Looks like Headlight covers are not new.
It might not be an 09 car. According to sources, NJ plates were issued in pairs starting in 1908 and new plates were issued every year and didn't start re-validating plates until 1953. Could be an 09 or maybe an earlier year.
Your mileage may vary....
Also, it's RHD....were there still car makers manufacturing cars with RHD in the US in 1909?
William, Most U.S. cars were right hand drive until about 1915 and quite a few didn't change until later on. Here is a 1914 Cadillac, the last of the 366 cubic inch fours with four and a half inch bore and five and three quarters inch stroke and still right hand drive.
Our '14 Hudson is left hand drive.
The mystery car in the first photo is a 1906 Columbia Mark XLVII, 40-45 HP.
I took these photos of a 1906 Columbia Mark XLVII at the AACA 75th Anniversary National Meet in Louisville in 2010. This is an extremely large and tall car.
Note that the cars have a valve handle protruding under the radiator nameplate and that the hand crank protrudes through a bracket between the frame horns.
Click on this link to view the 1906 Columbia catalog as well as additional photos of the same car.
http://www.kcstudio.com/col06.html
I wonder what the 46 Columbia cars before it looked like?
Columbia was part of the Pope Manufacturing empire and has a very interesting history being one of the earliest manufacturers of automobiles for retail sale starting in 1897. So, in 1906 they already had nine years of production under their belt.
They produced both electric and gasoline vehicles. It's my understanding that they used the "Mark" designation from the very beginning. The Mark I and Mark II were prototypes built in 1896 while the Mark III (an electric) was their first mass produced vehicle available retail sale starting in 1897.
^ That explains it.
Some years ago the Iola Old Car Show featured the Horseless Carriage Club and being on one of the better routes to Iola we got LOTS of cars passing by and quite a few stopped at the shop as I had ALL my tractors out.
One day the itinerary was to visit the Wisconsin Lions Camp which is one mile NE of town.
Having grown up less than 1/8 mile from the camp I went out to look at cars.
There was a Pope Hartford there and I thought (still do) it was the most beautiful OLD car I had ever seen.......
A good book to read on the early history of Columbia is "HORSELESS CARRIAGE DAYS" By Hiram Percy Maxim. First published in 1936/37. It has photos of many of the early cars made by them.
I think most is a strong term, but I have found several examples of post-1909 pre-1915 RHD cars: Buick, Oldsmobile, Cadillac, McLaughlin, Stevens-Duryea, I am sure there are others.
There were at one time over 2000 individual makes of car. Since there are no surviving images or even examples of all 2000, "most" is generic....IMO.