WHEN CARS HAD FLAIR bill berry

  When Cars Didn’t all Look Alike!

After world war II, 1940’s and 1950’s cars became lower, longer and broader in look, as well as more massive and hefty. The semi automatic transmission was introduced by Hudson , and the driver could change between manual and semi-automatic with the push of a button.

The US-made cars offered huge trunk sizes, width and length.

In the 1940s a new car cost about $800 and

a gallon of gas was about 18 cents, not a bad deal.

In the 50s, chrome was introduced to more cars and also a more luxurious

look in a country slowly getting back to its feet after the war.

The 1950s saw a huge boom in American car manufacturing,

and during that time, the US made more cars than England ,

France, Japan , Sweden and many other nations put together –

and many times over.

The 50’s was the decade of cars, and the huge demand

saw both Ford and GM hit the 50 million car mark.