Worth

Worth was the distinct vehicle name used for a small gasoline-automobile program of Chicago Motor Vehicle Company between 1899 and 1901. The project united William O. Worth with company officers including W. R. Donaldson, Henry R. Kellogg and J. E. Keith. Worth patented suspension/chassis work in August 1899, and museum study of a surviving Dog Cart describes an advanced steel chassis, shaft or cardan drive and an unusually early steering damper. Approximately fifteen Worth passenger cars were built, with two cars reported to survive, but no chassis ledger divides production by year or body. The best documented passenger form is the open Dog Cart; patent chronology makes 1899 the likely date of the Louwman Museum example, although the row uses the full 1899–1901 program envelope. Historical corporate material also describes a commercially oriented Rapid Delivery: a covered van on a Baushke-Worth-associated chassis whose interchangeable body could instead be arranged for passengers in a carryall, station-wagon or small-minibus role. These body alternatives remain one model family because no evidence establishes separate factory model names. Engine displacement, cylinder count, horsepower, gearbox, dimensions, weight, prices and annual changes are unresolved. A later four-wheel rail motor assembled by Chicago Motor Vehicle Company in 1903–04 employed the Worth Traction Drive, but that railway vehicle postdates the road marque and is not counted as a Worth road model. Worth is kept separate from Chicago-badged vehicles and unrelated Worth names.

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