The Bad Blonde | Automotive History

Today we discuss the man that defied General Motor’s orders to bring us the GTO and thus exploding America’s muscle car mania, the man that created the Delorean, and a man that was caught up in an FBI cocaine smuggling entrapment sting that ruined his company and reputation. Today we discuss the history of John Delorean.

Today we are talking about a man who fought in the French air force against the nazis, a man who took the dud of car into one of America’s favorite sports cars, the man considered the father of the Corvette, today we discuss Zora Arkus-Duntov.

Today we are talking about one of the most interesting “almost famous” sports car, a car with a cult following, the Canadian Ferrari… Today we discuss the Manic GT.

Today we discuss a man who’s charisma might just overshadow his racing accolades. MIGHT. An American businessman that managed to put STP stickers across the USA and even in Vietnam, a man who left a lasting mark on the Indianapolis 500, a man that might be motorsports greatest showman, and a man who managed a steal a kiss on Mario Andretti’s cheeks.. If you haven’t already guessed it we are going to be talking about Anthony ‘Andy’ Granatelli.

Today we discuss the Most Important Car Company You’ve Probably Never Hear about, an automotive manufacturer that basically wrote the recipe for most normal cars today.. Today we discussWhen people talk about automotive history, they think Karl Benz, Henry Ford, maybe even Ferrari if they’re feeling dramatic. But if we’re being honest — the layout of almost every “normal” car on Earth traces back to a French company with a name that sounds like a law firm: Panhard et Levassor.And while they didn’t survive as a household name did invent the blueprint of the modern automobile — and then went racing across France to prove it worked.Panhard et Levassor began in 1887 in Paris, founded by René Panhard and Émile Levassor. At first, they built woodworking machinery but they had their sights set on something grander.Panhard et Levassor was formally established in 1887 by René Panhard and Émile Levassor in Paris. Originally manufacturers of woodworking machinery, the firm’s trajectory changed through a licensing agreement to produce engines designed by German engineer Gottlieb Daimler. The rights were secured through French industrialist Édouard Sarazin, whose widow later played a pivotal role in continuing French access to Daimler’s technology.While many early vehicle builders treated engines as add-on components for carriage-like machines, Levassor adopted a fundamentally different approach: the automobile should be designed around the engine itself. This insight led to a decisive engineering breakthrough in 1891.Basically Levassor asked “What if… the car is designed around the engine?” This might not sound like a wild thought to you BUT this was actually Revolutionary stuff — especially in the 1890s during the birth of the automobile.

Today we are going to be talking about the man to built the first slingshot dragster, the first American to go over 400mph on the Bonneville Salt Flats, and a man who was murdered in cold blood in his driveway.. Famed motorsports promoter Mickey Thompson.

Today we discuss one of the world’s leading manufacturers that all started with experimental rubber bouncy balls in a tiny workshop. A company that changed the world of tires repeatedly. Today we discuss the fascinating history of Michelin Tires.

LIVE radio show recorded in South Texas with guest Porter Felton of Function Drives Form & Board Member of the National Automobile Museum.

What does the 24 hour of Le Mans, drug smuggling, and Texas have in common? The Whittington brothers. Today we tell the wild tale of the Don and Bill Whittington and how they went from humble Lubbock, Texas to the highest echelons of racing and funded it all by drug smuggling.

Today we discuss one of the wildest car races ever in the history of motorsport, a race that lasted 5 months and had half the cars drop out, a race that traversed Siberia, today we discuss the nearly impossible 1908 New York to Paris Race.Let’s paint a little picture of the times, in 1908 the automobile is still an oddity. They were loud, temperamental and unreliable. The horseless carriage was still just a play thing for wealthy eccentrics.It was a two newspapers, Le Matin in Paris and the New York Times, that came up with the wild idea of an automobile race to span from New York all the way to Paris.The whole idea behind this wild feat was to prove what the automobile could do. Cars of the day were more like tractors than modern vehicles we know today. They were chain-driven, hand-cranked, snapping axles, and blowing gaskets.Drivers were to maneuver from New York, across the United States, then cross the frozen Bering Strait into Siberia, in which no one had ever traversed by car at this time, then cross through Russia into Europe, and THEN finish in Paris. If you are thinking that sounds tricky, you are right. The drivers would encounter obstacles and also the discovery that the Bering Strait doesn’t exactly freeze over enough to drive over.Plus, I want you to think about doing all this WITHOUT ROADS! Asphalt wasn’t even invented till two years after this race. Many spectators didn’t even think the cars would get out of New Jersey let alone get through Siberia!

LIVE @ Coastal A's & Rod's Car Show | Bad Blonde Automotive History

Today we discuss a car company that could have been the 1960s F1 rival to Ferrari, a car company that should have stolen the grand touring seat from the prancing pony, a car company that helped pioneer mid-engine placement in grand touring cars, and car company that couldn’t quite get it together. Today we discuss Automobili Turismo e Sport aka ATS.To understand ATS, you have to start in Maranello in 1961 with the famous “Palace Revolt.”Alright it is the ’60s, Ferrari is successful but chaotic. Enzo Ferrari is running the place like a personal kingdom and he and his are fighting like there is no tomorrow.Ferrari staff tensions are boiling over when several senior staff clash with Enzo and, most importantly, with his wife Laura, who was increasingly involved in business matters. The result was a mass walkout (and a few firings for good measure) of some of Ferrari’s brightest technical minds, including chief engineer Carlo Chiti and development engineer Giotto Bizzarrini, one of the brains behind the 250 GTO.These “Ferrari runaways” were angry, ambitious, and very aware that Enzo’s dominance in both racing and road cars wasn’t inevitable. So they went to wealthy industrialists such as Giorgio Billi and Bolivian mining heir Jaime Ortiz-Patiño, and with a few other rich backers they decided to create a rival of Enzo Ferrari.And that was the dramatic start to Automobili Turismo e Sport aka ATS. TheATS was founded in 1962 in the Bologna area and their goal was simple. BEAT FERRARI.

Today we discuss the close competition between steam, electric, and combustion, during the birth of the automobile and The Battle to Build the First CarIn the middle of the 19th century, the world ran on steam. Giant iron locomotives thundered across continents, steamships across wide oceans, and in the cities, the hiss of boilers and the clang of pistons were the soundtrack of progress. The future, it seemed, would always be built upon water and fire.But beneath the soot and steam, a few restless inventors began to wonder: could motion be made smaller? Could power belong not to railways or ships — but to people? The idea was radical — a carriage that moved without horses, a machine that could carry a man down any road, under his own command.It was an era before gasoline had even found its purpose. As we mentioned a few shows ago, Chemists still treated it as a junk by-product of kerosene lamps — often burned off as waste.

Today we discuss some of the most rakish daredevils in racing history, a group that charged their own era in Le Mans racing, some British privateers that not only grabbed headlines but also trophies. Today we discuss the Bentley Boys, their antics and their victories.Between 1923 and 1931, a loose fraternity of British gentlemen drivers—the “Bentley Boys”—won Le Mans five times and stamped a rakish, champagne-and-castor-oil identity onto motor racing. Their success flowed from a simple formula: W.O. Bentley’s mechanically conservative but brutally durable cars, coupled with drivers who could push them at an unflinching pace for a full day and night.

Today we discuss the birth and history of something that literally makes the world go round. A volatile fraction that was considered a waste product in the mid 1800s. A thing that has caused crisis and war. Today we discuss the birth of gasoline.To start we need to go way back in time to when we were using kerosene lamps. You see kerosene was what they were after when Edwin Drake dug the first crude oil well in Titusville Pennsylvania in 1859. You see he distilled the oil to produce the kerosene.A handful of other petroleum products, including what we would come to know as gasoline, was produced in the process and they had NO use for gasoline. They literally burned it off or discarded it.So you see, gasoline wasn’t technically invented it was just what you would call a volatile fraction obtained by distilling crude oil.

A car that became the symbol of speed, style, and rebellion for the baby boom era, a car exploded onto the scene at the 1964 New York fair, a record breaking sales for Ford Motor CompanyIt’s the early 1960s, the American auto industry is booming, but it was also predictable. Big, heavy sedans dominated the highways, and car companies fought mostly on size and horsepower. But you see the mood of the country was shifting. The postwar baby boom generation—millions of teenagers and young adults—were coming of age. They didn’t want their parents’ cars. They wanted something exciting, affordable, good on gas, and stylish that reflected their own independence.

Henry "Smokey" Yunick was an influential American mechanic, engine builder, and car designer renowned for his ingenuity and controversial rule-bending in the world of auto racing. A legendary figure, he was known for his "Best Damn Garage in Town" in Daytona Beach, Florida, and is often credited with shaping the early years of NASCAR.

The "Collier brothers" of the Revs Institute are Miles C. Collier, the institute's founder, and his father and uncle, C. Miles and Sam Collier. They were members of a prominent family of racers and automotive enthusiasts who were instrumental in the formation of American sports-car racing.

Buick was founded in 1903 by David Dunbar Buick and became a key component in the founding of General Motors by Billy Durant in 1908, known for early innovations like the overhead valve engine and popularizing the luxury car market, especially as the highest-selling GM brand for a period after Chevrolet's entry into GM. The company's tri-shield emblem, adopted in 1960, is still in use today, symbolizing the brand's enduring legacy of quality, performance, and elegance, which continues to define Buick as a premier luxury marque within GM.

Walter P. Chrysler was a railroad machinist who became one of America's most influential automotive pioneers, founding the Chrysler Corporation and building it into a major player in the "Big Three" of US automakers. His career was defined by mechanical talent, a knack for production efficiency, and an ambitious drive that led him to turn around ailing companies and challenge his industry's biggest players.

HISTORY OF RACE DRIVER & FLYGIN ACE EDDIE RICKENBACKER | BAD BLONDE AUTOMOTIVE HISTORY

Today we discuss a high school drop out that would become one of racing’s most influential pioneers, a man who’s cars won the Indianapolis 500 ten times, a man who’s engines dominated oval-track racing for almost half a century, today we talk about race and engineering pioneer Harry Miller.

Today we discuss a creator of one of most beautiful cars of the 1930s, an early America luxury carmaker, one of E.L. Cord’s trifecta of manufacturers, and a car company was taken down by the great depression.

Join us for our yearly radio show with the Corpus Christi Car Show judges!

A car considered one of the most notorious failures in automotive history, car who’s styling has lost more battles than it won, a car that Ford gave up on within 2 years, the Edsel.It is 1955 and ford has begun research and development for an all new line code named the “E Car”. Which stood for experimental car and would become the Edsel.

Today we discuss one of the most impactful men of automotive design, the man that introduced Tailfins, the man that created dynamic obsolescence, the man that created the concept of the concept car, the man behind the design of the first generation Corvette, the man who founded the Damsels of Design, today we discuss the prolific and talented Harley Earl.Harley J. Earl was born on November 22, 1893, in Hollywood, California. His father, J.W. Earl, ran Earl Automobile Works, a coachbuilding shop specializing in custom-built car bodies for Hollywood's elite, like Rosco Fatty” Arbuckle and Tom Mix. As a young man, Harley learned about automobile design and craftsmanship from his father, developing a keen eye for aesthetics and engineering.

We are going to be talking about possibly the most adorable American car ever built, a car who’s manufacturer completely veered from the norm of behemoth vehicles to create mini commuter, one of the few cars that can make Pepto pink look good, an American car that was technically built across the pond, if you haven’t already guessed it we are going to be talking about the Nash Metropolitan, the Hudson metropolitan and eventually just the Metropolitan.

Today we discuss a true renaissance man during the turn of the century. He was building ships, building cars, building the hoover dam, created one of the first integrated healthcare systems for his employees, and also dabbled in broadcasting… Kenry J Kaiser,

Today we talk about one of America’s first performance car manufacturers, a car maker that shook up the first ever Indianapolis 500, a carmaker credited with the underslung chassis, today we discuss Stutz Motor Car Company and it’s history.

Today we talk about the man behind Healey Motors, Nash-Healey, Austin-Healey, Jensen-Healey, the man that turned down repeated offers by Ford and Saab to make a sports car, today we discuss the talented and driven Donald Healey.Healey was born in 1989 in Cornwall England to a shopkeeper. His father was a keen motor enthusiast and owned a 1907 Panhard and would give Donald a 1923 Buick which had the first overhead valve engine that Buick made.As a lad he took to al things mechanical and went on to study engineering before beginning an apprenticeship in aviation.Before he could finish his apprenticeship and at just 16 years of age, WWI broke out. Healey volunteered immediately in the Royal Flying Corps, earning his pilots wings to go on night bombing raids and anti-zeppelin patrols eventually becoming a flying instructor. He actually received his pilots license two years before he qualified for his driver’s license.Things were going good till he got shot out of the sky by British anti-aircraft fire plus a series of other crashes put him out of the pilot seat and into the mechanic’s bay checking aircraft components for the Air Ministry.Post WWI, Healey jumped into automobile engineering and opened his first garage in 1920. Soon he found himself more interested in rally driving and racing than fixing other peoples cars. He began using the garage to prep for competitions and entered into the 1929 Monte Carlo Rally driving a Triumph 7. Which was the tiny response to the Austin Seven, both small cars and drafted by the same guy, Stanley Edge.

America’s motorcycle brand, the manufacturer that at one point was synonymous with youth motorcycle gangs in the 60s but now frankly you got to somewhere middle income area to afford.Today were are going to be talking about the birth of Harley-Davidson and winding journey from top American motorcycle manufacturer to being run into the ground by a bowling equipment manufacturer and back.

The story of Fiat’s birth is a tale of vision, innovation, and a determination to bring Italy into the modern automotive age. Founded in the late 19th century, Fiat rapidly became a cornerstone of Italian industry, playing a significant role in Italy's economy and the global automobile industry. Here’s a comprehensive look at the birth and early years of Fiat:

Today we talk about the man who made Buick a success and sort of booted out the founder, the man who founded General Motors and got booted out himself, the man who helped build Chevrolet and then ran off Louis Chevrolet, the man who also founded Frigidaire… today we talk about William C. Durant aka Billy.

Today we discuss one of the most iconic car designers, the man who designed the first American mid-engine super car, a man I consider the Italian Raymond Loewy for his diverse designs, the man who unknowingly influenced the shape the first minivans, the man behind one of the most famous movie cars EVER, and a man who created his own shape of PASTA.

One of the most influential figures in automotive design, a man behind the pen of some of the most iconic supercars, one of the fathers of the wedge shaped car design, the guy that put a lot of the iiii in Lamborghini, we talk about Marcello Gandini

One of the most influential car designers of the 20th century, a man who left an indelible mark on the automotive world, had his own design era at General Motors, today we discuss legendary designer Bill Mitchell.

We are going to be talk about one of the more aggressively designed Corvettes, the one inspired by the Mako Shark II, we are going to be talking about the third generation Corvette, the C3..The Chevrolet Corvette C3, produced by General Motors for the model years 1968 through 1982, is a legendary American sports car that left an indelible mark on the automotive industry. The C3 generation, also known as the "Shark," is celebrated for its distinctive design, performance, and cultural significance. Here's a comprehensive history of the Corvette C3

One of the most iconic Corvettes, with the brief split window edition, the second generation, the Chevrolet Corvette C2..

Great show talking the past and future of classic cars with Colleen Sheehan owner of Next Generation Classics!

A man who started as an orphan but would find in himself at the forefront of the birth of the internal combustion engine. The man who’s company would produce engines for nearly all the Nazy tanks in WWII and then become one of the most luxury brands of today. Today we discuss the fascinating life, history, innovations, and inventions of Wilhem Maybach.

Enjoy a brief history on the wild ride of Iso Rivolta from refrigerators, to microcars, to grand touring high performance and high luxury cars.

A man considered the Jackie Robinson of Motorsports. The first African American man to drive a Formula One racecar. The first African American man to drive at Indy 500. Willy T Ribb's story was one of adversity, tenacity and triumph.

A man considered the Jackie Robinson of Motorsports. The first African American man to drive a Formula One racecar. The first African American man to drive at Indy 500. Willy T Ribb's story was one of adversity, tenacity and triumph.

A man who has set more speed records than ANYONE, the man who put the Bonneville Salt lats on the map, considered one of the pioneers of speed, and at one point was the Racing Mayor of Salt Lake City.. We are talking about Ab Jenkins..Salt Lake City was known as the “birthplace of speed” at the turn of the century and soon Ab would get bitten by the bug. He’d soon take to racing motorcycles on dirt tracks and cross-country races.Ab got his first taste of racing behind the wheel in Studebaker racing the Union Pacific train. He won by 5 minutes. And he wasn’t done, he liked it so much a year later he raced his Studebaker again against a train from NYC to San Francisco. He managed that trek in 86hrs and 20 minutes which was 14hrs faster than the train.Ab nails 175 miles per hour out of the Pierce-Arrow V12 driving across the Utah salt flats. He did over 100 miles per hour for 24hrs along a 10 miles course covering 2,710 miles – 3k more miles than what he had promised Pierce-Arrow. He was just shy of a world record with this attempt too! During this he stopped to refuel every two hours but never left the driving seat. And He was basically deaf by the roar of the engine.But wasn’t enough for the motivated Mormon, the following yea he broke that record by driving 25hrs at around 117 miles and coving 3k miles.In the 1930s the popularity of the Bonneville Salt Flats would grow and grow as more speed records were bring broken there. Really, you could say this was the man behind Bonneville.It was in 1935 that Ab got behind the wheel of a new supercharged Duesenberg Model J and took back his speed record title from Jobb Cobb who’d swooped it up the year before. BUT he didn’t hold on to it long as it would be then swooped up by Sir Malcom Campbell in one of his bluebirds who’ve we’ve covered on this radio show just a few shows ago.Then in 1938 Ab debuted the Mormon Meteor III and set even more records. One of his most famous was in 1940 when Jenkins managed 3,868 miles in 24hrs at an average speed of 161mph. A record that stayed unchallenged all the way until 2005.The Mormon Meteor III Built on a 142-inch wheelbase with specially-made 22-inch Firestone tires, it used the same Curtis 12-cylinder airplane engine from the Mormon Meteor II. The car was nearly 21 feet long and was once again engineered by Augie Dusenberg. It was designed to run with two airplane engines, although only one was ever installed.

The Legend You Never Heard Of - Allard | The Bad Blonde Car History A car company that many of you haven’t heard of, that had two of the greatest names in the business behind it’s wheel at one point, a car company that tried to create a “Corvette Slayer” BUT proved to be a company that could not keep up with the competition, today we are going to be talking about the rise and fall of the Allard Motor Company.

The Birth of Harley-Davidson

The surprisingly interesting history of the birth of Buick

This is a story about a man with bold ambitions and iffy funding. A story of an American supercar that would have rivaled the Bugattis and Lamborghinis of the day. A story that will leave you wondering how much substance is behind the hype?Join us in the tumultuous history of Jerry Wiegert and his dream of an American supercar.

This is a wild one... The tale of the Dale is full of intrigue! From fraud to murder to a runaway CEO and more, this hopeful eco-commuter car was supposed to change the automotive industry but it ended in corruption.

From fleeing Argentina to marrying an American heiress, to found De Tomaso Automobili. Hear the tales behind the carmaker of the Pantera and P72.Enjoy automotive history? That's us. Follow or like for more.