The first Citroen was produced in 1919 by a company of the same name founded by Andre Citroen. Citroen was an adventurous Jewish freemason and his car hit newspaper headlines with the first crossing of the vast hostile Sahara desert in 1922.

Citroen History

Shortly after Mr Citroen had introduced the first all-steel body automobile to be seen in France, in 1925 he introduced a C-6 six-cylinder engine (a very rare achievement in those days). And so the tradition of producing modern cars using the very latest car technological and engineering breakthroughs continued at this famous car marque.

Very shortly after the Second World War ended, Citroen emerged with the innovation it is still most famous for. The 15CV model was launched equipped with hydropneumatic suspension.

This gives a very comfortable ride even in terrible off-road conditions and the car maker still uses this Citroen technology to great advantage in its’ cars. Despite the fact that the company continued to roll out well-built cars (DS 19 in 1955, the plastic-bodied Mehari in 1968 and the luxurious SM in 1969) by 1974 Citroen was insolvent.

The company was saved by the government of France which organized talks with Peugeot (another popular carmaker in France). By 1976 PSA Peugeot Citroen was formed after majority shares in Citroen were purchased by Peugeot.

Currently PSA still produced Citroen, a brand that is associated with reliable and yet affordable modern cars mainly produced for the masses. Citroen has also been very successful in the world of rallying and is currently leading in the World Rally Car Championship rally circuits.