Holy crap, they actually did it: they let 2025 expire. Someone didn’t pay the year bill, and now they’re cutting off all of our 2025. Great. But don’t panic! It looks like someone got a free trial of 2026, so I guess we’re just going to move over to that? That’s fine. How bad could it be? Also, if we move to 2026, then there will be an important car, one that has a human name even, that will turn 100 years old! That’s exciting, right?
Want to know what that car is? Of course you do, you’re human, full of wonder and a deep, powerful interest in cars. The car I’m talking about is interesting in the sense of its significance as the start of this well-known automaker, though the car itself, while charming, isn’t especially novel in technical or design ways, not really.
I feel like any hints I can give about this car would give it away too easily; the traits that the automaker is known for today are too closely associated with it, enough that I think I could tell you just two descriptive words and most people – even people not really into cars – could guess it in, at most, two tries.
Here’s one hint, though: this car was nicknamed “Jakob.” Does that help? Well, here’s the car I’m thinking of:
The Volvo ÖV 4. Well, I’m actually specifically talking about one of the 10 prototypes for the ÖV 4 which were built in 1926, and one of which was called “Jakob.” I’ll explain why in a moment.
The point is, this was the very first Volvo car, ever, and 1926 is the year it was built, and the year that Volvo was founded, initially as a subsidiary to a bearing and seal (like a grommet, not like the dog of the sea kind) company called SKF.
The company was founded by Gustav Larson and Assar Gabrielsson with the goal of designing an building a car that could withstand Sweden’s rough road conditions and harsh, cold winters. With that in mind, somehow these two ended up designing a freaking convertible, which is one of the more delightfully baffling design choices in all of automobilia.
Oh and here’s an interesting detail: see how the logo – taken from the old alchemical symbol for iron, not males, as is sometimes thought – is mounted to the grille?
On that diagonal bar, all cast into the grille’s chrome shell. That was used because it was just the easiest, cheapest way to get the logo in the center as part of the radiator shell: a diagonal bar. And that diagonal bar is still part of Volvo’s branding today, even on their modern EVs that don’t even have grilles.
The car was officially known as “Öppen Vagn 4 cylindrar” which just means an open car with four cylinders, traits the car definitely had. For some reason that I have yet to really find out, the prototype that was finished on July 25, 1926 was named Jakob because that was the name of that date’s Name Day, which is a sort of observance I wasn’t familiar with.
It seems that, in Sweden and some other places, there is a tradition where each calendar day has a name associated with it, and as a result one can celebrate a “name day.” It started as a list of Saint’s Days and then morphed into the more general name day thing – honestly, that’s all probably too much for this post, and would be better on the name-focused website we’ll be launching soon, Nomenculture.
Why did none of the other nine prototypes not get named as well? I should probably reach out to Volvo and ask.
Back to the car. The ÖV 4 had a 1.9-liter inline four making a quite-respectable-for-the-time 28 horsepower, with a three-speed manual gearbox. The chassis designer, Jan G. Smith, worked in America’s car industry and learned a great deal, so this first Volvo follows a lot of American-style design practices.
Jakob and his nine siblings were extensively tested on Sweden’s rugged roads and harsh weather, and the design was refined and tweaked and by 1927, the ÖV 4 was ready to launch. Well, almost; on the day it was supposed to roll out of the factory, the first car would only go backwards. There was a pinion in the rear axle that was installed backwards, so they had to fix that and officially launch the car the next day.
Volvo only sold about 205 ÖV 4s, largely because, duh, it’s cold as hell in Sweden and no one wants a convertible. They followed it up with the PV 4, which was actually closed, and haven’t looked back since.
So, there’s something to look forward to: the proto-Volvo named Jakob will turn 100 this year!
I hope everyone’s 2025 ends in a pleasing way, and that 2026 proves great! I’m hopeful? Cautiously?
The post Tomorrow Is 2026: Guess What Car With A Person’s Name And Was The Start Of A Famous Carmaker Will Turn 100 appeared first on The Autopian.
