Carl Benz was born at Mühlburg, now part of the City of Karlsruhe, on November 25th, 1844. His father was an train driver. On July 20th, 1872 Benz married Cecilia Bertha Ringer of Pforzheim. In the early eighties of the nineteenth century, Benz moved to Mannheim, the city with the chequered ground-plan. In square T 6, 11 (today T 6,33) he established a small business undertaking on October 1st, 1883: the "Benz' Rhenish Gas Engine Works General Partnership". Here he began tinkering with an idea for a motor car, an idea that led to his patent on the invention of the first usable motor-driven vehicle (DRP 37435 of January 29th, 1886). Less than half a year later he enjoyed full success: on July 3rd, 1886 Benz rode in this rather odd-looking, putt-putting vehicle for the first time in public from his machine shop to Mannheim Ringstrasse. The age of the automobile had begun! By 1894 Carl Benz had already constructed the world's first motor-driven bus at Mannheim.