MOTOR-CARS 5'S 



and Levassor to other types of vehicles. The French 

 were thus the first to perceive the great possibilities 

 of it. and by 1894 the motor-cars alreadv in use in 

 France were so numerous that the first sporting event 

 in the history of them — the 760 miles' race from Paris 

 to Bordeaux and back — was run. 



The following year Mr. Evelyn Ellis brought over 

 the first motor-car to reach England, a 4 h.-p. Panhard. 

 and a little later, Sir David Salomons, of Tunbridge 

 Wells, imported a Peugeot. In that town. October 

 15th, 1895. he held the first show of cars — four or five 

 at most — in this country. Then began an agitation 

 raised by a few enthusiasts for the removal of the 

 existing restrictions upon road traffic. A deputation 

 waited upon the Local Government Board, and the 

 Light Locomotives Act of 1896 was passed in August, 

 legalising mechanical traction up to a speed of fourteen 

 miles an hour, the Act to come into operation on 

 November 14th. 



For whatever reason, the Light Locomotives Act 

 was passed so quietly, under the aegis of the Local 

 Government Board, as to almost wear the aspect of 

 an organised secrecy, and the coming of what is now 

 known as Motor-car Day was utterly unsuspected by 

 the bulk of the public. It even caught the newspapers 

 unprepared, until the week before. 



But the financiers and company-promoters had been 

 busy. They at least fullv realised the importance of 

 the era about to dawn ; and the extravagant flotations 

 of the Great Horseless Carriage Company and of many 

 others long since bankrupt and forgotten, together 

 with the phenomenal over-valuation of patents, very 

 soon discredited the new movement. Never has there 

 been a new industry so hardly used by company- 

 promoting sharks as that of motor-cars. 



No inkling of subsequent financial disasters clouded 

 Motor-car Day, and as at almost the last moment the 

 Press had come to the conclusion that it was an occasion 

 to be written up and enlarged upon, a very great 

 public interest was aroused in the Motor-car Club's 



