Enrico Bernardi: the pioneer of the Italian automobile
The Enrico Bernardi Machine Museum tells the story of the genius and innovative vision of this great Italian inventor, offering a fascinating journey through the engines and vehicles he designed and built. His story, often little known to the public, invites us to rediscover a fundamental chapter in the history of Italian motoring and automobiles.
Enrico Bernardi (1841-1919), born in Verona and lived between the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, is considered a pioneering engineer that designed and built precursors of the modern automobile. His insights and inventions in the field of internal combustion engines paved the way for technological developments that then marked the history of motoring. Since the 1870s, Bernardi began searching for solutions to design light and portable devices that would satisfy the needs of the place where he lived, Veneto, as well as small local industries and national domestic industries.
Bernardi’s path took a crucial turn in the early 1880s, with his design of the Pia Engine, the first petrol engine ever built in Europe. This invention subsequently led to the Lauro engine, which introduces various innovations to the four-stroke engine. It will also be the Pia Engine, mounted on the wooden tricycle of his son Lauro, that would become the first vehicle with a petrol engine in Europe.
In addition to innovations in the field of engines and vehicle mechanics, Bernardi distinguished himself for a pioneering vision that foresaw the future of the automobile as a means of individual transport. In an era when mobility was still dominated by trains and carriages, the Veronese inventor understood the potential of an autonomous vehicle that could be used by anyone. In 1894, he designed and built a three-wheeled vehicle, perfectly functioning and capable of reaching 35 km/h, which is now kept at the Enrico Bernardi Machine Museum and represents one of the most extraordinary pieces of the collection. Precisely based on the construction and marketing of his vehicle, Bernardi founded the first Italian automobile industry in 1894 together with two of his students Miari and Giusti. In 1899, Bernardi took over the company and renamed it Società Bernardi. Unfortunately, due to difficulties related to the social and economic context of the Veneto region, a predominantly agricultural and not at all-industrialized region, the company failed in 1901.
The figure of Enrico Bernardi is important not only for motoring, but also for the progress of science and technology, as well as being an example that shows the importance of the social and economic context for their development. His inventions have been, and remain, a point of reference for those studying the evolution of engines and mechanics applied to vehicles.