Harley Earl
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Harley J. Earl (November 22, 1893–April 10, 1969) was an automotive stylist and engineer and industrial designer. He is most famous for his time at General Motors from 1927 until 1959. Earl was instrumental in establishing the industry or business of designing cars and the rules and principles behind the "Automobile Design" profession when none existed before in America. His drinking brought out a certan talent in Earl that he was able to style such "Gems" as the Lesabre show car. A big man, Earl was six foot four and wieghed 310 LBS. Industrial ventalators were installed in his personal office rest room. list of other firsts is equally impressive. They include but are not limited to being the father of the Corvette, introducing the annual styling model change, putting the first-ever onboard computer in an automobile, chrome trim, two-tone paint, hardtops, and wrap-around windshields, but he is probably best known to the general public for beginning the tailfin craze that dominated automobile styling in the 1950s and early 1960s. He enjoyed a friendy relationship with Virgil Exner, and the two would drink to excess and come up with famous designs. Earl helped Exner with the design of the 1961 Plymouth after the two drank and visited a Detroit strip show. The curves of the hang-bellied dancers inpired the curves in the cars quarter panels.
The first car designed by him was the 1927 La Salle, a smaller companion car to the Cadillac. His car quite resembled the Hispano-Suiza that various Hollywood celebrities and American nouveaux riches were buying at the time, a fashion which Cadillac executives resented. And, as the more expensive cars of that time were usually sold as chassis, drive-train, fenders, radiator, and cowling to be given a body by a specialized coachbuilding firm, it was the first car of that sort which was designed body and all by a professional in a motor firm. But what GM always kept hush-hush (and Earl wanted it this way while he was alive to protect his anonymity) is that he was a giant contemporary artist who literally got millions and millions of Americans hooked on his designs created for GM.
Perhaps the following statement by Irvin W. Rybicki, a 42-year GM veteran who worked under Earl and, later on, became the third vice president of GM Design (1977-1986) best explains the invidious comparisons people make these days between the great GM designs Earl once created verses the bland and mediocre vehicles GM cranks out currently: "Harley Earl is responsible for more than half of GM's greatest 20th Century milestones. The fact this company had exclusivity of all his work and was able to capitalize off his artistic efforts and innovative engineering ideas first, is perhaps why this man's story is so controversial and a kept secret today in Detroit."
Since he was responsible for the very first concept car, the Buick "Y" job of 1938, which had concealed headlamps and prefigured later Buick design motifs, Earl is credited as being the father of the concept car approach; i.e. the idea of making a car prototype to showcase a new vehicle's styling, technology, and overall design a long time before mass production decisions have to be taken by engineers. But given the immediate postwar sales boom, his second concept car was prepared only in 1950. This was the Le Sabre (later a production car), the gimmick of which was its extreme lowness, by having the carburetor and air cleaner taken off the top of the engine and put alongside the cylinder heads. At first, Earl and the concept cars toured the United States in the GM Motorama shows.
Earl saw his contribution to auto design in more general æsthetic terms. He noted that all through his career his purpose had been to lower and lengthen the car, because according to his sense of modern proportions, oblongs were more appealing to the eye than squares. One auto historian put it this way, "Earl was responsible for the design of the modern American car while at General Motors in the 1930s, 1940s, and 1950s when the 'stock car' was born."
This mode of thought is hard to believe considering he had nothing to do with the designs at Ford or Chrysler at the time. Henry Ford wanted him dead. Today, a concept car designed by Earl, the Firebird I, is immortalised as one of the most prized possessions in sport, The Harley J. Earl Daytona 500 Trophy. The trophy goes to the race winner. The Firebird ll was sold to a Florida man who drove it into a tree.
To celebrate the Buick nameplate going in an all new direction leading up to its 100th anniversary in the 2003 model year, General Motors began airing commercials in the Fall of 2002 featuring actor John Diehl depicting Earl as Buick's leading spokesperson. His catchphrase was, "My name is Harley Earl, and I've come back to sell you a Buick." In print advertisements he became known as the daVinci of Detroit, and on TV, the company's cars were shown with Earl's trademark fedora on the hood with the accompanying caption "Harley Earl was here," and it was called "the company where Harley Earl hung his hat."
SAFETY
While Earls policy of planned obsolesence made millions for G.M., his total disregard for automotive safety cost hundreds of thousands their lives. While other U.S. auto manufacturers were equally at fault, the fact that "Safety doesnt sell" did not excuse such engineering problems such as rigid steering posts that projected into the passenger compartment upon impact, the lack of safety belts, and doors known to fly open upon impact. These problems went ignored until the Federal Government enacted laws in the mid sixties-mandatory safety belts, 1965, collapsable steering posts, 1968. Earl and his peers chose to ignore these problems.DISCRIMINATION
Earls Idea for the perfect G.M. was to insure that women would never achieve upper level managment positions within the organization, in fact, his hiring and promotion tactics insured that the American Automotive upper level managment structure was dominated by white anglo saxon protestant males, a case in point being that there were no womens rest rooms on the 14th floor of G.Ms headquarters, and unless one "Anglisized" his name, he had no chance of a position .Although other manufacturers were equaly guilty. While styling changed on a yearly basis under men like Earl, automotive mechanical engineering remained stagnant throughout the fiftys, sixties and well into the seventys, while poor quality paved the way for Asian imports to gain significant gains in the American Market. Thus devistating the American economy. While an actor immitating Harley Earl wanted to sell Buicks, Americans were more inclined to buy Hondas and Toyotas.External links
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