History of the diesel car Production diesel car history started in 1933 with Citroën's Rosalie, which featured a diesel engine option (the 1,766 cc 11UD engine) in the Familiale (estate or station wagon) model. The Mercedes-Benz 260D and the Hanomag Rekord were introduced in 1936. Immediately after World War II, and throughout the 1950s and 1960s, diesel-powered cars began to gain limited popularity, particularly for commercial applications, such as ambulances, taxis, and station wagons used for delivery work. Most were conventional in design. Mercedes-Benz offered a continuous stream of diesel-powered taxis, beginning in 1949 with their 170D powered by the OM-636 engine. Later, in 1959
Biddle Motor Car Company equally high aspirations of the company for its customer base. Biddle was one of more than 2000 car makers, located all over the USA in the first quarter of the twentieth century, who failed to survive the intensifying pressures of mass-production and national distribution in the late teens and the intense competition imposed by massive corporate consolidations in the early 1920s. Biddle Motor Car Company The Biddle Motor Car Company manufactured luxury automobiles in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania from 1915 to 1922. "Information, rather than Persuasive Sales Talk" was the advertising slogan of the company, which was noted for its conservative advertising.