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Year: 2023
Editor's Note
The rise of the European van and other musings from a few days camping
Indie Auto is a day late in sending out its weekly e-letter because I wanted to sneak in some camping at a national park before the federal government likely shuts down Oct. 1 (Lunney, 2023). […]
Media Analysis
Collectible Automobile’s 1967 Rambler Rebel SST feature is pretty but vapid
The December 2023 issue of Collectible Automobile has a photo feature of a 1967 Rambler Rebel SST hardtop. As usual, the images are first rate and the accompanying text give a nuts-and-bolts overview of the […]
Literature
If you ran VW in 1959 how would you prepare for Detroit’s compacts?
(UPDATED FROM 8/15/2014) Imagine that you run Volkswagen’s American operations in 1959. Detroit has finally woken up to the public’s growing interest in small cars. Studebaker and American Motors are already seeing dramatic sales increases after introducing compact […]
History
Did early-postwar independent automakers try too hard to be different?
The late-40s and early-50s arguably had more design and engineering variety among U.S automakers than we would ever see again. That strikes me as a mostly good thing for consumers, but there were two downsides. […]
Design Notes
1951 Packard 300: The double-edged sword of an anonymous design
(EXPANDED FROM 2/26/2021) The above-pictured car is a 1951 Packard 300 in front of an auto shop in Northern California. The faded paint and spray-painted “For Sale” sign are good metaphors for the new-for-1951 design, […]
Fake Design
1961-70 Jaguar Mk X: When Hudson step-down met Wienermobile
(EXPANDED FROM 11/5/2021) The Jaguar Mark X may have a commanding presence, but it also looks like the lovechild of a Hudson step-down and the Oscar Mayer Wienermobile. Intriguing but somehow . . . not […]
Auto Paedia
Bigger, glitzier, more powerful: The auto industry’s holy trinity
(EXPANDED FROM 11/1/2019) The dominant tendency of the U.S. auto industry has been to make its vehicles bigger, glitzier and more powerful. In recent decades both domestic and foreign automakers have embraced this practice. Indeed, […]
Letters to the Editor
Peter Wilding sorts out why people switched to smaller cars
Peter Wilding offered a detailed comment about our our post, “The switch to smaller cars began before the first oil embargo in late-1973.” I don’t agree with everything that he says, but he makes some […]
Quotes
The switch to smaller cars began before the first oil embargo in late-1973
The shift to smaller cars was happening before the first oil embargo, which stretched from October 1973 through March 174 (Wikipedia, 2023). In an October 1972 column, Popular Science Automotive Editor Jan P. Norbye walked […]