The Budd Company

I just made contact with a cousin that I didn't even know existed. She's a twin, she's been corresponding with relatives in Germany and she has a ton of information about my biological father's family that she has shared with me.

I've never seen this picture of my father, on the left holding the duck. I'm not quite sure what the child, named Kiki is holding, on the right, I suspect it's a cat.

I had no idea that my father grew up around farm type animals, I'm including ducks and geese in that category.

I remember visiting my grandmother Martha's house when I was small and feeling overwhelmed with all the uncles milling around. I think I spend a lot of time in the back entrance porch, playing with the new kittens when we did visit.


I never saw much of my Grandfather. I thought he worked on cars because he always seemed to smell like engine oil.  Imagine my surprise when my cousin sent me information that he had worked for the BUDD COMPANY in Philadelphia.

"The Budd Company was the major supplier of body components to the automobile industry.  They used to manufacturer stainless steel passenger rail cars during the 20th century. The company was founded in 1912 by Edward G. Buss, whose fame came from his company's invention of the 'shotweld' technique for joining pieces of stainless steel without damaging its anti-corrosion properties.

In 1916, Budd built one of the first steel car bodies, for Dodge. They also created the first "safety" two piece truck wheel, used extensively in World War II. They also built truck cargo bodies for the US military.

In 1940 they developed the now-ubiquitous method of assembling vehicles, first used by Nash Motors."

My grandfather worked there as a machinist, one of my uncles was a supervisor and when my father got married in 1947 he went to work there too.