Today, four-wheel drive or all-wheel drive is available on everything from lawn mowers to the family car as a result of innovations that date back nearly 200 years. In Great Britain, steam coach builders Burstall & Hill built an all-wheel-drive vehicle as early as the 1820s. British engineer Joseph Diplock patented a four-wheel-drive system for a traction engine, while in Vienna, Austria, Ferdinand Porsche developed an electric vehicle that also had all wheels driven, with an electric motor at each corner, as early as 1899.

The first automobile, as we recognize it today (i.e., with a gasoline-powered engine), to get power to all four wheels was the Spyker, a Holland-built car also noted in historic circles for being the first six-cylinder automobile. Prototypes were shown in 1903, and it achieved limited production from 1904 to ’07. A cone clutch within the flywheel took the drive to a separate gearbox; within it lay a differential sending power to the front and rear driveshafts. This also allowed an early version of engine braking, from the days when front brakes were virtually unheard of. The all-wheel-drive was thought to prevent skidding, which was common on the primitive, greasy roads of the period.

Looking back at the original meaning of 4 x 4 and AWD.