In 1954, General Motors unveiled something called the Firebird, an experimental show car meant for display in the very popular "Motoramas" the company held periodically in various American cities. These were exercises in marketing, not technology, and the cars shown were often simply versions of current models with heightened symbolic content, or trials of features that were a year or two away. Later, General Motors produced a car called the Firebird, but the Firebird of 1954 was never meant for the road. It was a literal translation of the fighter plane into what may have been an automobile. If it weren't for the four large, garishly hubcapped wheels, you would never guess it was an automobile. For one thing, it had wings, delta wings sticking out from the sides of the car and looking large enough to carry a real airplane, as long as there was a jet engine. In fact, it actually had a form of jet engine. The Firebird had a clear bubble top and a black-painted pointed nose and a single fin at the back. [Harley] Earl himself designed this Firebird, and two subsequent ones that were a bit less fantastic. Firebird 2 had many titanium components, just like a real jet. Earl said at the time that the construction of the prototype brought titanium production cars fifteen years closer. We're still waiting. The Firebirds were obviously never intended as prototypes for cars that might someday be produced. Rather they were affirmations of an aspiration toward limitless power, lightning speed and the desire of Americans, as individuals, to participate in the technological revolution that was happening all around them.

Thomas Hine, Populuxe
Copyright © 1986 by Thomas Hine. All rights reserved.

Posted 3 August 1996

| No Comment menu | E-mail to Chaz