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The Automobile and American Life - John Heitmann

The Automobile and American Life

(Autor)

Buch | Softcover
187 Seiten
2018 | 2nd Revised edition
McFarland & Co Inc (Verlag)
978-1-4766-6935-9 (ISBN)
CHF 49,95 inkl. MwSt
In its updated second edition, this book tells the story of how the automobile transformed American life and how automotive design and technology have changed over time. The author covers the cars’ inception as a mechanical curiosity and later a plaything for the wealthy; racing and the promotion of the industry; Henry Ford and the advent of mass production; market competition during the 1920s; the development of roads and accompanying highway culture; the effects of the Great Depression and World War II; the automotive Golden Age of the 1950s; oil crises and the turbulent 1970s; the decline and then resurgence of the Big Three; and how American car culture has been represented in film, music and literature.

John Heitmann is a professor at the University of Dayton, where he teaches courses in the history of science and technology.

Table of Contents


Acknowledgments

Preface to the Second Edition

Introduction: The Automobile, Its History and Influence, and Some Contradictions

1—Beginnings: From a Mechanical Curiosity to a Plaything for the ­Well-to-Do

European by Birth, American by Adoption

Technological Antecedents—The Bicycle

Compact Power: The Internal Combustion Engine (ICE)

Choices Made: Competition from Steam Engines and Electric Motors

American Pioneers

Organization as Power

The Automobile for Better or Worse?

Music Galore

The Mechanical Arts and the Coming of the Machine Age

The Quest for Speed

2—The Inscrutable Henry Ford and the Rise of the Machine Age

From a Dearborn Farm to the World Stage

Frederick Winslow Taylor and “One Best Way”

The Genesis of Mass Production at Highland Park

The Flivver King

The Model T: What a Car!

World War I: War Without End

Later Years: Hero or ­Anti-Hero?

Early Economy Runs and the Gilmore Years, 1906–1941

Industrial America: The “Carnival of Speed” and the Indianapolis 500

3—The Rise of the Competition and the Consumer During the 1920s

“Billy” Durant and “Silent” Sloan

Kettering, Earl and “Keeping the Customer Dissatisfied”

The City of the Future and Dynamic Dayton of the 1930s

The Last of the Big Three: The Chrysler Corporation

The Independents

Innovation at the Periphery: The Cracker Jacker, Rickenbacker

The Jordan and Advertising the Dream

4—From Mud to the Open Road

Which Came First: Good Roads or the Automobile?

The Good Roads Movement

A Transcontinental Link: The Lincoln Highway

Federal Legislation and the Gas Tax

Two Lane Black Top, or Concrete If There Is Money

Auto Camping and “Gypsying” Across America

Fill’er Up

Road Food

Divided Highways, Parkways, and Expressways

5—Religion, Courtship, Sex, and Women Drivers

An Answer to Prayer or Something to Pray About?

Sex in the Back Seat

Those Women Drivers!

Cars as Homes

6—The Interwar Years: The Great Depression, Aerodynamics, and Cars of the Olympian Age

Olympian Automobiles of the 1930s

Streamlining and the Chrysler “Airflop”

Sitdown, the Coming of the United Auto Workers, and the Battle of the Overpass

The Poetic Response to the Automobile

Singing the Blues About Automobiles and Life

Filming on the Race Track and Soundstage

7—World War II and the Reconversion Economy: No Time for Sergeants or Aspiring Automobile Manufacturers

“Little Bo Peep Has Lost Her Jeep…”

Wartime Labor: Sacrifices and Selfishness

The Black Market: “Chiseled Gas”

The Reconversion Economy and a Man’s Dream

 8—The Golden Age of the Automobile: The 1950s in America

The Automobile and Civil Rights

Hot Rod

Sports Cars on American Tracks, and The Red Car

Some Critics Surface: Safety and the Environment

Dealers, Good and Bad

The UAW, the Big Three, and Pattern Bargaining

The Cars of the Golden Era

The 1958 Recession and European Competition

The Volkswagen Bug

Cars and Rock and Roll

Film: The Rebels

A Night at the ­Drive-In

On the Road

The Coming of the Interstates

Summing Up the Glorious 1950s

 9—The ­Go-Go Years, 1959–1970

The Microbus, Cars, and the Hippies

The Cadillac and the Establishment

An Age of Ambivalence

Ralph Nader and Unsafe at Any Speed

Government Regulation: Safety and the Environment

From a Brief Affair with Economy Vehicles to the Emergence of the Muscle Car

California Dreaming

James Bond, Steve McQueen, and the Action Thriller

Summing Up the Sixties

10—America and the Automobile During the 1970s

Introduction: A Decade Often Forgotten, Rarely Celebrated, Yet Certainly Pivotal

“We Can’t Fail”: The Gremlin, Vega, and Pinto

A Fresh Wind from Foreign Shores

The Early 1970s: Structural Shortcomings

Harry Crews and the “White Trash” in His Novel Car

On the Eve of Oil Shock: Auto Culture During the Summer and Fall of 1973

Oil Shock I

Japanese Cars Come in a Big Way to America

The New Automotive Technologies of the 1970s

Fasten Your Seat Belt; Watch Your Speed!

Mobile Lovemaking

Wither the Automobile?

11—The Automobile World Upside Down, 1980–2015

Oil Shock II, the Big Three, and Japan

Oil Shock Shockwaves: Chrysler and American Motors Corporation

The Automobile and Contemporary Art

The UAW in Retreat

Rivethead and the Quality Cat

Trucks, Sport Utility Vehicles, and Crossovers

The Car Hobby: Car Crazy

The Fast and Furious: Thank God for Fast Cars

Cars and Crime: The ­Drive-By

NASCAR Nation

Saturn, NUMMI, Chrysler, and Germans in the New South

New Technologies

Automobiles, Women, Eros, and Film

Poetry, Women, and Passion

The Great Recession, the GM and Chrysler Bankruptcies of 2007–2009, and Recovery

A New Global Order: China, the Largest Market for Automobiles in the World

Where Does the Automobile in American Life Go from Here?

Epilogue: The Automobile and One American Life

Chapter Notes

Select Bibliography

Index

Erscheinungsdatum
Zusatzinfo 50 photographs
Verlagsort Jefferson, NC
Sprache englisch
Maße 178 x 254 mm
Themenwelt Natur / Technik Fahrzeuge / Flugzeuge / Schiffe Auto / Motorrad
Geisteswissenschaften Geschichte Regional- / Ländergeschichte
Geschichte Teilgebiete der Geschichte Kulturgeschichte
Sozialwissenschaften
ISBN-10 1-4766-6935-X / 147666935X
ISBN-13 978-1-4766-6935-9 / 9781476669359
Zustand Neuware
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