Lincoln Motor Company
The Lincoln Motor Company was founded in August 1917 by Henry Leland and his son Wilfred. Among the founders of Cadillac, Leland had sold the company to General Motors in 1909, remaining on as an executive until 1917, when he left over a dispute with GM President William Durant. Naming Lincoln Motor Company after Abraham Lincoln, the first President for whom he ever voted (1864), Leland financed the company by securing a $10 million contract to build Liberty V12 aircraft engines, breaking ground on the Lincoln Motor Company Plant. To build the Liberty engines, Lincoln sourced parts from other manufacturers; along with cylinders produced by Ford, other parts were sourced from Buick, Cadillac, Marmon, and Packard. In total, 6,500 Liberty V12 engines were produced by Lincoln before the end of World War I ceased wartime production.
Lincoln Motor Company
For 1949, all three Ford Motor Company divisions debuted their first postwar designs. Sharing its body structure with the Mercury Eight, the redesigned Lincoln model line (code-named the EL-series) marked the first use of a V8 in a Lincoln since 1932. An all-new V12 intended for Lincoln was stillborn in development, leading the division to adapt a Ford flathead V8 (from the Ford F-8 conventional truck). As with the previous Lincoln Continental, the 1949 Lincoln dispensed with running boards completely, moving on to abandon pontoon styling entirely, with a straight fender line (and low hoodline) from headlamp to taillamp. In a carryover from Zephyr-based Lincolns, the 1949 Lincolns retained rear-hinged passenger doors. As a flagship model of Lincoln, the Lincoln Cosmopolitan was styled with its own rear roofline.
As Lincoln entered the 1950s, Ford Motor Company sought to increase the differentiation between the Mercury and Lincoln model lines. For 1952, to add interest to the brand, Lincoln returned to model names for the first time since 1942, with the Lincoln Cosmopolitan becoming the standard Lincoln model, with the Lincoln Capri becoming the flagship model line. In a return to (small) pontoon rear fenders, Lincolns shared a body with the Mercury Monterey. Mechanically, Lincoln differed from Mercury, as the Ford truck V8 was replaced by the Lincoln Y-block V8 with a Hydramatic transmission. For the first time since the discontinuation of the Model K, Lincolns were produced with front-hinged rear doors.