Drive-By Musings
Silent night (mostly)
(UPDATED FROM 12/24/2021) At pretty much all hours of the day and night I can hear the relentless drone of automobilia in the Seattle-area suburb where I live. Thus, it’s a real treat to visit […]
Drive-By Musings
Drive-By Musings
Chrysler’s Lynn Townsend in 1973: Even a compact is too small
CEO Lynn Townsend hinted at why the Chrysler Corporation arguably neglected its aging line of compacts in the first half of the 1970s. Townsend told Forbes in 1973, “The subcompacts are just too small. The […]
Drive-By Musings
If you dislike recent styling trends does that mean you only like old cars?
Jim stopped by to respond to our story, “Styling comparison: C8 Chevrolet Corvette Stingray versus the original.” He wrote: “I think it would be nice to know which modern sports cars, if any, you do […]
Drive-By Musings
Why U.S. auto history focuses so little on the business side of manufacturing
Aaron Severson (2024) recently suggested that auto history counterfactuals almost always focus on design, engineering and product-planning choices rather than what he considers “far more decisive and dominant factors,” which he argues are “capital investment […]
Drive-By Musings
Would you believe that there was once a car in this picture?
A fairly popular type of auto history post includes photos of street scenes from the past. Readers tend to focus on naming the cars. It’s good, clean fun if you have nothing better to do. […]
Drive-By Musings
Robert Atkinson Jr. suffers from the insularity that he complains about
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 […]
Drive-By Musings
Should the Automotive Hall of Fame present accurate information about its inductees?
The Automotive Hall of Fame has a fancy website, a big building and lots of very important people on its board of directors. Yet its explanation for why Robert S. McNamara was inducted has surprisingly […]
Drive-By Musings
What were Detroit’s top-five most iconic vehicle designs from 1980-2000?
Michael Karesh (2023) of TrueDelta recently asked, “Which cars (model and year) from the Detroit Three since 1980 do you feel qualify as design icons?” I would invite you to check out the ensuing debate […]
Drive-By Musings
What do you think American automobiles will be like in 2043?
A while back I asked Indie Auto readers, “If you could have foreseen the future in high school, would today’s cars surprise you?” George Denzinger subsequently suggested in our “Story Ideas Bank” that we prognosticate […]
Drive-By Musings
If you could have foreseen the future in high school, would today’s cars surprise you?
This is a question that may be most interesting to older Indie Auto readers. What brings it up for me is a fictional story in McSweeney’s Internet Tendency, which is a humor magazine. Alex Baze […]