In 1916, Ernest Holmes, a technician from Chattanooga, Tennessee, was called upon to help his old business school professor, John Wiley. He had driven his Ford Model T off the road and into a creek bed. Holmes took eight hours and six men to raise the car out of the creek bed and set it right-side up again. Contrary to popular belief, this is believed to be the first tow truck - not a heavy-duty truck — as it was constructed on the chassis of a 1913 Cadillac.

In November 1917, Holmes filed a patent (US Patent 1254804) for his innovative invention of a crane and pulley system in a three-year-old Cadillac that could lift and secure broken or destroyed vehicles to tow them back to the mechanic's shop. To make the system even more stable, he added a pair of outriggers. With this patent in hand, Holmes shifted his business to focus on producing Holmes Wrecker tow vehicles and selling them to mechanics and garage owners as an effective way to generate income.

Ernest Holmes Sr. was the inventor of the tow truck. Before his death in 1945, he had patented several variations of the tow truck concept, as well as a range of other car-related equipment including lifts, creepers and jacks. This information is sourced from an article cited by Wikipedia.

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