Hugh Chalmers worked for National Cash Register from the time he was 14. He rose to vice president before he was 30 and in 1907 bought the Thomas half of the Thomas-Detroit Company. By 1909 he had complete control of Chalmers-Detroit, and renamed it the Chalmers Motor Company. Chalmers backed Harry W. Ford’s Saxon Motor Company in 1913 in a spectacular, though eventually unsuccessful attempt to challenge the Model T. He became chairman of the board of Chalmers when it was leased to Maxwell in 1917, a position he held until his retirement in 1922.