On this day in 1956, automobile designer, visionary and entrepreneur, Preston Tucker dies. Tucker was obsessed with automobiles from an early age. At age 16, he began purchasing late model automobiles, repairing/refurbishing them and selling the cars for a profit. He then joined General Motors and quickly worked his way to vice president of a Packard dealership in Indianapolis. He befriended racecar designer Henry Miller, and the two men chatted often about how to build a truly great automobile. They teamed up to build race cars for Ford in the 1930s, but when the United States entered World War II, Tucker turned his attention to the war effort. He invented and manufactured a gun turret for Navy ships. After the war, the public was ready for totally new car designs. But the Big Three Detroit automakers had not developed any new models since 1941, and were in no hurry to introduce them. This provided great opportunities for new, small independent automakers who could develop new cars more rapidly than the huge legacy automakers. Tucker saw this as his opportunity to develop and bring his car of tomorrow to market, designing a safety car with innovative features and modern styling. With their low-slung, aerodynamic teardrop shape, Tucker cars looked like nothing anyone had ever seen. Their rear-mounted engines were modified helicopter engines, and they had disc brakes, fuel injection, specialized transmissions, and a third Cyclops headlight that was connected to the steering wheel and swiveled with the cars wheels. Ahead-of-their-time safety features abounded: padded dashboards, pop-out safety glass windshields and a reinforced carbon frame. This new car was called the Tucker Torpedo. Production of the automobile (now called the Tucker 48) was shut down amidst scandal and controversial accusations of stock fraud on March 3, 1949. Tucker was acquitted in January 1950, but the damage was already done: Tucker lost all his investors, had to fire all of his workers, and never built another Torpedo. Only 51 cars were made, so if you own one... its worth over a million dollars.
Posted on: Fri, 26 Dec 2014 16:00:04 +0000
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