Rockne

Rockne was an American automobile brand produced by the Studebaker Corporation of South Bend, Indiana, from 1932 to 1933, named for the University of Notre Dame football coach Knute Rockne and built in Detroit, Michigan. Studebaker president Albert Erskine had planned to end his slow-selling namesake Erskine and saw a Rockne prototype as a larger, more powerful replacement, though Knute Rockne, hired as Studebaker's manager of sales promotions in February 1931, was killed in an airplane crash on March 31, 1931. Two models were approved, the 65 on a 110 inch wheelbase, designed by Ralph Vail and Roy Cole for Willys-Overland and bought by Erskine, and the 75 on a 114 inch wheelbase, based on the Studebaker Six. Production of the 75 began at South Bend on December 15, 1931, and the 65 started at the old E-M-F plant in Detroit in February 1932. For 1933 the range was cut to the single Model 10, built in South Bend from April to July 1933 after Studebaker entered receivership. The Vail and Cole engine went on to replace the six-cylinder engines of the Dictator and Commander and power Studebakers until 1951.