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Allison Transmission

American company

Layered newspapers, civic records and oral-history reels arranged as chronological evidence
History and societyInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionAug 31, 2026
Entity authorityQ2036530 ↗
Source-derived summary

Allison Transmission Holdings, Inc. is an American manufacturer of commercial duty automatic transmissions and hybrid propulsion systems. Allison products are specified by over 250 vehicle manufacturers and are used in many market sectors, including bus, refuse, fire, construction, distribution, military, and specialty applications.

With headquarters in Indianapolis, Indiana, Allison Transmission has a presence in more than 150 countries and manufacturing facilities in Indianapolis, Chennai, India, and Szentgotthárd, Hungary.

History

Racing team

Allison began in 1909 when James A. Allison, along with three business partners, helped fund and build the Indianapolis Motor Speedway. In 1911, Allison's new track held the first Indianapolis 500 mile race. In addition to funding several race teams, James Allison founded the Speedway Racing Team Company on September 14, 1915 and quickly gained a reputation for his work on race cars and automotive technology in general. Allison built a shop near the track and changed the team's name to the Allison Experimental Company; the shop later became Plant No. 1.

Wartime aviation

When World War I began, Allison suspended racing, and the Allison Experimental Company began machining parts, tools, and masters for the Liberty airplane engine — the main power plant used in the U.S. war effort.

Editorial summary

The public source identifies “Allison Transmission” as american company. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Allison, Transmission and American.

Editorial reviewA strong contextual entry point for chronology, institutions and public events when official records are distinguished from later interpretation. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1909, 1911, 1915—that can be checked directly. The linked authority record independently contributes the date 1916. Its value is orientation rather than verdict, with Allison, Transmission and American providing the first useful test.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

A short description can identify a subject without explaining its stakes. For “Allison Transmission”, the useful work is to connect “american company” to the records capable of establishing context and consequence.

Evidence profile

Chronology, provenance and viewpoint should be read together before a broad social or political interpretation is accepted. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 31, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q2036530. VIAF identifies the subject as 5673147907511379210003. The Library of Congress control number is n2016056222. 2 of 4 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1909, 1911 and 1915.

Critical limits

Institutional narratives can privilege the records that survived while minimizing voices that were never formally collected. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Compare institutional narratives with records created by participants and affected communities. Dates and formal titles are useful anchors, but not substitutes for context.

Best used for
  • Event chronology
  • Institutional context
  • Locating named record creators
Verify next

Contemporary correspondence, government or organizational records, oral histories and cited historical scholarship.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “Allison Transmission”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow Allison Transmission primary sources, Allison Transmission archive and Allison research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Allison Transmission”?
  2. Which voices are present, absent or mediated by the institution?
  3. What chronology connects this entry to wider political or social change?
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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “Allison Transmission” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.