Indie Auto

J. ‘Kelly’ Flory Jr.’s American Cars series is pricey but valuable

by Steve in Readings 0

The most valuable books I have bought of late have been J. “Kelly” Flory Jr.’s American Cars reference guides. This multi-volume set provides wide-ranging information on U.S.-made cars during the postwar era. Flory’s series has some advantages over the Standard Catalog of American Cars. Perhaps most importantly, he came up with a format that [...]

Motorcade magazine’s ‘sneak peek’ of the 1969 models made up a whole lot of stuff

April 17, 2024 0

Motorcade is among the more obscure magazines included in the Automotive History Preservation Society’s digital archives. A supposed preview of the 1969 models may hint at why the magazine apparently did not survive the [...]

Robert Atkinson Jr. suffers from the insularity that he complains about

April 16, 2024 1

Curbside Classic tends to avoid political debates in the comment threads for good reason. As a case in point, a reposting of Brock Yates’ “Grosse Pointe Myopians” essay drew Robert Atkinson Jr. (2024) to share with the [...]

Genesis GV60 is relatively understated but still a quirky electric SUV

by Steve in Gallery 0

We’ve taken to task Hyundai for the gratuitously industrial styling of its Ioniq 5 (go here), so let’s take a look at its Genesis counterpart. The GV60 is based on the same platform as the Ioniq 5 and its brother the Kia EV6 but is positioned as an entry-level luxury EV, with a base price of $53,350 (Wendler, 2024). That’s roughly $10,000 higher than either the [...]

The 1965-73 Ford LTD may not have impacted Mercury very much

April 11, 2024 8

(EXPANDED FROM 1/28/2022) Indie Auto commentator Geeber recently discussed how premium-priced big cars did better than their lower-priced brethren as the 1970s progressed. His comment, which is worth reading in [...]

Collectible Automobile’s take on the decline of big cars gets partway there

by Steve in Media Analysis 7

Collectible Automobile’s June 2024 issue does an unusually good job of discussing why low-priced big cars took a nosedive in sales during 1970-74. However, the magazine’s article by Sam Fiorani (2024) didn’t say much about one of the most important stories of that time period — the rise of the Ford LTD. Fiorani draws upon production data to [...]

Readers brainstorm ideas for future Indie Auto stories

October 14, 2022 68

This is a centralized place for readers to offer specific story ideas to Indie Auto. Any ideas are welcome, from potential feature stories to book reviews. I have started off by posting suggestions from readers [...]