Wills Sainte Claire
Wills Sainte Claire was an American automobile brand manufactured by C. H. Wills and Company, in Marysville, Michigan, from 1921 to 1927. Childe Harold Wills, the company founder, was a perfectionist and his automobile company focused on very high quality cars. Wills' mother was a fan of Lord Byron's poetry and Wills never used his first name. As a metallurgical engineer, Wills was an aide of Henry Ford. Wills introduced vanadium steel for the production of the Ford Model T; it was the first the large scale application of the alloy. Wills was also a designer and is credited with designing the script "Ford Blue Oval" emblem that the company uses to this day. Wills left Ford on his own terms and with a severance package of more than 1.5 million dollars, which he used to establish his own car company he originally named "Wills Saint Clair" – Wills for himself and "Saint Clair" for the Saint Clair River near his new factory. Wills later added the extra es, thinking that the French spelling elevated the cachet of the product. The first Wills Sainte Claire rolled off the assembly line in 1921. Production was delayed due to metallurgy issues surrounding