One of America’s oldest trucking firms predates the automobile by five years

America’s oldest African-American-owned business, E.E. Ward Moving & Storage Co., opened in 1881—five years before Carl Benz patented the first automobile in 1886.

Founded by John T. Ward and his son William with two horses and a wagon, the company has grown into a modern fleet of 45 trucks and 75 employees.

The Ward family controlled the business for 120 years until Eldon Ward, the great-grandson of John T. Ward, sold it in 2001 to current owners Brian and Dominique Brooks.

E.E. Ward’s history is intertwined with the evolution of road transport: it operated horses until 1921, four decades after its founding, and transitioned through early truck models including Dodge B-Series trucks from 1948–1953 and a W-Series from 1940, later adopting a Mercedes-Benz ‘NG’ cab-over-engine truck in the late 1970s and early 1980s.

The company’s progression reflects broader shifts in mobility, from horse-drawn wagons to internal combustion trucks and now toward potential future adoption of electric or hydrogen-powered vehicles.