Locomobile of Bridgeport, Connecticut, was one of the most respected automobile manufacturers in the United States during the early 20th century, known for producing luxury cars of superb quality with conservative but outstanding engineering. In 1911 the company introduced a 7.0-liter T-head six-cylinder engine in the Model M. This design would win great acclaim and within a few short years, it evolved into the Model 48. Locomobile Model 48s were always beautifully made and extremely dependable, factors important to the company’s conservative, wealthy clientele.

The Model 48 offered here was bodied by A.T. Demarest of New York City, a firm somewhat obscure today but renowned in the era as one of the Empire State’s finest coachbuilders. Noted for its work on Locomobile since 1910, it specialized in dignified coachwork for conservative clientele, as witnessed in the razor-edge lines of this car, with its crisp brougham-style roofline carried out in polished wood in true carriage-trade fashion, and “six-fender” roofline—as Janet Cussler notes, “a must for muddy roads and long skirts.” The interior is beautifully appointed in wool broadcloth, with a superb open-pattern coiffured or “skeleton wood” headliner, all complemented by an older finish in two-tone milk white and buff tan.

The Locomobile was acquired from longtime owner Ted Valpey of Dover, New Hampshire, in 2012 by Clive and Janet Cussler. Mr. Cussler recounted late in life that “when I was about five years old [in 1935], I was sitting on the curb in Alhambra, California, and this car went by and I was just agog—because everybody had a Chevy or a Ford, but here was a town car with the chauffeur sitting out front in uniform. I was blown away by that.” He was so struck that he focused on the town car body style when building his original collection in Colorado, eventually accumulating one of the finest assemblages of formal coachwork in the country.

While this Locomobile’s restoration—likely now four or five decades old, shows age throughout—it is still quite handsome, retaining much of its original structural woodwork and beautiful, high-quality fittings. This is a fine specimen of one of America’s most regal automobiles.