Fred Duesenberg’s home and lifestyle in Indianapolis
from 1921 onward

At forty-five years of age, Fred Duesenberg no doubt had a fulltime chauffer and mechanic for his automobile and his wife’s automobile. The accommodations above the two-car garage would have been quite sufficient for a chauffer and his wife, who could have worked as a maid, cook, and servant in the main house. At the time of her arrival in Indianapolis, Isle had a nursemaid for her son Denny. With the fortunes of the Duesenberg automobile companies shrinking in the mid-1920’s, Pete DePaolo, winner of the 1925 Indianapolis 500 Mile Race, lived on the third floor during the month of May. The Duesenberg live-in staff was reduced during the mid-1920’s because of the financial problems with the companies. In the late 1920’s, Gordon Buehrig, designer of many beautiful Model J Duesenberg bodies, also lived on the third floor for a period of time prior to his marriage.

The Duesenberg’s arrival in Indianapolis after the Great War had to be a major city event since he started a new automobile company under his own name. He already had an outstanding and recognized name in building racing engines for automobiles in 1913 in St. Paul Minnesota to marine racing engines and forming a racing team headed by Eddie Rickenbacker in 1914. Then he started to design aircraft engines after the United States entered the Great War in a new plant in Elizabeth/Newark, New Jersey. With war contracts being canceled immediately by the U.S. government in1919, Fred Duesenberg and his brother August “Augie” Duesenberg returned to their love of building a high tech automobile while keeping their fingers in the automobile racing game in the postwar years. Thus a new automobile company was financed by investors called “Duesenberg Automobile and Motors Corporation” and brought to Indianapolis with new facilities being built on West Washington Street starting in 1920. At the same time, the new Duesenberg home was started on Fall Creek Boulevard. The new Duesenberg Eight Model A automobile with its high tech straight eight engine and the first automobile manufactured with four-wheel hydraulic brakes was the talk of the Industry.

The Duesenbergs were celebrities as they arrived in Indianapolis. Acquiring a fashionable home with a staff of servants allowed the Duesenbergs to join in upscale socializing and entertaining the elite of the city’s society. Formal dinner parties were a way of life, with men wearing white tie and tails for evening wear. (Tuxedos did not come in until the 1930’s). Isle Duesenberg and lady guests would wear stylish long evening gowns. The evening meal after initial elegant socializing would be served by the household staff in the dining room. Prior to the dinner, guests would arrive by car under the porte-cochere with a walk-up of a few steps into the atrium of the home. The guests would have been served hors d’oeuvers with the men indulging in cocktails of Canadian rye whisky mixed with charged seltzer water from a carbonated seltzer bottle. Ice, contrary to the English tradition, would be placed in the glass. (CROWN ROYAL and CANADIAN CLUB are both high end Canadian whiskies. These whiskies were similar in taste to the rye whiskies early in the 1920’s. These whiskies were often smuggled out of Canada by airplane and delivered outside of Chicago for the Al Capone gang. The going price for a plane load of Canadian whiskey was $500.) Scotch was not normally brought into the United States because of the high import taxes on items coming from England to Canada. American Bourbon whiskey was not an option because its distilleries had been closed down since the start of Prohibition. However, stills all over Kentucky and Tennessee were busy producing “white lightning” made from corn. But this was not the classy drink for the elite. The tradition of mixed drinks was normal upscale behavior for the privileged elite even during Prohibition, which went into effect in January 1920. Dinner would probably be served on a white linen table cloth most nights, but for formal events, a lace tablecloth was substituted, with Bavarian Rosenthal China made in Selig, Germany at each place setting. Dinnerware crystal was from the Tiffin Glass Company in Tiffin, Ohio. The Gorhan Sterling silver flatware was made in Providence, Rhode Island with Fred Duesenberg’s initials engraved on each piece. Most of the silver flatware, dinnerware, and crystal were given as wedding gifts when they were married in Des Moines, Iowa in 1913. While there might not have been a complete set of crystal, silver, and flatware, Isle no doubt completed the balance for twelve place settings at the high-end boutique department store, Charles Mayer and Co. in Indianapolis, Indiana.

After dinner, the women would convene to the sun parlor, while the men would converge into the living room and light up their cigars. Manly talk would prevail, mostly about the future of post war Europe, its automobile racing program and automobile manufacturing. The Duesenberg’s new high-tech automobile was a center point of talk. The U.S. economy was of major concern as a depression was on the radar screen. Lastly, President Woodrow Wilson’s health after a most serious stroke in October of 1919 was of concern to all, since his wife Edith in essence as making the decisions for the President. Even Vice President Thomas Marshall from Indiana was not allowed to see the President during the latter portion of Wilson’s presidency.

Who were the guests in the home of the Duesenbergs? Most notably were August “Augie” Duesenberg and his wife, Gertrude. The two brothers and their wives were almost inseparable. Most guests were related to the automobile industry. Isle Duesenberg was not native to Indianapolis. Thus, all of her friends were newly made friends brought about by Fred’s business connections. In many respects Isle early on seemed to be somewhat of a “5th wheel” as she hosted a whirlwind jump into Indianapolis society of the automobile elite. Not all parties were elegant formal affairs. Sunday afternoon open houses would have preceded the more elegant dining gatherings later on in the early 1920’s. Isle Duesenberg had to meet the wives of the automotive male elite before she felt comfortable in having them to dinner. In addition she was not a social high flier. Fred Duesenberg’s lifestyle had been fast and furious leaving little time for social niceties of life for himself or for his wife. Yet the home of the Duesenbergs was the grandest of the homes of the automobile magnets at the time in 1921 with the exception of the founders of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, namely Carl Fisher, Jim Allison, Arthur Newby, and Frank Wheeler. All of these men with their wives attended affairs over the years at the Duesenberg home with the exception of Frank Wheeler, who was the perennial bachelor. Harry Stutz and his wife were good friends to the Dusenbergs. Stutz was so impressed by the architectural layout and features of the Duesenberg home that Stutz later on built his home on North Meridian Street with similar features from the original architectural plans of the Duesenberg home. Other guests no doubt were successful men in the automobile industry. They would have included Joseph J. Cole, Howard and Walter Marmon and members of the Board of Directors of the newly formed Duesenberg Automobile and Motors Company, inc. They were Newton E. VanZandt, President; Luther M, Rankin, Vice-President and general manager; F.A. Reilly, Treasurer; and B.H. Worthington; an outside director and influential member of the Board of Directors, who was president of a railroad company in Indiana. The political elite would have been invited, these being the Governor of the State of Indiana in 1921, James Putnam Goodrich, and the mayor of Indianapolis, Charles W, and Jewett, who served as mayor during all of 1921.

The Duesenberg Eight Model A automobile never succeeded financially. In essence the automobile never made it its projected output. When production started to reach its projected output, it had an insufficient marketing arm, compounded by the Depression of 1922-23. It also suffered major setbacks in its corporate management team. Two Duesenberg corporations failed as a result. The second of the two companies went into receivership in 1925 with the assets being picked up by Erret Loban “E.L.”Cord of the Auburn Automobile Company. Cord hired Fred Duesenberg for his engineering talents and told him to design the mightiest and most powerful car that had ever been created. The Duesenberg Model J was the result. Cord let Augie Duesenberg out of the new corporate structure. Augie went across West Washington Street to the racing facility to continue to build race cars until the Great Depression set in.

E.L. Cord probably visited the Duesenberg home on one or two occasions from 1925 to 1932. Cord lived in Auburn, Indiana, from 1925 and later on in Chicago on the north side of the Drake Hotel facing Lake Shore Drive and Lake Michigan. His corporate office in the 1930’s was the Wrigley Building, located at 400 North Michigan Avenue.

With the Great Depression starting with the stock market collapse in late October 1929, the glory days of the Roaring ‘20s came to a screeching halt. With Fred Duesenberg’s untimely and tragic death in late June of 1932, Isle Duesenberg’s life changed along with her son Denny. Isle lived in the home for many more years. The house has changed hands several times since then. It is today uniquely original. The present owners, two brothers, inheriting the house from their mother, haven’t lived in the home recently. They are desiring to sell the Duesenberg home with all the memories of the past. For that reason, they contacted Marsh Davis, President of Indiana Landmarks, and an affiliate group, Indiana Automobile Historical Society to view the home. Members of the society are in part members of the Indiana Region CCCA. In December 2014, George Maley, Charles Mullen, Reverend Cliff Vogelsang, Andy Wolf (president of the Society) along with Indianapolis Motor Speedway Historian Donald Davidson took a tour of the home. To walk through the rooms of the home is to conjure up memories of the glories of the past. It is a home of another era and a culture of elegance that is foreign to this present generation.

Captions

1. Fred and Isle Duesenberg- Courtesy ACDA Museum Collection
2. The Duesenberg home on Fall Creek Parkway, Indianapolis, in 2014.
3. The Fred and Isle Duesenberg home in Newark, New Jersey
4. The Duesenberg Brothers racing garage, also in Newark, c 1974.
5.The living room still retains its 1938-vintage carpets.
6. Dark wood paneling bestows a simple elegance on the dining room.
7. The narrow sunroom is very tidy and comfortable.
8.The bathroom is functional….but in serious need of updating.
9.The garage provided plenty of room to store and to maintain a couple of Model A Duesenbergs.
10. A guest’s-eye view. Exit your car under the porte-cochere and slip up a few steps to enjoy Duesenberg hospitality.
11. 1924 Duesenberg Model A roadster. Courtesy ACDA Museum Collection.
12. 1921 Duesenberg Model A Coupe. Courtesy ACDA Museum Collection.
13.Everyone remembers that silent film star Tom Mix met his end in a Cord. Here he is in Model A roadster. Courtesy ACDA Museum Collection.
14. Fred and Augie Duesenberg in 1925. Photo courtesy of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway
15. Indianapolis Motor Speedway historian Donald Davidson, Indiana Landmarks president Marsh Davis, and IAHS president Andy Wolf enjoy a tour of the Duesenberg home given by current owner Doug Tevebaugh.