Norway’s automotive industry never got quite as large as neighbor Sweden’s (to put it mildly), but Norwegians can still puff up their chests with pride when they see a Troll Sportcupe cruise by. Read More >
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Category: History
On the road, behind the wheel, there is no such thing as an accident. There is only a swelling potential of mistakes, building towards an event that happens or does not. You are drunk but the road is empty and you know the way; not enough potential. You are tired, the phone is ringing, and your left front tire is underinflated; now we’re talking. Then you swerve to avoid a pothole and the oscillation chain begins. Potential fulfilled. You are about to have an “accident”.
I say this because I do not remember the “accident” that put me on my back for nearly a month in a disinfectant-stinking hospital room, my eyes taped from the airbag burn, my arms broken, pumped-up on a cocktail of things I cannot even pronounce. They say my Town Car hit the edge of a line of Jersey barriers and flipped forward, landing on the top edge in a ballet of megaton kinetic energy that shattered the windshield and creased the roof down into the bench seats. Single car. I don’t remember. But I remember what happened afterwards.
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Bill Mitchell, only the second man to head General Motors styling when he took over from the monumental Harley Earl, was not a man about whom people were impartial. GM’s official history reveres him. Harley Earl’s family reviles him. His coworkers and subordinates at GM either loved him or despised the man. Even landmark designs that were signatures of his reign at GM Styling, the split-window 1963 Corvette Sting Ray and the boat tail Rivieras, are polarizing designs that had detractors, including some on the GM Styling staff. He admittedly ran that department like a dictator, though he rarely fired anyone. Mercurial in temper, he’d have screaming fits at his design staff, laced with the most vulgar epithets, then defuse the tension with an offhand joke as he left the room. Shamelessly ambitious and self-promoting, often taking personal credit for his staffs’ designs, had the term “larger than life” not existed, Mitchell would have coined it to describe himself.
By today’s standards of workplace political correctness, diversity and racial and sexual harassment law, Bill Mitchell was an atavistic throwback to an age when ethnic jokes by supervisors were uncomfortably endured by the brunt of that ‘humor’. An executive then could tell his secretary to order him up some hookers after a multiple martini lunch, knowing that she’d hold all calls and cover for him if his wife (or another executive) got jealous. As a result, in addition to whatever praise and criticism his aesthetic direction and management skills have garnered, Bill Mitchell’s legacy has been somewhat tarred with the brush of bigotry.
The question is are we being fair to the man? Are we applying contemporary standards to an era that was simultaneously more innocent and more evil in terms of racial, ethnic and other prejudice?
Initial stock offerings, bankruptcies, brands being shuttered, established manufacturers being taken over by other concerns, financial crises – a time of turmoil in the auto industry. The time I’m describing is not just the present, it could well describe just about any period in automotive history. With the possible exception of the 1960s, when the Big 3 consolidated market share gained after the independent automakers were reduced to American Motors, there really never has been a long period of stability in the domestic auto industry. Even in the 1960s, Chrysler Corp. stumbled badly.
About a month ago Wayne State University Press, one of the leading publishers of automotive history books, sent me a box full of their recent titles, most of which concern the earliest days of the American auto industry: David Buick’s Marvelous Motor Car by Lawrence Gustin, Maxwell Motor and the Making of the Chrysler Corporation by Anthony J. Yanik, The Dodge Brothers: The Men, the Motor Cars, and the Legacy by Charles K. Hyde, and Hyde’s latest book, Storied Independent Automakers: Nash, Hudson, and American Motors.
While reading up on early American automotive history and I couldn’t help being struck by a sense of the more things change, the more they stay the same.
No, Virginia, that’s not a turbo Eldo, that’s a turbine Eldo
Paul Niedermeyer’s article and more recent book review concerning Chysler’s Turbine car show that Chrysler was savvy to use it as a halo vehicle – its appeal continues to resonate today. Though we’re learning new details all the time, most car enthusiasts know that Chrysler made a turbine powered car in the 1960s. Less well known is the fact that General Motors also had their own turbine program. While Chrysler’s Turbine Car was mostly a short lived PR effort, it happens that GM had a much longer lasting automotive turbine development program, starting in the 1950s and lasting for at least 40 years, without ever coming anywhere near to production. TTAC commenter jmo, alerted us to the existence of a powdered coal fired turbine powered Eldorado that GM developed after the oil crises of the 1970s, and we were hooked.
Later this month at the upcoming Paris auto show, Lotus will be revealing the first car that reflects their new strategic vision, a vision of going upmarket and luxurious to compete directly with the likes of Porsche, Ferrari and Aston Martin. The car, originally slotted to fill the role of the much beloved Esprit, will now be “something more” than the Esprit. The midengine supercar is rumored to be powered by the V10 engine that powers the Lexus LF-A. Toyota currently supplies Lotus with all of its production car engines. The LF-A’s announced production run of 500 units probably won’t cover that engine’s development costs, so the rumor makes sense.
Part One of this piece can be found here.
Were it not for an act of God, the fecklessness of General Motors’ executives and the difference between a self-promoting Texan and a Californian willing to walk away from it all, the many Cobras you see, real and ersatz, would be joined by another predator, Bill Thomas’ Cheetah.
Developed with backdoor assistance from Chevrolet, the Cheetah was the Chevy powered answer to the “Powered by Ford” Cobra. A racing Cheetah was given one of the first Gen IV big block 396 Chevy “rat” motors made. Based around Corvette drivetrain and suspension components, and a not very robust tube frame, the Cheetah was covered in a body that is unforgettable.
Though the Cheetah only competed in a small number of SCCA races, winning 11 events while simultaneously developing a reputation for extreme speed but treacherous handling (caused by the flimsy chassis), its drop dead gorgeous body styling made it instantly memorable. The fact that the Cheetah came out in the mid 1960s, when scale models and slot car racing were hugely popular with teen baby boomers, didn’t hurt the car’s popularity.
The Shelby 427 Cobra is a curious car. There are few vehicles that more worthily deserve the description iconic. The originals are so historically significant and rare that each is worth hundreds of thousands of dollars (and in the case of the six Daytona Coupes, millions), yet stylistically identical replicas are ubiquitous. Chances are, if you see a Cobra, it’s probably not real baby seal. Over the decades thousands of replica Cobras have been produced to varying degrees of fidelity by a variety of kit car and turnkey manufacturers. When Carroll Shelby realized that he couldn’t sue the replicar makers into submission, he decided to make his own “continuation series” Cobra replicas (in your choice of carbon fiber, fiberglass or original aluminum bodies). He’s also come to a licensing agreement with Superformance, who make superb Cobra and Daytona Coupe reproductions. I’m a big supporter of the idea of intellectual property, and Ol’ Shel is entitled to make a living off his name and accomplishments, but Carroll Shelby’s proprietary attitude towards the Cobra borders on the absurd.
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It’s called “convergent evolution”, and it refers to cases in which two unrelated, or distantly related, animals evolve to similar shapes or capabilities due to the pressures of their environment. Examples can be found here, with the most interesting one being the “pronghorn antelope”. It really isn’t an antelope, you see. It turns out that when there is pressure in an environment, animals will eventually all adapt to their optimum form for that environment.
While there are many unforgiving environments around the world, from the Sahara to the Arctic Circle, few are as murderous as the American automobile market. It turns out that the aforementioned “optimum form” appeared some time ago, and everyone else has been evolving that way ever since..Don’t worry. You may not believe in evolution, let alone the Mitsubishi Evolution, but I will serve as your John Scopes in this auto-Darwinian voyage.
If you scan the autoblogosphere on a regular basis, you’ve read some half-hearted eulogies to the best and worst of Mercury. Fair enough, as the Mercury brand deserves every one of those backhanded compliments: sharing too much content with a comparable Fords and (sometimes) sharing too many styling cues with the Lincolns means it couldn’t die off without a dig or two. And it is an easy target: aside from the (lead-sled) post war Yuppie clientele that inspired Mercury’s creation, the original sleeky-Sable and a few old Cougars, this was bound to happen.
But obviously my love for Mercury (here, here, and here) means I’m not going to bury Mercury, but to praise it. And to make sure the brand remains in our collective consciousness just as long as it’s GM counterpart, Pontiac. Wishful thinking, Mehta?
In the basement are boxes of historic newspapers and old car magazines that I’ve saved since the late 1960s. The oldest items date to the Detroit Tigers’ 1968 World Series victory and the Armstrong/Aldrin moon landing the following year. The automotive publications are mostly from the early 1970s through the late 1980s, primarily Road & Track and Car and Driver from the US and CAR from the UK, plus a few odds and ends.
While looking for the newspapers on the moon landing I came across the November 1969 issue of Sports Car Graphic. SCG’s content was aimed more at the string-back glove set and road racing fans than Robert Peteresen’s other titles like Hot Rod & Motor Trend. I guess SCG was staking out a niche between C&D and Autoweek. I believe that TTAC contributor, Stephan Wilkinson was an editor at Sports Car Graphic during the 1970s so perhaps he can give us some historical background on the publication.
Picking up and reading a 40 year old car magazine evokes a range of thoughts and feelings. The physical object is both an artifact as well as historical source material. Certainly there’s a sense of nostalgia, as well as curiosity to look at the table of contents for cool cars. You read an old magazine differently than you’d read one that came through your mail chute today. If you still subscribe to C&D or R&T, you flip past the TireRack ads as fast as you can. With an old magazine you savor even the advertising copy, wondering if IECO still makes Corvair parts or even exists. Thinking Francophonically, there is an enduring sense not of déjà vu but rather of plus que change.
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Cadillac’s new ad campaign, with the tag line “The Mark of Leadership”, has received mixed reviews. Some have questioned the use of the word “mark” because it may evoke a model name long used by luxury competitor Lincoln. Others have said that the mark itself is in question, the Cadillac wreath and crest logo, is itself tainted by association with tacky blinged out Escalades of questionable aesthetic taste. Those points may be valid, but I think that there’s a more troubling problem with the slogan and that has to do with Cadillac’s heritage.
Many new Automotive Histories as well as updated and expanded versions of many of these articles below are at the author’s new Curbside Classic site here]
The Suburban long ago achieved iconic status. It may the most American vehicle ever; in what other country would so many folks drive a vehicle so much larger than necessary? Yes, that’s the uglier side of the Suburban, like my former neighbor who terrorized the neighborhood with her driving antics while babbling unceasingly on her cell phone on the way to her Botox injection appointments. The other side has its roots as a practical hauler of eight or more; a sturdy hybrid of pickup truck and station wagon. The Suburban most perfectly reflects America’s two faces. And which is this one? Read More >
That Subaru is still thriving is in itself a minor miracle. The small Japanese car makers have either imploded (Isuzu), are threatening to (Mitsubishi), or have sought shelter (even Subaru is now 20% owned by Toyota). Subaru did have its own near-death experience in the early nineties. But in a long string of wild bets, Subaru’s final card in the US was a big gamble on AWD, and the timing couldn’t have been better. And like most successful gamblers, there have been losses along the way (see above). But perhaps because of the bumpy ride, Subaru is still alive and kicking. Read More >
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