It's a well-known story: Adolf Hitler wanted Germans to own their own car, just like Americans. He asked sportscar designer Dr Ferdinand Porsche to develop the vehicle and in 1937 the first Volkswagen, or Strength Through Joy car, as it was called and which we know as the Beetle, was rolled out. What's less well known is that it was inspired, by an oddly shaped vehicle made by the Tatra company in Czechoslovakia.
Tatras were always somewhat different but in 1931, its chief designer Hans Ledwinka teamed up with Zeppelin engineer Paul Jaray to produce an astonishing rear-engined car with a rounded front and an extravagantly streamlined rear. This was the car that the first Volkswagen was based upon. In 1934 it evolved into the T87, which had a huge air-cooled V8 engine capable of pushing the car to a top speed of 160 kilometres an hour.
Its rear was even more impressive, with an extravagant fin for added stability. And stability was what it needed. When Czechoslovakia was occupied by the Nazis in 1938, the car's power made it popular with German officers, but many were killed in road accidents, thanks to the car's predilection to flick out its back when cornering. Eventually the German army banned its officers from driving the car, which didn't exactly dent its popularity with the oppressed Czech people.
The focus on streamlining was not that unusual. In America, Buckminster Fuller launched the Dymaxion in 1933, which looked like an aeroplane without wings, and even Chrysler released the Airflow which was a flop. Tatra kept developing the idea, though. In 1956, it launched the T603, a huge boat-like car with headlamps clustered behind glass at the front like a cyclops that still turns heads. It had the some of the flair and originality of the Citroen DS launched at the same time in France and was a great success, although, sadly, a rare sight on our side of the Iron Curtain.
A final model, the T613 was released in the 1970s, with a rakish body styled in Italy and the huge V8 engine still in the boot. It wasn't a bad car but just not good enough to compete against rivals like BMW and Mercedes-Benz. In the 1990s, the company called it a day, although it continues to make trucks that look, sad to report, perfectly ordinary.
The Tatra story is a reminder of the design flair that was common in Czechoslovakia before the Soviet gloom. And it serves also as an inspiration to those who continue to work against the prevailing trends.
Source: www.bing.com
