Karl Friedrich Benz was born in Karlsruhe, Germany, on November 26, 1844. He attended the local gymnasium and polytechnic school. At age 21, Benz went to work in a local machine shop. He continued to work in the machine tool industry and, in 1871, opened a small engineering works with August Ritter as his partner. His first efforts to power a horseless carriage were not very fruitful, but he persisted. Some said he was obsessed with the idea. Shut out of the race to develop a four-stroke engine by Nikolaus August Otto's patented engine, Benz continued to make improvements to a one-horsepower, two-stroke engine of his own design at his factory in Mannheim. Eventually, this new engine attracted enough financial support for Benz to open a new company (without Ritter) in 1883.

It was this company, called Benz & Company, which built the world's first automobile powered by an internal combustion engine. Benz and...