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 Capri
These were the first Lincolns produced at the new Wixom, Michigan, plant, and were made on a unibody platform much like the Lincoln-Zephyr and the original Lincoln Continental. While advertising brochures made the case that Continental Division was still a separate make, the car shared its body with that year's Lincoln. The Lincoln Capri was the base model in the Lincoln product line, with the Lincoln Premiere positioned as higher level of standard equipment. Lincoln lost over $60 million during 1958-1960, partly reflecting the expense of developing perhaps the largest unibody car ever made. The 1958 full-size Lincoln sold poorly in all models because of the economic recession in the U.S.