In The News
This page will host any stories or articles that have been written about The Mitchell Company and its products, as well as any publications about the opening of the collection to the public!
KOMU-8 reporter Mackenzie Huck created this January 2018 feature story.
This Missouri Life Magazine Article came out in September, 2015 — enjoy!
Lewis made his television debut when we were featured on KRCG’s Road Trippin’ segment in June, 2015. Look for “Mitchell Museum” on their page.
Here you can read Roger Edison’s story about The Mitchell Wagon on his website, “Cowboys and Chuckwagon Cooking.”
Click here to read Tom Strongman’s article about Lewis and Susan’s 1913 Mitchell automobile.
For a blast from the past, check out this news clipping on The New York Times website, back when the Mitchell Motor Car Company absorbed Mitchell & Lewis Company.
From the New York Times, October 1909:
Mitchell Branching Out
Sailing for Europe on Nov. 3, William Mitchell Lewis, Treasurer and General Manager of the Mitchell Motor Car Company, and Secretary G. V. Rogers purpose looking over the entire foreign field with the serious view of vigorously pushing into the Old World as competitors of the pioneer makers of Europe.
Each believes that there is a wide field in Great Britain and the Continent for the right car at the right price, and the Mitchell machine has had such unqualified success with this as a slogan in the American field that they are confident that the foreign competitive field will be a fertile one.
While abroad the Mitchell Company officials will attend the automobile shows and consummate a deal for the establishment of an agency in London.
The Mitchell agency in Paris, France, under the supervision of M. Rene M. Petard, also will be visited by Messrs. Lewis and Rogers. After returning to the United States, Mr. Rogers expects to take a ship for South America to establish an agency for the Mitchell car.
A Mitchell Motor Car Company Agency in the Philippine Islands! That is the latest plan of the officials of this concern. There are Mitchell cars in the far-off island possessions of Uncle Sam. The correspondence of the company indicates that the demand is sufficiently great to warrant the establishment of an agency in Manila.
Unless all signs fail, the foreign trade feature of the Mitchell Company will expand into a considerable industry. Plans have been made for sending at least 1,000 cars into foreign lands, and the Philippine consignment will form a considerable portion of the exportation.
And from the New York Times, June 5, 1910:
Close Call for Motorists
Just returned to his home in Racine, Wis., after a record-breaking motoring trip in Europe and a stay in London to attend the funeral of King Edward, Capt. William Mitchell Lewis is convinced that the Continent furnishes a maximum of every form of sensation in automobiling—from the charm of speeding day after day through picturesque and thrifty hamlets, provinces, and Alpine districts, to battling with snows in the mountains or touring amid topographical settings on the Mediterranean Sea that almost tempt the chauffeur to try his hand at poetry.
The Captain was accompanied on the tour by Mrs. Lewis, their children, Katherine and William Turner 2nd, a Chicago automobile authority, and M. Rene Petard of Paris, and Frank Zirbes, the transcontinental road driver, held the wheel of the Mitchell six.
“We were twelve days in the motor car after leaving London,” said the former Yale football player and prospective candidate for Governor of Wisconsin, as the choice of many leaders in the Republican Party, “and every hour of the journey through Paris, into Switzerland, through the Alpine wonder districts, to Venice, Genoa, and fin
ally into Milan, was crowded with matters of interest.
“It is given to few motorists in the Alps to have such a providential escape from a terrible death as our party had in Province Hautes-Alpes, not far from Gap,” continued Mr. Lewis. “But for the coolness of Driver Zirbes and the nerve that enabled him to steer the automobile into a claybank—the only claybank in that country of sheer precipices and roads cut from the living rock that he was able to note—death must have been the penalty we paid for essaying a night trip around the numerous hair pin turns on the Cotienne Alps, where we were eager to take advantage of the clearness of the sky to view Halley’s comet.
“While creeping around the turns and practically hanging over the edges of terrible precipices that looked bottomless from our position, we were nearing Gap when the yells of soldiers on the march startled the echoes of the mountains as well as the members of our expedition. A runaway automobile was bearing down upon us, threatening to overtake us at ‘Death Curve,’ the fifth turn in the descent of 1,200 feet.
“Zirbes had to think quickly. He pressed on the accelerator and the big car responded instantly. It was a case of putting on the brakes every moment as we struck the curves. Petard got out on the footboard to help Zirbes and seeing the only clay bank we had encountered, gave the driver the order to ditch our car. He obeyed, and the runaway limousine dashed past us to be wrecked fifty yards beyond it. Our glass windshield was dashed into bits, but Zirbes was not injured. Our mechanician was hurled fully twenty feet, but landed on his feet. I crouched in the tonneau and escaped injury. As for Petard, he was hurled a considerable distance, landing on his head. The wrecked machine belonged to M. Louis Campagnon of Paris. M. Campagnon and his wife were in the limousine when it was wrecked, but the physician said neither was badly injured. The chauffeur had a dislocated shoulder.
“We fully intended to cross the Alps, but with the passes filled with drifts and six feet of snow, we pushed on to Nice. The remainder of the journey was without incident, as was the return by train to the port of Boulogne. It’s only a step from there to London.”