Please note that the content of this book primarily consists of articles available from Wikipedia or other free sources online. August Samuel Duesenberg was a German-American automobile pioneer manufacturer. Duesenberg was born in Kirchheide, Lippe-Detmold. His large family emigrated to the United States when he was five, settling in Rockford, Iowa. In the 1890s, August Duesenberg started building and racing bicycles with his brother Frederick. In 1900, they then began playing with gasoline engines and also motorcycles. In 1906 the brothers obtained financing to manufacture cars from Edward Mason, an Iowa lawyer. F. L. Maytag, washing machine and appliance magnate, bought 60 percent of the company. The result was the Maytag-Mason Motor Company at Waterloo, Iowa. But neither Maytag nor Mason were experienced in the car business, and the company gradually folded