Return of the artful Dodge

The Dodge Caliber is styled to look like a small SUV, and comes come with gadgets such as the glovebox/icebox.

The story goes that when Henry Ford was trying to start his car company early last century he asked a couple of brothers who were running a machinery company in Detroit to help bankroll him.

John Francis Dodge and Horace Elgin Dodge did just that, supplying bearings and parts for early Fords.

The deal continued for the next 12 years or so until the the brothers started their own car operation, the Dodge Brothers Motor Vehicle Company, in 1914.

Soon they had 50 dealers across the United States. In 1915, Dodge built more than 45,000 cars, each one carrying the company's "Dependable" advertising slogan.

It was a meteoric rise. Henry Ford fought the Dodge brand through the courts, claiming the deal the brothers had with his company prevented them from building a rival nameplate. He refused to buy the Dodge parts.

The case dragged on until 1917, when a court ruled against Ford and ordered him to pay back Dodge. It cost Ford a small fortune. By then, Dodge was the fourth best-selling brand in the US after Ford, Buick and Willys-Overland.

Meanwhile, the US had entered World War I and Dodge had branched out from cars like the luxury open-top Tourer to light vans and trucks for US forces.

Business grew. The commercial vehicles Dodge made for the military were in demand on civvy street after 1918, as US industry spread wide. So was its four-door sedan, a rival for Ford's best as America entered the 1920s.

But the brothers didn't live to see how influential Dodge would become in the early 1920s with models like the first all-steel car. Both died within months of each other in 1920, from influenza. John was 56, Horace 52.

Veteran Dodge executive Frederick J. Haynes successfully ran the company for the next few years until 1925, when it was sold to New York investment bank Dillon, Read & Company for US$146 million, said to be the largest cash transaction in history.

Dillon Read sold Dodge to the emerging Chrysler Corporation on July 31, 1928. Dodge models soon after began turning up in numbers in New Zealand, imported by Todd Group founder Charles Todd. Earlier Dodges, both left and right-hand-drive, had found their way into the country privately.

The Todd Group began local assembly of Dodge in Wellington in the 1930s and the nameplate remained part of the landscape until the late 1950s, when its parent Chrysler began assembling the Valiant sedan in Australia.

There is some debate about the last Dodge model built here. Some say it was in the late 1950s, others in the early 1960s. Whatever, 40-plus years on, the nameplate is officially back in New Zealand, now part of the DaimlerChrysler group and pinned to a five-door hatchback called the Caliber.

It was launched in Auckland yesterday, powered by the choice of a 1.8-litre four-cylinder engine mated to a five-speed manual gearbox, or a 2-litre unit with a continuously variable transmission.

Both engines are the products of a programme set up with Mitsubishi, Hyundai and Kia to develop four-cylinder variable valve units from 1.8 to 2.4 litres. It is the first time they have appeared in a Chrysler Group vehicle.

A 2-litre turbodiesel engine is expected to be available in the Caliber in New Zealand later in the year, as is the 2.4-litre petrol unit.

The front-drive Dodge Caliber is bigger overall than the Volkswagen Golf and has been styled to look like a small sports utility vehicle, appearing taller than it is on 17-inch wheels.

Gadgets abound, including a tailgate flip-down pair of speakers, glovebox drinks chiller, ceiling light that turns into a removable torch and the MP3/mobile phone holder in the centre console.

The Caliber is built at Chrysler's Belvidere plant in Illinois and re-launches Dodge on international markets.

No word on prices yet, but Chrysler is understood to be trying to keep the introductory price below $30,000.