Visit the Museum

Gilmore Car Museum website for Hours and Directions.

Map to the Collection at Hickory Corners

The Franklin Collection

View the first cars in The Franklin Automobile Collection at Hickory Corners.

Read and Article in Hemmings Hemmings Classic Car Magazine on the Collection at Hickory Corners.

The Franklin Collection on YouTube

View a video of The Franklin Automobile Collection at Hickory Corners.

Check out some other museums that feature Franklin automobiles.

The Franklin Auto Museum™, maintained by the Thomas H. Hubbard/H.H. Franklin Foundation, is located in Tucson Arizona. Click here to visit the Museum web site.

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The Northeast Classic Car Museum in Norwich, NY has over 160 classic and vintage vehicles on display. Exhibits include the Fabulous Franklins, Cars Made in New York State, the Post-War collection and more Click here to visit the Museum web site.

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Where else can you see Franklins? Click here to see where in the world more Franklins are being exhibited.

The Franklin Automobile Collection

The Franklin Automobile Collection at the Gilmore Car Museum is the permanent home of The H. H. Franklin Club's collection of automobiles, display engines, and artifacts that span the four-decade history of the H.H. Franklin Manufacturing Company (maker) and Franklin Automobile Company (sales and service).

Franklin was a pioneer American manufacturer. The Syracuse, NY firm pioneered die-casting (1893), automobiles (1902), scientific management (1916), and numerous innovative engineered technical features still in use 100 years later. They are best known for their extensive use of aluminum, air-cooled engines, flexible chassis, and low unsprung weight. Of the over 150,000 Franklin cars built between 1902 and 1934, thousands survive and many are still in use. Club members like giving rides.

Eleven of the Collection's cars have been donated by Bob and Patricia Kern of Waukesha, WI. In addition to the Kern cars, the collection has been given a fully restored 1932 Franklin V-12, four-door sedan from Mrs. Beth Marshall of St Louis, MO, in memory of her husband, the late Alex Marshall, a long time Franklin enthusiast and collector.

Other cars in the collection include a Franklin Type A Runabout, the first four-cylinder car built in America. A similar Franklin made the trip from San Francisco to New York City in 1904, cutting in half the cross-country record set the previous year. Also featured are Franklin's answer to luxury sedans built by Packard, Pierce-Arrow and Cadillac, like the 1932 Series 17 Sedan, the one and only American car powered by a 12-cylinder air-cooled engine. And, there's a 1928 sedan that closely resembles the Franklins in which "Cannon Ball" Baker set so many "jazz-era" cross-country and hill climb records.

The Collection building is a faithful replica of a Los Angeles dealership once owned by Ralph Hamlin, the former bicycle racer who became Franklin's west coast distributor and the firm's largest and most successful dealer.

Visit The Franklin Automobile Collection at the Gilmore Car Museum.