner and I who
later became treasurer of Detroit Edison Company, he died 3 years ago, we were partners. We
played doubles so much you know in those days. I played up by the net because I was tall and
could reach a lot of them, stop them from going back. I couldn‘t run, he could run, he was fast
like old Borg in Sweden now you know. And this other fellow what‘s his name? I don‘t know.
And I couldn‘t run. So we played doubles quite a lot. He had his house full of cups. He was
champion of the west side and also head of the Detroit Edison Tennis Club for years and years.
He was good. I wasn‘t. I was better at playing baseball. I used to play baseball. Not
professionally but, and I don‘t know how it was I was so thin but I had a swing, a long swing.
Boy that ball would go.
Interviewer: Were those grass courts in those days?
Mr. Blomstrom: Well we had one grass and one clay court. The city put down the clay. I guess
you‘d call it clay, it was white roll. But they put up the posts. We had to furnish the net and stripe
it. We used to have our own machine for striping. And we had to furnish the nets and keep it up.
They gave us a spot in the park. There‘s hundreds and thousands of them in Detroit now public
you know. The only ones that were public were a couple at Belle Isle and two at Waterworks
Park. We used to go there and play; I‘d drive a bunch of kids over there. But now there‘re
thousands of them. Well you‘re asking me a lot of questions about myself. I thought this was
about my father.
Interviewer: Well I‘m interested in both of you. I wanted to go on to you back to you for a
moment. You became associated with some businesses.
Mr. Blomstrom: Well the first thing I did was after I was six years after I left high school and
they said don‘t go to college, I was going to MIT as I said, principal got me in there. Ordinarily
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they, those days, you had to take an examination; he got me in, without an examination. And for
six years I did nothing. I‘d walk. I‘d walk downtown and back twice every day. That was ten
miles. Finally I got so I could walk ten to fifteen miles a days. I was thin but apparently I grew
too fast and I was six foot five and weighed a hundred and forty pounds. Occasionally when I‘d
take the car, I had a car father gave me. But I didn‘t do anything there for six years. Then I got a
job in a small company as a timekeeper. We had those calculagraph clocks you know you punch
a card in out on the job. And I got to running all the machines there when they were idle I‘d see
the machine idle I‘d go and run it. I had that privilege, I knew the owners, and because I‘d
learned how to run practically every machine that father had you know. He had quite a machine
shop there. And you can see some of the pictures here I think, I don‘t know there might be some
here.
Interviewer: Yes there are, I see some.
Mr. Blomstrom: Yeah there‘s lots. I have lots more besides what‘s on the wall here. In the den,
and I could run anything-gear cutter, building machine or lathe or any machine because after
school I‘d go down there and see an idle machine and I‘d go run it. And I got so I could run and I
could figure of course. The average workman, a toolmaker, or anybody working in the shop
didn‘t know mathematics. They got through grade school and had to go to work. It was a
necessity they had to. They didn‘t go to, very few people went to high school. They went up to
the eighth grade like my father did.
And of course he had the ICS course but he was an inventor. Prolific inventor I call him. Henry
Ford was the same thing. But I spent an hour with Henry Ford a year before he died. It was on
his problem of bearings out there. Of course I was with the Bearing Company then -FederalMogul. It was Federal Bearing and Bushing originally, they merged with Muzzy Lyon Company
to form Federal-Mogul, which is in existence today. It‘s a big company. A very big company.
Interviewer: How long were you with them?
Mr. Blomstrom: Thirty-seven years. I went in as Chief Tool Engineer, Tool Designer, whatever
you want to call it. And then I got to be Chief Engineer including the machinery, designing, tool
fixtures and jigs and everything like that. And also the product engineering I had both. Now it‘s
split up it‘s so big. And then I got to be Chief Engineer and then I, the last ten years, I was
consulting to the president on manufacturing and engineering. Consulting engineer.
Interviewer: Did you live in Detroit during all this period?
Mr. Blomstrom: I lived in Detroit forty years from nineteen one to nineteen forty-one. We put up
a plant in Greenville which is still there and that‘s where we put metals on the moving strip,
while it‘s moving. And those were my babies. I engineered those. It took a lot of aspirin but I got
them working. And there‘s nine of them now; five in Greenville and four in St. Johns. And
they‘re a hundred and eighty feet long. Couldn‘t powder or babbitt on moving steel, freeze the
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babbitt of course the copper lead it goes thru ovens. It‘s a hundred and eighty feet long from a
coil of steel to a fine metal ready for the press room, form it into bearings. It‘s a very fine
process. We make our own powder. That is we I said I‘m not with them now but I
mean…Federal-Mogul makes their own powder. And St. Johns and we atomized molten metal
you know, make it molten metal make powder out of it.
Interviewer: Did you retire after you worked for Federal-Mogul you said you were willing—
Mr. Blomstrom: Well, when I was sixty-five they don‘t want you anymore like General Motors,
they kick you out. That‘s the customary retirement; they‘re talking about changing it now to
sixty-eight or something else.
Interviewer: Did you come back to Grand Rapids at that time or?
Mr. Blomstrom: I came back here in fifty-five. I bought a house on Maryland. I sold that when
my wife passed away. She‘s been gone—we have no children—she‘s been gone nineteen years
now. And I leased this when it wasn‘t even half finished through this building. There were no
walls, just a framework. And they were working on the brickwork outside. I‘ve been here, one of
the first here, eight years now I‘ve been, eight or nine I guess. No, I had a house over on
Maryland near, between Michigan and Fulton.
Interviewer: Yes. Tell me more about your father, tell me more about his later years.
Mr. Blomstrom: Yeah, I was going to tell you, you asked me about what I was doing. Well then,
I worked for this little shop and got around to be the inspector there. They made tool work and
some production work. And then I went with Paige Motor Car Company it was called—it wasn‘t
called the Graham-Paige then, the Graham brothers hadn‘t bought it then—it was called PaigeDetroit [Motor Car Company]. It was near where we lived on the West Side. I went in there, and
I‘d never take a drawing lesson in my life, but I told them I was an expert gauge designer. They
wanted a gauge designer. So I got to be their chief gauge designer. I think I was about twenty-six
years old or something like that. And I got along fine. From there I went to—well I was still with
Paige when they built that big plant out on Warren near the Lincoln Motor Plant which is now
Detroit Edison shops you know, that big building on Livernois and Warren. And, Paige was a
mile further out. I don‘t know what it is now, probably Chrysler Plant or something. Well I got to
be assistant tool engineer there. We had thirty-eight in the department. I was first chief checker
then I got to be assistant to the Master Mechanic. He‘s the headman of tool engineering today,
Master Mechanic. I got to be assistant Master Mechanic.
Interviewer: Excuse me interrupting, about when was this?
Mr. Blomstrom: Well it was around the war, just after the war, the First World War
Interviewer: First World War
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Mr. Blomstrom: Well I‘m getting a little ahead of my story. In the First World War I went from
Paige to Lincoln Motor Car Company. They hadn‘t made a car yet, they were making their first
one. You know they made the Liberty engine, the airplane engine. They made the biggest
quantity around six thousand of ‗em. And Ford made some, Marmon made some, Cadillac made
some, Hinkley made some. But Lincoln Motor made the bulk, there were six thousand about.
Probably all the rest were about four thousand. Not a one got across to Europe you know, they
were all on the coast when the war ended.
Interviewer: I see
Mr. Blomstrom: And honest, you could buy up for a song you know. A twelve-cylinder. ----Six
separate cylinders, each one bolted. They were made of steel. And I was chief gauge inspector
there under the head of all inspection. I wasn‘t the chief in the department, I was chief gauge
inspector. So I got a lot of—And then from there I went to Paige. The war stopped you know in
November, eighteen wasn‘t it? I believe we were only in two years. The war had been on since
fourteen of course. And then I went with Paige. So it was after the war that I was there as an
assistant tool engineer for… during the Depression of twenty-one there were thirty-eight of us in
the department and during the Depression there was only three of us, the boss, myself, and the
clerk. It was a sharp drop-off just like a cliff you know. But it started coming back, in eighteen
months it was normal. But everybody was laid off except a few key people you know. But
Lincoln wanted to keep me. Mr. [ Henry M.] Leland whose, was, started as one of the founders
of the Cadillac Motor Car Company, he left to start the Lincoln. They were building the car in
the —secret room. He gave me permission to go in there. I had a key. They were building the
first car during the war there. I saw the first Lincoln. And while it was being built, as a matter-offact, I was one of the privileged to go in there. And when the war ended there you know there
was a false, on Thursday you know there was a false alarm, but we didn‘t know it was a false
alarm, that the war was ended. The following Monday it was the real thing! And Mr. Leland, I
said, I‘m leaving, I‘m leaving, there‘s nothing here to do. We just played checkers and chess you
know with thirty-six of us in that whole plant including the office. We‘d come in ten o‘clock and
go out to lunch and then we‘d come back, play some more checkers or chess and go home at
three o‘clock. We did that from November to March, so I got tired of playing checkers and chess.
So I told him. ―No‖ he says, ―we got a good job for you. We‘re going to build a car in August, by
August.‖ I said, ―Mr. Leland you can‘t tool up. It‘s going to take you a year and a half to two
years to tool up.‖ Machinery wasn‘t good for that you know, what they had for the airplane
engine. So, well I was right of course, he couldn‘t start in August, this was March see. So I left.
He begged me to come back. In the meantime you know, Ford took it over. He had a little
trouble with Wilfred Leland‘s son, Henry Leland‘s son. Leland was very nice to me; he begged
me to come back. I says no, I‘m not coming back. And then Ford got hold of me—records I
suppose there, and he kept pestering me for two or three years to .... He had me all signed up to
be at Highland Park then you know, in the head of their gauge department. In the meantime of
course, during the war there, the Bureau of Standards wanted me in Washington, which would
�14
have been good experience. But my mother was ill, my father had passed away you know. So I
didn‘t go. Well, they said, we‘ll send you to Franklin Arsenal in, near Philadelphia. I says no, I
can‘t leave Mother. Well he said, we‘ll get you closer, Rock Island Arsenal where you‘re in the
Mississippi. I said no. So they passed it up. But Ford kept writing me for years, I never went out
there.
Interviewer: What did you do after..?
Mr. Blomstrom: Well, then I went with the Bearing Company.
Interviewer: I see.
Mr. Blomstrom: I been there, I was there until I retired. That was Federal Bearing and Bushing.
They merged in, that was twenty-one. In twenty-four they merged with Muzzy-Lyons to form
Federal-Mogul. Federal was the trade name of the Federal Bronze and Mogul was the Babbitt of
Muzzy-Lyons. So they took their two trademarks and formed a corporation, Federal-Mogul.
Interviewer: In what year did your father die?
Mr. Blomstrom: Twenty-three. Mother died, he died in early spring and Mother died in the fall.
Interviewer: I see. Had he been active up to the end?
Mr. Blomstrom: Yes, yes, he was active. He was always figuring out something new you know.
Interviewer: Well, do you have some other memories about the cars that your father-there‘s one
picture there you said was shown in New York?
Mr. Blomstrom: Well that‘s these two here. That picture‘s taken at the show; that‘s the chassis
and the touring car. This is the runabout. I had one of these. Front drive car. Course they‘re quite
new. There‘ve been front cars made before; old [J. Walter] Christie made a front drive racer, the
fastest car in the world those days until Barney Oldfield came around with a Blitzen Benz.
Interviewer: What year were those cars made?
Mr. Blomstrom: Those cars?
Interviewer: Yes.
Mr. Blomstrom: Well I think that‘s in nineteen seventeen when it‘s in the show. We started
that—well I didn‘t go down there; I was home. I wasn‘t doing anything for six years. I would say
it was around sixteen or seventeen.
Interviewer: Was that show in New York in the armory?
Mr. Blomstrom: I think it was what they called a National Armory, isn‘t it, something like that?
�15
Interviewer: Well I‘ve heard they used to have shows there.
Mr. Blomstrom: Yeah, that‘s right, I think so. I‘m not that certain about it, but I would think so.
They had a couple places there they showed ‗em. I wasn‘t down there, Father of course was
there. He‘d show the Queen car he started in Chicago at the old auditorium. He‘d stay at the
Congress Hotel. The owner of the Congress Hotel and the auditorium there was this one
millionaire [in] Marquette that financed the Queen. Of course we‘d go over to Chicago we‘d
have free hotel rooms and dinners and everything was free.
Interviewer: What was his name?
Mr. Blomstrom: Well that was the Kaufman family. They were very wealthy.
Interviewer: Did they live in Marquette?
Mr. Blomstrom: Some of them did. Of course one of the family, the one that financed Father,
was the oldest one. They married wealthy. They were smart, they married wealthy people. Louie
Kaufman, one of the brothers, was in New York. He was head of the second largest bank in the
United States. What was the—what is the second largest bank? I don‘t know if it is today.
Interviewer: I can‘t answer your question.
Mr. Blomstrom: Well, City Bank is one of them now I guess. But he was head of, he was
interested in the General Motors too. He made a lot of money besides, Louie. I met him, I met
him years ago. There were several brothers, four that I knew. And they all ended up pretty
wealthy you know.
Interviewer: Yeah.
Mr. Blomstrom: They made a lot of money in copper you know. And married a lot of… Well, I
could write a book if I‘d been around to it years ago. The editor of the Detroit Free Press, he‘s
not living now, needless to say, Mr. Blomstrom, he says, you ought to write a book he says, you
know more about the automobile business that anybody I‘ve ever talked to. Well I grew up with
it and I have a good memory you know, and through Father‘s associations.
Interviewer: Clearly.
Mr. Blomstrom: And I met a lot of the people later on when I was with the Bearing Company.
Did I say I met Mr. Ford, spent an hour with him, I got along fine with him. But he gets along
fine with outsiders, but he‘s tough on the people who work for him. Very tough. He‘s a one man
show you know. Edsel of course was my age exactly. If he‘d been living he‘d be close to eightyfive now. He was very small; he‘d only come to my shoulder you know. Ford was quite tall; he
bent over in the last few years. But I got along fine with Henry Ford
Interviewer: Did you know Edsel Ford too?
�16
Mr. Blomstrom: No, I never met him personally. I saw him lots of times. And I‘ve seen the sons,
his three sons, of course, lots of times when they were kids with knee pants. They‘d walk down
Washington Boulevard and there‘d be a guard in front and back you know. When they went to
school they‘d have to have guards you know, their school Yale or wherever they went. There
was Henry the second, and Benson, and William…Clay, see. They were all their middle names.
Well Clay was. You see, Mrs. Edsel Ford was a niece of J.L. Hudson the store man you know
Interviewer: Yes.
Mr. Blomstrom: And she was a Clay, her name was Clay, so that‘s where they get the Clay.
William Clay, and of course the younger son married one of the Firestone. You know old Henry
is their grandfather. [Harvey] Firestone and [John] Burroughs you know, the botanist or
whatever he was, and [Warren G.] Harding and they went camping. I have a picture here
somewhere. That‘s the first station wagon I ever saw. Ford made one just for that trip you know.
They‘d go camping, six or seven of them you know. Ford would always pay the expense. And
Edson, Edison, Thomas Edison, was one of that group.
Interviewer: You said Burroughs, but don‘t you mean Burbank?
Mr. Blomstrom: No no, I mean Burroughs.
Interviewer: Oh Burroughs.
Mr. Blomstrom: Burbank was the—
Interviewer: You know what you‘re talking about.
Mr. Blomstrom: Yeah. He was an elderly man, quite short. I have his picture here with Ford.
And Harding was president, then they invited him. Thomas Edison. Ford would do that every
year. And he got very close to Firestone. I think that‘s the reason why Edsel‘s youngest boy
married a Firestone. He owns a football team don‘t he? The Lions?
Interviewer: Yes, I believe so.
Mr. Blomstrom: That‘s the youngest. Then there was girl in the family too, Josephine I think‘s
her name. I don‘t know exactly. I think so. She married a Ford so she didn‘t have to change her
name.
Interviewer: Another Ford family as I recall.
Mr. Blomstrom: It‘s the Ford-Alkali, Michigan Alkali, or Wyandotte Chemicals now. They were
very wealthy people. That‘s the Ford of Libbey-Owens-Ford family Toledo, the plate glass
people.
Interviewer: I see.
�17
Mr. Blomstrom: It‘s not the Ford automobile people. No connection. No connection. And that
Ford building in Detroit‘s the same way. That‘s not the Ford automobile man, that‘s the FordAlkali, I call ‗em Alkali because it was the Michigan Alkali in Wyandotte you know. Now it‘s
Wyandotte Chemicals. They make products for making glass, they supplied the elements.
There‘s a famous Ford family in Toledo, Pittsburgh plate glass and Libbey-Owens-Ford family.
That‘s a different family entirely. See Father made the cars before Ford. Well of course he made
that one. He made one here in Grand Rapids in ninety-two, but I‘ve never checked with the
newspapers if it‘s in there. He was working with the Perkins Machine shop on Front Street. They
just tore that building down, of course they‘ve been gone for years, when they made the freeway
through there. Front Street is jogged there somewheres. Then he went to Marquette in ninetyseven. Well he was quite a smart duck considering he didn‘t have any education. He had both
feet on the ground like Kettering, ―Boss‖ Kettering, Charles Kettering. He was a great fellow; I
used to go and visit him. He had both feet on the ground. They‘re so interested in developing
new things that they never stop to make any money. That is a beautiful drawing isn‘t it? I don‘t
know what I‘m going to do with that.
Interviewer: It says, The Lion Forty Power Plant.
Mr. Blomstrom: Well, that was the old SAE rating. England still uses that rating. What you do,
you square the bore, if it‘s a five inch cylinder you square it, that‘s five times five is twenty-five,
multiply by the number of cylinders four, that‘d be a hundred, divided by two and a half, that‘s
where you get forty see.
Interviewer: I see.
Mr. Blomstrom: Get it?
Interviewer: I get it.
Mr. Blomstrom: Well they still use that in England, we don‘t, we use the brake horsepower. Test
it on a brake dynamometer. Actual horsepower of course, they take off the water pump and the
generator. Actually, the horsepower‘s not what they say it is because they take off some things
that take horsepower, your water pump and your generator and that stuff. But it‘s brake
horsepower, actually torque. Testing torque. That‘s what brake horsepower is, testing torque.
Foot pounds. Well the horsepower is 33,000 foot pounds.
Interviewer: I keep thinking of things about that car in the museum. I went to see it; I think it was
yesterday afternoon, because it‘s locked up in a room there.
Mr. Blomstrom: Yeah, they had it on display two years in a glass – in the entrance to that
looking at the stars stuff. It was beautiful there. But they, they got this room, and it‘s all cluttered
up. It‘s typical of nineteen hundred. It‘s an old blacksmith shop or something.
Interviewer: How fast would that car go?
�18
Mr. Blomstrom: Thirty-five miles an hour.
Interviewer: Oh really?
Mr. Blomstrom: That‘s about all it would do.
Interviewer: Well that‘s pretty fast.
Mr. Blomstrom: We had motor, we had bicycle police, traffic cops in Detroit, on Belle Isle. They
couldn‘t catch me. They couldn‘t pedal. What they‘d do, they‘d cross the Island and catch me on
the other side. That‘s the way they‘d put their bicycles; they‘d get another cop, and they‘d put
their bicycles on the ground, and I‘d have to go out on the grass, which is not permitted. They‘d
take me over to the station, there‘s a station on Belle Isle. Been there ever since I can remember.
And get another policeman and they‘d cross the Island midway, and I‘d go way around the tip of
the island. And they‘d catch me on the other side of the island. They had their bicycles on the
road, the roads weren‘t very wide. And of course in order to go by them I‘d have to go out on the
grass, and of course they stood about each side there. So then they‘d take me over to the police
station on Belle Island, been one there ever since—still there as far as I know. Of course then I
would tell Dad. He says forget it, which I did. He knew all the judges I guess. They used to come
down and borrow the boats on Friday, go up to the flats. I knew every judge because they‘d
come down there on a Friday afternoon after court and get one of those boats and go up to the
flats. A whole bunch of judges.
Interviewer: Where were the flats located?
Mr. Blomstrom: That‘s the beginning of the St. Clair River. It‘s at the north end of Lake St.
Clair. You went through St. Clair River. The flats is the first part. It‘s swampy and islands, so
dozens of islands there. There‘s that big Indian island there, the Walpole. It‘s across from that
park where the boat used to go up to ___ park. That‘s below Algonac, see. Algonac is where Gar
[Garfield] Wood is. We built the propellers for Gar Wood‘s, all his speed boats. He had the
world‘s record until now; we‘ve gone way beyond it. This fellow out in Lake Washington in
Seattle has gone, what is it, over two hundred miles an hour I guess. Of course they‘re really not
boats anymore, they‘re practically out of the water, they‘re hydroplanes! They have steps in
them. But we built them for Gar Wood and well, he had the world‘s record, a hundred and
twenty-six miles. We built all the propellers and most of the --- tugboats we built the propellers.
We sold that to Michigan Wheel; I say we, it‘s Federal-Mogul. Michigan Wheel still makes a
Federal equipoise propeller, which we had a patent on. Most of the --- tugboats used to buy them
from us, I don‘t know if they‘re buying them from Michigan now. Michigan‘s right here in town.
Interviewer: Yes.
Mr. Blomstrom: Its part of a, I don‘t know if some corporation has bought them out.
Interviewer: Yeah. It used to be that Mr. Evenson was president of it. Charles.
�19
Mr. Blomstrom: I don‘t know. I met a lot of them when they were considering about, something
about a machine they were building for to machine the propellers, the production. Course they
use it for making patterns, I know. But they were going to make a machine to do the production,
which according to me is not according to ―Hoyle‖. It‘s not necessary. You know the pitch, the
pitch is the one turn is a pitch, like a thread. The ones we made for Gar Wood were only
seventeen inches in diameter but was twenty inch pitch. They had two of them, one going this
way and one going opposite so his boat wouldn‘t tip over, see. Like the English[man]… Kaye
Don tipped over. I watched him, I saw his boat tip right over. He got in the wave of a Gar Wood
boat that was leaving, and his propeller come out of the water, there was no resistance. And the
torque of that just took his boat, which was very light, and tipped it right over and he went in the
drink. I saw it. I was only five hundred feet away from it when it happened. Well Gar Wood was
smart, he put two propellers on, going in the opposite direction, so you didn‘t get that chance of
tipping over if the wheels went out of the water. He was smart, smart old duck. He died, didn‘t
he, a little while ago? I think so.
Interviewer: I don‘t know.
Mr. Blomstrom: He was very old. I knew him, met him. Course they had the Gar Wood... they
made that dump truck, hydraulic dump truck. We made a lot of parts for them. I knew all the
brothers. There was a bunch of brothers! There were about pretty near as many of them as the
Fisher brothers. They were seven I guess. I knew a couple of them, Ed the youngest.
Interviewer: I think you ought to write that book.
Mr. Blomstrom: Well, a lot of people have said that. I think Mr. Frankfurter said it too, and some
of the other people. I did write a book on bearings for the company. Millions of those were sent
out. It‘s a very small book. It‘s been in most of the libraries now around the country. Some
people wanted a thousand. The Ordinance Department, where is that, Fort Benning in Georgia
where they had the Ordinance? Well a major came up from there one day, I didn‘t know he was
coming, and the office wanted to see Mr. Blomstrom. The girl says, there‘s a major from Fort
Benning here. He wanted a thousand of those little books. They were just small, about Reader‘s
Digest, you could just stick it in your pocket. It was run serially in an automobile magazine for
eight months. So we give him a thousand, it didn‘t cost much. They‘re in most of the
universities, they wrote, they sent. Course now they put out a hardcover, but this was just soft
cover. But it was about probably the first small bearing book on servicing, you know taking care
of bearings, automobile engine bearings, not ball or roller bearings. So that‘s the only writing.
It‘s difficult for me to write, but I suppose I should. It‘s too late now, I guess.
Interviewer: You could always dictate it.
Mr. Blomstrom: Yeah, I bought a machine, I have a machine. I bought it for that purpose. I
haven‘t used it but once I guess, twice, but not for that purpose. I bought a machine, nothing as
�20
elaborate as your machine here. It‘s just a simple…has about the same kind of a microphone I
guess. Micro—what do you call it?
Interviewer: No, it‘s a microphone, yes.
Mr. Blomstrom: Yes, I have that. Some of them have it built right into the case. I see some of the
new ones advertised. Yeah, I have one.
Interviewer: How do you keep busy these days?
Mr. Blomstrom: Well I‘m rummaging see, getting stuff here. I‘m going to dispose of a lot of
books and things. I don‘t know what I‘m going to do with all these pictures; of course Mr.
Frankfurter would like them. I don‘t if he ever saw this; I don‘t think I had that at the museum.
These others I had at the museum for a couple years, until they moved the Queen car where it is
now.
Interviewer: I see. You said your cousin restored that car?
Mr. Blomstrom: Yeah, I think a second or third cousin.
Interviewer: Who‘s he?
Mr. Blomstrom: His name is Bloomstrom, they put too many o‘s in it. He lives in Sparta,
Michigan. He works here in Grand Rapids. He works in the furniture business - woodwork. He‘s
a young fellow, compared to me of course, he‘s about half my age. But he‘s restored a lot of
cars, for himself and for others. He does a beautiful job.
Interviewer: But you were the one who actually found it?
Mr. Blomstrom: Oh yes. Well, one of our people at the—we have a, Federal-Mogul had a plant
at Lancaster, that‘s the Amish town you know.
Interviewer: Yes.
Mr. Blomstrom: He says there‘s a Queen car over here. And this fellow had an old car, one very
rare car. Everybody down there has an old car. Every town has people who recondition old cars...
a Lancaster and Valley Forge and around Pennsylvania. So he says there‘s a Queen car over
here. Well, I says, can you find out when it‘s convenient to see it? Yeah. I‘d been looking for
one; I‘d located seven you know, which is pretty good for being that old. They run from—there‘s
this nineteen six four cylinder in Detroit, he won‘t sell it to me. He has the largest collection of
old cars in the world. The magazines say he has six hundred, he told me he has a thousand. I
believe it because they‘re in sheds. If you put up in a straight line or in a U they‘d be eight
hundred feet long and he‘s got five deep standing on the ends. So he says bring down a suit, you
know get a suit, a coverall suit. So I stopped at Sears Roebuck in Highland Park there and bought
one. The only time I ever used it, I gave it to a customer. And he says I‘ve got one of your
�21
father‘s cars. I says what is it? He says it‘s a four cylinder nineteen six Queen. Looked like a
Packard you know. There‘s a four cylinder up there and to the left, at the top, see it looks like a
Packard. Now maybe, I don‘t know who swiped who, but, they were swiping designs those days
as they are today. And everybody you‘d show that car too would say that‘s a Packard, and it was
a Queen, four cylinder. Well anyway. I got off the track.
Interviewer: Well, you were going to go look at these cars.
Mr. Blomstrom: Yeah, well, I bought that and on the way over there, he says, Mr.—we call him
Barney Pullerd, P-U-L-L-E-R-D, I guess he‘s still living. He has the largest collection of old cars
in the world. The last time he called me up here, two years ago, about seven, eight years ago he
says when you gonna write that story about your father for me? Cause he wants it you know.
Well, I says, I haven‘t got around to it. He says, I‘m gonna put up a building now, he says, and
I‘m going to show all my cars in a museum and charge like all the others are doing, Florida and
out west. I don‘t know if he‘s done it, I haven‘t talked to him for seven, eight years. He has, the
oldest car is a German eighteen ninety-seven, and all his cars are real old, I mean none of this
new stuff, twenty, thirty years, they‘re all old. From eighteen ninety-seven, I would say, to
nineteen twenty probably. He has almost every car imaginable. He‘s still looking for a Lion car. I
haven‘t told him I located one in this museum out by Rushmore. He‘s probably found out. He‘s
advertised in every…he says, that was the finest car your father built, he says, that would outrun
any car even a Stutz in those days.
Interviewer: How many Lions were built?
Mr. Blomstrom: Well I don‘t know exactly. I would say it‘s between a thousand and fifteen
hundred.
Interviewer: I see.
Mr. Blomstrom: You see, the Queen cars there were only ten a week made. It was all hand work
practically. He bought the bodies and a lot of the other axels. The axels were made by WestonMott in Flint, you know that‘s Mott, you heard-Interviewer: Yes, sure.
Mr. Blomstrom: Mott. The General Motors had more stock than anybody else outside of the
Dupont family. I met him; I saved the life of his financial secretary twice by giving him blood
you know. I had a hemolytic strep and it took me three years to come back on that. I lost seventy
pounds, I was in Harper Hospital. I gave blood side-by-side in bed to this fellow twice and saved
him. They looked all the records of the hospitals over Michigan and I was the only one who
could save this boy‘s life. You got to give him blood serum within twelve months when you
fought it off. They found my name and they got me to give him some blood and in a week he
was on his way to Arizona, and riding horseback in two weeks. The next year he got pneumonia
�22
and I gave him some more blood cause the same thing happened. I met Charlie Mott there, he
was tall as I was, six foot five. I thought he‘d give me a million bucks, but he never did. Well,
the Queen car had Weston-Mott axels front and rear; they were made in Flint. They moved from
Elmira, New York, I believe it is, somewheres in New York State, to Flint. That‘s how he got
there. And of course, General Motors bought the plant and he got stock, and he never sold his
share, he kept it, so now it‘s being sold. Well he was getting there at one time an awful lot,
several million dollars in dividends every year when it used to be two dollars or something.
Yeah, he had more stock I think than any individual, but the Dupont family probably had more
as a family.
Interviewer: Did you like Mott personally?
Mr. Blomstrom: I only met him as his secretary, financial secretary. I seen him lots of times, but
I never met him. I used to go up to Chevrolet and Buick, of course we made bearings, some of
them, for them. Not so much Buick, but one time we made forty percent of the Chevrolet until
they make their own now I guess down in Dayton Ohio, Moraine Products. I knew two of the
Chevrolet brothers, you know there were three: Gaston, Arthur, and Louie. The last time I talked
to Louie, he was assembling front drives on those twelve cars that Edsel ordered for Harry Miller
for the Indianapolis track. He wanted me to design the bearings for him, I did, which I did, they
were special. See they go up to seventy-two hundred rpm, those four cylinder Millers. Harry
Miller came to my office and he had Preston Tucker with him. He introduced me to him. Of
course the big thing, they say he designed the Tucker car. He didn‘t design that any more than I
did. He was an expediter that‘s all he was, he was no engineer, Tucker. I knew him quite well.
And I got to meet Harry Miller. We made bearings…There was five cars that were got down to
the Indianapolis track, but they had other front end troubles, steering gear trouble, none of them
finished the Ford cars. The old man didn‘t know about it I guess. They assembled them in a
building down on, West Lafayette there, about a mile from town. I was down there quite often.
Preston Tucker was a handsome fellow. He died quite young, in the forties wasn‘t it? Low
forties?
Interviewer: I think so.
Mr. Blomstrom: I talked to him over there in Chicago. They showed the car there in that big
building that Dodge ran during the war making engines. He was quite a talker. They raised a lot
of money but a lot of people lost a lot of money too. They sold a lot of stock. Anybody who
wanted to handle the car, dealer had to put down four thousand dollars I believe, something like
that. Don‘t quote me too much on that. What are you going to do with this?
Interviewer: This will go to the, well I‘m sure the museum wants a copy of it, and a copy will go
to the Grand Valley State Colleges.
Mr. Blomstrom: Are they interested in this?
�23
Interviewer: They have an oral history department.
Mr. Blomstrom: I see.
Interviewer: So, you‘ll be talking for the next few hundred years.
Mr. Blomstrom: The Swedes in Detroit, what they call the Detroit Council, Swedish Council
Incorporated, I know fifty percent of them, of course I could have been a charter member if I‘d a
stayed in Detroit. They just wrote a book last year as a project for the centennial, or was it
bicentennial isn‘t it? I have a copy here. They have quite a write-up about my father in there, and
they mention me too, and my father-in-law, he‘s right on the first page. He was one of the
founders of the Mamrelund church up here.
Interviewer: What‘s the name of the book?
Mr. Blomstrom: They Made a Difference.
Interviewer: They Made a Difference. Who published it, do you know?
Mr. Blomstrom: Aaronson, but I buy it through the friend of mine who‘s the secretary of the
Detroit Swedish Council, Signe Carlstrom I know her.
Interviewer: I presume that the local library would have a copy.
Mr. Blomstrom: I don‘t know. I bought several of the books to give to my nephews and nieces.
Of course what I was going to tell you was that it was a special project because of the king‘s visit
here. He was here last summer.
Interviwer: Yeah.
Mr. Blomstrom: Karl Gustof. Every Swedish king has got Karl Gustof in their name. That was
my grandfather‘s name, Karl Gustof Blomstrom. So they gave him several books, so my name
and my father‘s name and a lot of my relatives are in that palace in Stockholm. Well, they just
happened to put my name in, they got my father‘s write-up. In fact, this fellow that retired just
last year, the vice-chairman of General Motors Oscar Lundeen wrote it with – Jones, who was
the head of the big advertising agency there in Bloomfield Village, Bloomfield Center. Jones. I
don‘t know him, of course I know Oscar Lundeen real well. I‘ve known him since he was that
high; I knew his parents. I knew the three boys. One of them designed that Union Trust Building
downtown, Earl Lundeen.
Interviewer: Which building is that?
Mr. Blomstrom: The Union Bank and Trust.
Interviewer: Union Bank. The new building?
�24
Mr. Blomstrom: Well yeah, it‘s quite new. I don‘t know about the little building alongside, that‘s
named after the chairman isn‘t it? Frye Building.
Interviewer: Yes.
Mr. Blomstrom: But that‘s designed by Earl Lundeen. He and another fellow have a corporation
in New York City. That‘s Oscar‘s brother. There was three boys; I knew them all. There was
Edward, the youngest, Earl, and Oscar.
Interviewer: They were all in Detroit I take it?
Mr. Blomstrom: Oh yeah. Their father was the superintendent of the Detroit Screw Works and
then he went later, when he retired he went into real estate. But the boys have all done good.
Three boys. Well Oscar of course is a millionaire. He wrote this, and they start off with my
father, see, way back when designing the Queen car and building it.
Interviewer: Well we‘ve talked for about an hour I think, and I think maybe it‘s about time for
me to go home.
Mr. Blomstrom: Well if you want some more, just feel free to call up and come out.
Interviewer: I‘ll tell you, I‘ll play it back and see if I can-Mr. Blomstrom: I think it‘s too much of myself and not my father.
Interviewer: Maybe I can find that book and then read about your father and then come back and
ask you some more questions.
Mr. Blomstrom: Well it‘s just a page or two in there about him. It‘s on the first page. Of course,
they asked me last year to write about my father, but I was very miserable, I‘d been in the
hospital and I didn‘t write. They don‘t need to write to me about it anyway, all they got to do is
go the library, which they must have done because they got stuff there that I sent to the library,
word for word!
Interviewer: Thank you very, very much. I appreciate this. It‘s been a very interesting hour.
Mr. Blomstrom: Well I bore people to death talking automobiles.
Interviewer: No, not at all.
Mr. Blomstrom: I wish I was a good writer, I could write a book. I knew most of the early
people. The only one I didn‘t know was R.E. Olds, Ransom E. Olds. I know the history of the
company and all that. You see, he made the first car in Michigan, R.E. Olds, Ransom E. Olds.
That‘s his initials, R.E. O. for the REO you know.
Interviewer: Yes.
�25
Mr. Blomstrom: He quit the business you know. He was going to have cattle up north here. He
bought a ranch up here, or it‘s called a ranch. But his cronies in Lansing got him back to start the
REO. Of course it sold out long ago; the family isn‘t in it anymore. General Motors, of course—
no it‘s not, it was White, they were independent weren‘t they? There‘s White Motors and then
Diamond T Motors, and then now I guess it‘s gone. It was a good car, a big heavy car like the
old Pierce Arrow and the Locomobile. They were built like a locomobile, locomotive, heavy you
know, big heavy cars.
Interviewer: Ok.
A
G
American Motors · 3
General Motors · 3, 12, 16, 22, 24, 26
Grumback, John · 8
B
Belle Isle · 11, 19
Blomstrom Motor Company · 2
Blomstrom Thirty · 2
Blomstrom, Carl G. (Grandfather) · 6, 8, 9, 24
Blomstrom, Carl Herman (Father) · 1, 2, 3, 6, 7, 8, 10, 11,
12, 14, 15, 22, 24, 25
Bloomer Hill · 7, 8
K
Kaufman Family · 16
Kettering, Charles · 18
L
Detroit Swedish Council · 24
Dupont Family · 22, 23
Leland, Henry M. · 14
Libbey-Owens-Ford Family · 17, 18
Lincoln Motor Car Company · 13, 14
Lion car · 4, 18, 22
Lundeen Family · 24, 25
E
M
Edison, Thomas · 10, 13, 17
Miller, Harry · 23
Mott, Charlie · 22, 23
D
F
Federal-Mogul Company · 12, 15, 19, 21
Ford Motor Company · 3, 5, 10, 13, 14, 17, 18, 23
Ford, Edsel · 16, 17, 23
Ford, Henry · 10, 11
Frontmobile · 3
O
Old Lion Fence Company · 4
P
Paige Motor Car Company · 13
Pullerd, Barney · 22
�26
Q
T
Queen car · 2, 4, 5, 15, 21, 22, 23, 25
Tucker, Preston · 23
R
W
Rex (car) · 3
Weston-Mott · 22, 23
Wood, Garfield · 19, 20
Wyandotte Chemicals · 17
�
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/5974db0100116cc68e025d1077512441.mp3
c8bc4c4fcba754dc9dc84b7d455f4032
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Grand Rapids Oral Histories
Subject
The topic of the resource
Heritage Hill (Grand Rapids, Mich.)
Local histories
Memoirs
Michigan--History
Oral histories (document genre)
Description
An account of the resource
Taped and transcribed interviews conducted in the early 1970s primarily of the children and grandchildren of many of the founders of Grand Rapids, Michigan; many of whom were residents of the Heritage Hill neighborhood. Interviews were collected to develop a significant collection of oral resources that would supplement other primary and secondary local history materials. Initially funded as a private project, Grand Valley State College (now University) assumed responsibility for continuing the project until 1977.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Various
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/452">Grand Rapids oral history collection (RHC-23)</a>
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
application/pdf; audio/mp3
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text; Sound
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
RHC-23
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
1971 - 1977
Sound
A resource primarily intended to be heard. Examples include a music playback file format, an audio compact disc, and recorded speech or sounds.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
RHC-23_56Blomstrom
Title
A name given to the resource
Blomstrom, Lowell
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Blomstrom, Lowell
Description
An account of the resource
Lowell Blomstrom was born on March 22, 1893 in Grand Rapids. His father was an inventor and pioneer in the automobile industry. In 1904 Carl Blomstrom introduced the Queen Automobile produced in Detroit by the Blomstrom Motor Company. Lowell Blomstrom also worked in the automobile industry. He died in 1979.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives
Subject
The topic of the resource
Michigan--History
Local histories
Memoirs
Oral histories (document genre)
Grand Rapids (Mich.)
Personal narratives
Heritage Hill (Grand Rapids, Mich.)
Grand Valley State University
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Sound
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
application/pdf
audio/mp3
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
Grand Rapids oral history collection (RHC-23)
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1977