1899 La Jamais Contente

France and Great Britain were the first nations to support the widespread development of electric vehicles during the late 1800s. The first road vehicle that reached the speed of 1/5.882 km/h (5.792 mph), the 1899 La Jamais Contente was a Belgian-built electric racing vehicle. Designed by Camille Jénatzy, La Jamais Contente stood for 'The Never Satisfied'.

Jénatzy broke this land speed record on April 29, 1899, at Achères, Yvelines, near Paris, France. The previous record had been reached by Count Gaston de Chasseloup-Laubat at 92.78 km/h (57.65 mph) on March 4th, 1899. Camille Jénatzy was the son of Constant Jénatzy, who was a manufacturer of rubber tires, which were still a novelty at the time. Camille studied as an engineer and he was always interested in electric traction automobiles, an interest he utilized around 1898.

Jénatzy had a passion for the Parisian electric carriage market, so he began a manufacturing plant that would eventually produce numerous electric carriages and trucks. His biggest competitor was carriage maker Jeantaud, who he fiercely competed against in publicity stunts to see who made the fastest vehicles. Refusing to lose in the competition, Jenatzy built a bullet-shaped prototype conceived by the carriage maker Rothschild in Parinium; an alloy of laminated aluminum, magnesium, and tungsten. Following this, the combustion engine utilizing gasoline would overtake electric technology for the next century.

An electric vehicle La Jamais Contente featured light alloy torpedo bodywork though the driver's seat was highly positioned and spoiled much of the aerodynamics. The car was powered by two Electric Motors producing 50 kW each. The vehicle is capable of a top speed of 105.9 km/h (65.8 mph) with 100 x 2V cells. It was equipped with Michelin tires.

A replica of the original is in the automobile museum at Compiègne (Oise) and was built in 1993-94 by the students of the Universite de Technologie et du Lycee Technologique de Compiegne, in France.

By Jessica Donaldson