Ferdinand Anton Ernst Porsche biography

Synopsis

Early Life

Ferdinand Anton Ernst "Ferry" Porsche was born on September 19, 1909 in Wiener Neustadt, Austria. He is the second child born to Ferdinand and Aloisia Johanna (Kaes) Porsche (his sister, Louise, was born in 1904).

Porsche's father worked for several years as a technical director at the Austro-Daimler automobile company, which later became Daimler-Benz and manufactured the Mercedes-Benz; and designed the Lohner-Porsche Chaise, powered by four electric motors, in 1900. In 1910, when Porsche was just a year old, his father designed a car that traveled 85 miles per hour. In 1920, his father gave him for Christmas a small two-seater that he designed and built. It ran on a 3.5 horsepower, two-cylinder engine.

Porsche, inevitably, grew up with an innate love of cars. He began helping out with his father's business as soon as it opened and, together, they developed the Auto Union grand prix car, which had a lightweight design and 16-cylinder engine. Porsche liked to test drive this machine, but his father soon nixed his runs, fearing for his safety. At the age of 12, Porsche had witnessed a fatal car crash during a race, and while everyone else shielded their eyes from the carnage, he was engrossed in the wreck—not out of a macabre sense, but to analyze the cause of the tragic accident. Later investigation showed that his original assessment was correct; a tire wheel had collapsed. Porsche's scientific curiosity would translate to a successful future in building automobiles.

WWII Controversy

One of Porsche's greatest claims to fame was his involvement on the prototype Volkswagen, meaning "people's car" in German. The first model had its debut run in 1936, two years after Porsche and his father had first developed plans for the vehicle. Porsche's father had been recruited to build the car by German Chancellor Adolf Hitler, who wanted an affordable automobile to be available for the working class. In a savvy business move, Porsche made certain that he and his father would receive a portion of the profits for every car sold. Soon after, the VW "Beetle," so called for its small size and rounded body style, debuted as the "people's car" and eventually became the world's most popular car. The first VW plant was built in 1938. While working on the "people's car" project, in 1935, Porsche married Dorothea Reitz. They had four sons, Ferdinand "Butzi", Gerhard, Peter and Wolfgang.

Under the Nazi regime, the Porsches' firm flourished, as they manufactured military vehicles, airplane engines and tanks. Later, like most businesspeople who had dealings with the Third Reich, Porsche stated that he had no way to refuse Hitler's wishes.