Description of car models from around the world and their history.
Automotive writers are often obliged to report guilelessly on concept cars, relaying the manufacturer’s future visions at face value and seeking to maintain the industry’s credibility. Ford Gyron 1961 For once in 1961, though, Ford was not asking the world to believe it would be marketing a two-seater, two-wheeler gyroscope car any time soon. In […]
In 1962, Henry Ford 2 began negotiations to buy Ferrari, in order to sprinkle some much-needed racing stardust on the increasingly dull company his grandfather had founded in 1903. Ford GT40 1964 Victory in the Le Mans 24-hour race was the main aim. Why Enzo Ferrari recoiled at the eleventh hour is still unclear, but Ford decided to
The US’s Timemagazine called Brooks Stevens “The seer who made Milwaukee famous.” In 61 years of industrial design, he had 550 clients and created thousands of pieces of work, including several cars. Excalibur SS 1963 In 1950, he single-handedly created the “recreational” off-road market with his design for the Jeep Jeepster, a sort of four-wheel
By 1963, Chrysler was on track to do what no other carmaker had ever attempted-to make a gas-turbine-engined car and put it into the hands of consumers. Chrysler Turboflite 1961 It first installed a gas-turbine engine into a Plymouth in 1954, and two years later felt confident enough to try a “real life” voyage from
Chrysler’s Turbine project was the most glamorous rolling experiment ever conducted on American roads. The only car ever series-produced with a gas-turbine “jet” engine, the real-life test program went as smoothly as the power delivery from its vibration-free power unit. Chrysler Turbine 1963 Selling the car to the public was deemed too risky, so Chrysler
Count Louis Zborowski was something of a showman. He built four colossal aeroplane-engined cars in the 1920s. They were as much as 1,648ci (27,000cc) in size, and widely known as “Chitty Chitty Bang Bangs”; rarely revving above 1,500rpm. Chitty Bang 1968 One man they left an indelible impression on was James Bond creator Ian Fleming,
It’s one of the legendary stories of American car history-how, one day, head of General Motors Styling, William Mitchell, was out fishing off the Florida coast when he reeled in a short-fin mako shark. Chevrolet Corvette XP 755 1962 So smitten was he with this beautiful fish that he had it mounted on display in
The Testudo may look as extreme as any “dream” car of the early 1960s, but it had one crucial difference: it worked. Almost as impressive is the fact that the Testudo was conceived and constructed in a mere two months, from January to March 1963, causing a wave of excitment when exhibited at the Geneva Motor
The Bertone Carabo 1968 sits at the pinnacle of the “wedge” car design craze of the late 1960s and early 1970s. Along with a galaxy of other concept cars, this fantasy machine took groundhugging to extremes. Bertone Carabo 1968 Bertone used a mid-engined layout to turn what would normally have been a hood into an acute-angled
Nubar Sarkis Gulbenkian, monocle in right eye and orchid always on lapel, was one of London’s most recognizable playboys during the 1960s. He lived at the Ritz Hotel, married three times, and enjoyed a lifestyle of supreme indulgence. Austin FLM Panelcraft Taxi 1965 He was of Armenian-Jewish extraction and, like his father Calouste Gulbenkian, made