page_title: Lincoln Motor Company Plant
section_title: Henry Leland's Lincoln
hierarchical_section_title: Lincoln Motor Company Plant / Henry Leland's Lincoln
caption_attribution_description: English: 6500th Lincoln Liberty Aircraft Engine; Henry Leland and Wilfred Leland on left
context_page_description: The Lincoln Motor Company Plant was an automotive plant at 6200 West Warren Avenue in Detroit, Michigan, later known as the Detroit Edison Warren Service Center. The complex was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1978, due to its historic association with World War I Liberty engines and the Lincoln Motor Company. However, the main structures were demolished in 2003 and NHL designation was withdrawn in 2005.
context_section_description: Beginning in 1902, Henry Leland steered Cadillac to become a popular, high quality luxury automobile brand.  Leland sold the company to General Motors in 1908, but continued his association with Cadillac until the mid-1910s, when he resigned because of the company's unwillingness to transition to World War I wartime production needs.
  In 1917, Leland established the Lincoln Motor Company to build Liberty engines for fighter planes using Ford Motor Company-supplied cylinders.  Leland immediately purchased the former Warren Motor Car Company factory on Detroit's west side.  However, he quickly realized the facilities were not sufficient to house the engine production envisioned, so he purchased a 50-acre plot of land at Warren and Livernois. The company immediately broke ground for a factory complex of over 600,000 square feet (56,000 m²), hiring architect George Mason to design the new buildings and the firm of Walbridge-Aldinger to build them. By the end of the war, the plant complex contained the Administration Building and Garage (Building A), the machine shop (Building B), the main Factories (Buildings C and D), a power house, a heat treatment plant, a motor testing building, and other minor structures.
  In January 1919, after producing 6500 Liberty engines, manufacturing operations were suspended, and the war was soon over.  Lincoln considered manufacturing automobile engines for other nameplates in the postwar years, but soon opted to convert to the production of luxury automobiles. However, production delays and the postwar recession of 1920 hurt sales, and the company eventually went into receivership.
caption: The 6500th Lincoln Liberty Aircraft Engine produced in the plant; Henry Leland and his son Wilfred Leland are on left
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