Editing Citroën (section)

===Early years===
Citroën began planning to switch to automobile manufacturing by 1916, when he asked the engineer Louis Dufresne, previously with Mors rival [[Panhard]], to design a technically sophisticated 18-horsepower automobile he could produce in his factory once peace returned.<ref name=Automobilia1920/> Long before that happened, however, he had modified his vision and decided, like [[Henry Ford]], that the best post-war opportunities in auto-making would involve a lighter car of good quality, but made in sufficient quantities to be priced enticingly.<ref name=Automobilia1920/> In February 1917, Citroën contacted the 1909 creator of [[Le Zèbre]], French automotive engineer {{ill|Jules Salomon|fr}}, with a mandate that was characteristically both demanding and simple: produce an all-new design for a 10-horsepower car that would be better equipped, more robust, and less costly to produce than any rival product at the time.<ref name=Automobilia1920/>

The result was the [[Citroën Type A]], announced to the press in March 1919, just four months after the guns fell silent.<ref name=Automobilia1920/> The first production Type A emerged from the factory—located at [[Quai André-Citroën|Quai de Javel]], [[Vaugirard]], [[Paris]]—at the end of May 1919, and in June it was exhibited at a showroom at Number 42, on the [[Champs-Élysées]] in Paris which normally sold [[Alda (automobile)|Alda cars]].<ref name=Automobilia1920/> Citroën persuaded the owner of the Alda business, [[Fernand Charron]], to lend him the showroom, which is still in use today. This ''C42'' showroom is where the company organises exhibitions and shows its vehicles and concept cars. A few years later, Charron would be persuaded to become a major investor in the Citroën business.<ref name=Automobilia1920/> On 7 July 1919, the first customer took delivery of a new 10HP Type A.<ref name=Automobilia1920/> In the same year, it produced 30 cars daily, totaling 2,810 vehicles, with 12,244 produced in 1920.<ref name=":0">{{Cite web |title=Citroën 100 ans d'avant-garde |url=https://www.willemin.ch/fr/Vehicules-neufs/Citroen/Gamme-Citroen-chez-Willemin-SA.html |website=willemin}}</ref>
{{multiple image
| align     = center
| direction = horizontal
| image1    = Citroen A 8 CV Torpedo 1919.jpg
| width1    = 175
| caption1  = 1919 [[Citroën Type A|Citroën A 8CV Torpedo]]
| image2    = Citroen B2 Torpedo 1921.jpg
| width2    = 205
| caption2  = 1921 [[Citroën Type B2|Citroën B Torpedo]]
| image3    = Citroen 5 CV Typ C2 Torpedo 1923.jpg
| width3    = 235
| caption3  = 1923 Type C 5CV
| image4 = Citroën Showroom 1, Champs-Élysées, Paris September 2013.jpg
| width4 = 90
| caption4 = C 42 is the Citroën showroom on the Champs Elysées in Paris
}}
That same year, André Citroën briefly negotiated with [[General Motors]] a proposed sale of the Citroën company.<ref name="Sloan1964p317">{{Sloan1964}}, p. 317.</ref> The deal nearly closed, but General Motors ultimately decided that its management and capital would be too overstretched by the takeover,<ref name="Sloan1964p317"/> thus, Citroën remained independent until 1935.

Between 1921 and 1937, Citroën produced half-track vehicles for off-road and military uses, using the [[Kégresse track]] system. In the 1920s, the [[U.S. Army]] purchased several Citroën-Kégresse vehicles for evaluation followed by a licence to produce them. This resulted in the [[United States Army Ordnance Department]] building a prototype in 1939. In December 1942, it went into production with the [[M2 Half Track Car]] and [[M3 Half-track]] versions.<ref name=Weapons>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=MuGsf0psjvcC&q=M2+half+track+citroen+kegresse&pg=PA81 |title=The Encyclopedia of Weapons of WWII: The Comprehensive Guide to over 1,500 Weapons Systems, Including Tanks, Small Arms, Warplanes, Artillery, Ships, and Submarines |publisher=Metrobooks |pages=81–82 |isbn= 978-1586637620 |year=2002 | first = Chris | last = Bishop |access-date=10 June 2017}}</ref> The U.S. eventually produced more than 41,000 vehicles in over 70 versions between 1940 and 1944. After their 1940 occupation of France, the [[Nazi]]s captured many of the Citroën half-track vehicles and [[armored]] them for their own use.<ref name=Weapons/>

[[File:Tour Eiffel Citroen.jpg|thumb|upright|The [[Eiffel Tower]] served as a billboard for Citroën from 1925 to 1934.]]
Citroën used the [[Eiffel Tower]] as the world's largest advertising sign, as recorded in ''[[Guinness World Records]]''.<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://europeanmotornews.com/2009/10/14/get-an-eiffel-of-the-new-citroen-c3/|title=European Motor News|access-date=29 May 2010|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110710205416/http://europeanmotornews.com/2009/10/14/get-an-eiffel-of-the-new-citroen-c3/|archive-date=10 July 2011|url-status=dead}}</ref> He also sponsored expeditions in Asia ([[Croisière Jaune]]), North America (Croisière Blanche) and Africa (Croisière Noire), demonstrating the potential for motor vehicles equipped with the [[Kégresse track]] system to cross inhospitable regions. These expeditions conveyed [[scientists]] and [[journalists]].<ref name=Geo>{{cite magazine | volume = LX | number = 4 | title = The Citroën-Haardt Trans-Asiatic Expedition Reaches Kashmir | magazine = [[National Geographic]] | publisher=[[National Geographic Society]] |date= October 1931 | first = Maynard Owen | last = Williams | author-link = Maynard Owen Williams}}</ref>

Demonstrating extraordinary toughness, a 1923 Citroën that had already travelled {{convert|48000|km|abbr=on}} was the first car to be driven around Australia. The car, a 1923 Citroën 5CV Type C Torpedo, was driven by Neville Westwood from [[Perth]], [[Western Australia]], on a round trip from August to December 1925. This vehicle is now fully restored and in the collection of the [[National Museum of Australia]].<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.nma.gov.au/collections/citroen |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20081203162919/http://www.nma.gov.au/collections/citroen |url-status=dead |archive-date=3 December 2008 |title=1923 5CV Citroën, National Museum of Australia |publisher=Nma.gov.au |access-date=1 August 2011 }}</ref>

[[File:André Citroen 1927.jpg|thumb|Share of the S. A. André Citroën, issued 30 September 1927]]
In 1924, Citroën began a business relationship with the American engineer [[Edward G. Budd]]. From 1899, Budd had worked to develop stainless steel bodies for railroad cars, for [[Pullman Company|Pullman]] in particular. Budd went on to manufacture steel bodies for many automakers, [[Dodge]] being his first big auto client. At the Paris Motor Show in October 1924, Citroën introduced the [[Citroën Type B10|Citroën B10]], the first all-steel body in Europe.<ref name="citroen.co.uk">{{Cite web|url=https://www.citroen.co.uk/about-citroen/our-brand/history|title=Citroën Cars History &#124; Our brand|website=Citroën UK}}</ref> These automobiles were initially successful in the marketplace, but soon competitors who were still using a [[wood]]en structure for their vehicles, introduced new body designs. Citroën, who did not redesign the bodies of his cars, still sold in large quantities nonetheless, the cars' low price being the main selling point, which factor however caused Citroën to experience heavy losses.{{Citation needed|date=December 2007}}

In 1927, the bank [[Lazard]] helped Citroën by bringing new much-needed funds, as well as by renegotiating its debt—for example, by buying out the Société de Vente des Automobiles Citroën (SOVAC). It went even further by entering in its capital and being represented on the board; the three directors sent by Lazard were Raymond Philippe, [[Andre Meyer]] and Paul Frantzen. André Citroën perceived the need to differentiate his product, to avoid the low price competition surrounding his conventional rear drive models in the late 1920s and early 1930s. In 1933 he introduced the Rosalie, the first commercially available passenger car with a [[diesel engine]], developed with [[Harry Ricardo]].

{{multiple image
| align     = center
| direction = horizontal
| image1    = Paris - Bonhams 2013 - Citroën P19B chenillette Kégresse - 1931 - 004.jpg| 
| width1    = 200
| caption1  = 1931 C4 based Citroën P17 C [[Kégresse track]]
| image2    = Citroen Rosalie Coupe 15CV Anet.jpg
| width2    = 228
| caption2  = 1933 [[Citroën Rosalie|Citroën Rosalie Coupe 15CV]]
| image3    = Citroen 8CV front.JPG
| width3    = 166
| caption3  = Citroën 8CV
| image4    = 1933 Citroën P17 C Kégresse (rs).jpg
| width4    = 177
| caption4  = 1933 C4 based Citroën P17 C [[Kégresse track]]
}}
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