Nash Motor Company had been founded by crusty Charles W. Nash, who had resigned as president of General Motors in June 1916. On July 29, he bought the Thomas B. Jeffery Company of Kenosha, Wisconsin, and by April 1918 was building cars under his own name.
The fine reputation that Charley Nash took with him from GM was enough to assure success. The firm charged up the sales charts, reaching as high as eighth in industry production during the 1920s. And 1928 would be Nash's "roaringest" year of the decade as 138,137 cars were built, good for 3.67 percent of the market and enough to keep all three assembly plants humming at capacity. It was a record that wouldn't be broken until the advent of the 1949 "bathtub" Nash Airflyte.
Nash's success was no fluke, for the firm offered solid, well-engineered cars at reasonable prices. They came in three series: Standard Six, Special Six, and Advanced Six. The price-leader Standards used an L-head six developing 45 bhp -- America's "lowest price seven-bearing six." The Special, however, boasted a 52-bhp overhead-valve unit-a result of Nash's earlier stint as president of Buick, one of the pioneers of "valve-in-head" engines.
Appropriate to its top-line status, the Nash Advanced Six also featured an ohv, seven-bearing motor, but it was larger: 279 cid, good for 70 horses on 4.6:1 compression and a mid-70s top speed.
The Advanced Six lineup comprised nine models: two-door touring, sedan, and Victoria, plus a four-door touring and several sedans (two seven-passenger), a roadster, and a delightful 121-inch-wheelbase coupe. Prices ranged from $1,340 to $2,165, upmarket compared to Nash's cheapest model, the $865 Standard Six touring (a Model A Ford cost $460).