In response to soaring import sales in the early-1970s, US automakers made brave promises of a counterattack. In retrospect, many of those promises sound decidedly hollow. For example, in the wake of a critical review […]
(EXPANDED FROM 2/9/2024) There was good news and bad news about Mitsubishi’s U.S. sales in 2024. The good news: Sales were up 25 percent, led by its Mirage economy cars. The bad news: This was […]
(UPDATED FROM 11/18/2022) The original Ford Mustang was the automotive equivalent of The Beatles rock band. The U.S. auto industry had never seen anything like it — a small sporty car that proved so popular […]
(EXPANDED FROM 10/31/2022) The automotive media tends to treat orphaned American brands with extra enthusiastic pom-pom waving. An example of the genre is Mark J. McCourt’s (2020) Hemmings article about Oldsmobile. He breathlessly insisted that […]
(EXPANDED FROM 8/19/2022) The topic that has elicited the greatest blowback from Indie Auto readers has been my argument that the U.S. auto industry was less able to respond to a rising tide of imports […]
We’ve had a robust discussion about when American automakers should have begun producing a domestic subcompact in the comment thread of “Aaron Severson’s Ford Cardinal story challenges auto history field.” I would like to bring […]
A few days ago Aaron Severson (2024) posted an epic story about the aborted Ford Cardinal. His 22,000-word piece deepens the dialogue about this important car. In a moment we will debate some of his […]
A recent post on Ate Up With Motor’s Patreon page discusses the rise of the imports in the United States. Aaron Severson (2024) draws upon data he dug up from a report by the U.S. […]
Car Life magazine argued that the 1970 AMC Hornet met two out of three of the automaker’s stated goals for the car. Engineering Editor David Bean wrote that American Motors thought that the compact and […]
“During the 1960s and 1970s GM was lulled into a false sense of security by its dominance of the market. There was certainly a bottom-line mentality, but this mentality dictated that additional costs be passed […]
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