Studebaker Avanti - An Affordable Icon

The NY Times profiles some of the many faces of Avanti.

"1963 STUDEBAKER AVANTI R-1 $11,000 to $33,000. The original article with road-sniffing rake and round headlight trim. Less expensive than a supercharged R-2. Forget about finding an authentic R-3; only a few were made, though many clones exist."

Click here to read the full article.

New Spectacles - "Doc" Studebaker

In the "just for fun" file. I made some new specs for "Doc" this week. Check them out.

Studebakers at Fair Oaks Fiesta Days, California

We visited the Fair Oaks Fiesta Days "Show & Shine" last Sunday. Here are a few pics of the Studebaker vehicle line-up, many of which are from the Karel Staple Chapter of the Studebaker Drivers Club.

The Rolling Stonebaker Pizza - Tomato Season

The Rolling Stonebaker team grows their own tomatoes and cooks their artisan pizzas in two retrofit vintage Studebaker trucks.

Awesome.

Visit the Rolling Stonebaker Facebook page.

Studebaker Body Drop - Auto Assembly

An interesting article about the Studebaker automobile assembly "body drop" process.

See the full article here.

Slideshow of Studebakers

A fun slideshow of Studebakers at a Crusin' Grand event. It's great to see new Studebaker pics from around the country during 'car show season.'

Bill Porter, Designer of Pontiac GTO, on Nature-Inspired Automobile Designs

This NYT article notes Roger Ebert's talk about Studebakers. In thinking about Porter's observation, one could say that Studebaker-Packard were ahead of their time (as usual) with the Packard Hawk nose, the Loewy Coupe grille, etc.

"At the 2009 Detroit auto show, I had a sort of epiphany," Mr. Porter said at the introduction of his presentation. "I saw a whole new kind of forms inspiring today’s designers rather than the speed forms that inspired my generation." He argued that designs today were dominated by forms adopted from nature, like marine animals, leaves, flowers, flames and faces."

The Society of Automotive Historians, whose membership numbers about 900, gather every other year to hear the presentation of papers on topics that have included the history of Cadillac advertising and the importance of two-tone paint schemes.

Robert Ebert, a Studebaker buff and professor emeritus of economics at Baldwin-Wallace College in Ohio, delivered a talk on Harold Churchill, president of the Studebaker-Packard Corporation. Mira Wilkins, professor of economics at Florida International University, spoke about the history of foreign investment in the American automobile industry.

Read the full article here.

Loewy-owned Avanti Up for Auction in May

" 1972 Avanti II Coupe originally owned by Raymond Loewy, the father of industrial design who streamlined everything from Greyhound buses to toothbrushes, will cross the auction block in May.

Loewy designed the Avanti, a two-door four-seater which has a European feel with minimalist trim, for Studebaker in the early 1960s. It is one of the highlights of the Les Grandes Marques a Monaco sale by Bonhams in Monte Carlo on May 11.

Bonhams said in a statement that the car is expected to fetch a minimum of $46,120."

Read the full article here.

Studebaker - Genealogy of Automobile Companies

This is an amazing poster tracking the genealogy of automakers.

"A flowing history of more than 100 automobile companies across the complete time span of the automobile industry. From 1900 to 1925 over 3,300 organizations were formed to produce automobiles in the United States. In 1910 alone 400 new startups entered the industry. Most attempts lasted less than two years. While car sales exploded (from 1910 to 2010 US sales rose from 200,000 to 11.5 million cars) the strongest entrepreneurs bought out rivals and combined forces. Today, ten companies account for about 90% of all US automobile sales."

See the full poster here.