Ettore Bugatti

Lore & Background

Bugatti was born into an artistic family in Milan, Italy. He was the elder son of Carlo Bugatti and Teresa Lorioli. His younger brother, Rembrandt, was a renowned animal sculptor. Bugatti constructed his 'Bugatti Type 1' in 1898 with Prinetti & Stucchi.

With financial support from Count Gulinelli, he developed the Type 2, a prize-winning exhibit at the Milan Trade Fair in Spring 1901. Baron Adrien de Turckheim then offered him a position at Lorraine-Dietrich in Niederbronn. Bugatti became head of technology at De Dietrich in 1902, where he met Émile Mathis. They left De Dietrich in 1904 to produce cars under the name 'Mathis-Hermes (Licence Bugatti)' until 1906.

Bugatti then set up a research centre at Illkirch-Graffenstaden and collaborated with Deutz. In 1907 he became Production Director at Deutz, designing the Type 8/9, and built the Type 10 in his basement. In 1913 he designed the Type 19 Bébé for Peugeot. He founded Automobiles E. Bugatti in 1909 in Molsheim.

During World War I he designed the 16-cylinder U-16 aircraft engine. Between the wars he designed the Autorail Bugatti and the Model 100 airplane, which never flew due to World War II. He also designed surgical instruments still in use. Bugatti's son Jean was killed on 11 August 1939 while testing a Bugatti Type 57 tank-bodied race car near Molsheim.

World War II ruined the Molsheim factory. Bugatti planned a new factory at Levallois in Paris during the war. He was inducted into the Automotive Hall of Fame in 2000.

Reader's Guide

Bugatti married Barbara Maria Giuseppina Mascherpa in 1907. They had two daughters, L'Ébé (born 1903) and Lidia (born 1907), and two sons, Jean (born 1909) and Roland (born 1922). Barbara died in 1944. Bugatti remarried in 1946 to Geneviève Marguerite Delcuze, with whom he had a daughter, Thérèse (born 1942) and a son, Michel (born 1945). Bugatti died at the American hospital in Neuilly, Paris, on 21 August 1947, after a stroke. His property in Alsace, seized after the war due to his Italian origins, was restored to him on 20 June 1947, but he died without regaining consciousness. He is buried in the Bugatti family plot at the municipal cemetery in Dorlisheim. The Musée de la Chartreuse in Molsheim houses a section dedicated to his life and work.