MI Tests the Crosley ‘Hotshot’
By Tom McCahill
A “warm missile” is one way our English cousins might sum up the new Crosley “Hotshot.” Whatever you call it, though, this brand-new, miniature American sport car should prove a fiery shot in the arm to its big, somber American contemporaries. This new car is something to have fun with and enjoy—definitely not a vehicle to carry crepe at your grandmother’s funeral.
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Ok, now I’m starting to think that Tom McCahill just had a fetish about imagining Chinese men in uncomfortable situations.
By the way, if you want to see just how much safer modern cars are than cars of this era, check out this video put out by the insurance institute on its 50th birthday. It’s a collision between a 1959 Chevy Bel Air and a 2009 Chevy Malibu. Guess who wins.
McCahill Sounds Off On Safety
Uncle Tom blasts so-called “safety features” and suggests ten ways makers can cut traffic deaths.
By Tom McCahill
IN THE automobile business right now the topic of safety is as hot as a naked Chinaman in a barrel of tabasco. With various professors fronting for them and spouting statistics by the yard, carmakers in newly-tailored angel suits have set out almost en masse to halt highway slaughter.
Now this is a noble undertaking, the good Lord knows, and I am all in favor of anything that will save even one life on the road. But the trouble is, the safety campaign so far has not shown much evidence of being overloaded with realistic thinking. Read the rest of this entry »
I’ve never really thought about it, but it must be really hard to come up with new and interesting superlatives for things you like.
“…Dr. Porsche’s engineering with such cars as the SSK had the same head-spinning effect as a pipeful of poppy dust to a Chinese playboy.”
MI Tests the German Porsche
If money is no object and you are looking for a small competition car that’s really loaded with TNT, this is it, our Uncle Tom reports.
By Tom McCahill
THE late Dr. Ferdinand Porsche was the Hopalong Cassidy of the automobile business. For 50 years he engineered mouth-watering cars for generations of big boys to dream about. What Hopalong does for the kids today, old Doe Porsche did for their old man’s old man by building cars with all the intrigue of a Left Bank dive. His fame started back in 1900 with the chassis and power plant of the Austro-Daimler and really came to a boil with his SSK Mercedes and later the famed Auto-Union. Doctor Porsche got more sex appeal on four wheels in a single day than Minsky could cram on a runway in 30 years. To the real gone automotive nut, Dr. Porsche’s engineering with such cars as the SSK had the same head-spinning effect as a pipeful of poppy dust to a Chinese playboy. Read the rest of this entry »
America’s Fastest Sports Car…’52 CUNNINGHAM
If the U.S.A. ever wins back leadership in international road racing, this is the car that will do it, says Mi’s own auto expert.
By Tom McCahill
THE 1952 Cunninghams have four wheels and a base Chrysler block but aside from this they look no more like the 1951 models than I resemble Fred Astaire on a ballroom floor. The first cars came in for a lot of hard criticism because of their unfortunate showing in the 24-hour race at Le Mans a year ago. But before the year was out, they succeeded in cramming a crankcase full of words down the critics’, throats by running away with the Elkhart Lake and Watkins Glen races. In finishing one, two and four at Watkins Glen, even the sourest observer was forced to admit that they were about the hottest cars ever to run on these shores. And this year the Cunningham is even hotter. Read the rest of this entry »
Screw the iPhone. I’m getting a record player for my car.
THE ’56 DODGE
Featuring a unique pushbutton transmission, the new Dodge will be hard to beat in the medium-priced field, reports Uncle Thomas.
By Tom McCahill
THE fan-out of the rear fender line is the big styling change for the 1956 Dodge. Oddly enough, this looks much better in person than in photographs. The hood has been drooped slightly at the nose, a new ornament has been slapped on, and under the hood there is a much larger ram than for ’55.
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Sea-Going Diner Pays No Taxes
BY TOM MCCAHILL
SAILORMEN of New York waters don’t die of thirst any- more, thanks to a new enterprise that pays no rent and no local taxes.
No, sir. When they’re a little parched they twist an ear until they pick up a few musical horn-toots. Then they jump up and wave their arms. A slick cruiser draws alongside. “What’ll you have?” asks a smiling cookie. Read the rest of this entry »
MI Tests the 1950 Studebaker
“One of the best dollar values today,” says Tom McCahill. They’re not the fastest cars on the road but they’re tops in comfort and quality.
THE new, needle-nose Studebaker gives the boys of the Big Three something to shoot at. Back in ’46, with the introduction of the 1947 Studebaker designed by Raymond Loewy, this first real post-war auto stirred up the populace. And now, once again, Loewy has set the pace with the 1950 Studebaker. Read the rest of this entry »
The Mercedes-Benz 190 SL
Fine workmanship and splendid roadability are the top features of this sports rig, says Uncle Tom.
By Tom McCahill
THE NAME Mercedes-Benz, like Tiffany, Morgan & Company and Diamond Jim Brady is known from pole-to-pole and over the border and into Finland. Mercedes-Benz has had only one rival through the years for the title of Prestige Car Of The World—and that is Rolls-Royce. Actually, from a quality standpoint and longevity, Rolls gets the nod, but from a performance and accomplishment standpoint no one can touch Mercedes.
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MI Tests The Triumph TR-2
“A hairy-chested, flame-spiffing wildcat” is how Tom describes this 104-mph import. By Tom McCahill THE fastest automobile in the world selling for under $2,500 is one way of summing up the TR-2 Triumph sports car. In its price class, the new Triumph is a hairy-chested, flame-spitting wildcat. With this uninhibited rig you can pass a flat-out MG with enough extra speed in hand to give the MG driver double pneumonia in addition to dust in his eye and a slight eardrum concussion.
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McCahill Drives The Austin Healey
Uncle Tom test-drives the most talked-about sports car of the year and finds very few faults to criticize, many virtues to praise.
NOT since the day Neville Chamberlin showed up at 10 Downing Street with his umbrella incorrectly rolled, has a more sensational shocker taken place than that caused by the birth of the new Austin Healey 100. The windscreen and bonnet boys of England’s motordom were outrageously amazed at the reception accorded this upstart at Mr. Herbert Shriner’s Second Annual International Motor Sports Show in New York. At this prime American exhibit, the sales people of some of Britain’s oldest and most traditional concerns never put a mark on an order blank whilst Mr. Donald Healey’s creation was causing a near-riot. In two words, Donald Healey and associates “had It” whilst their fellow Britons “Had it.” Read the rest of this entry »
The NASCAR Story
Strictly stock car racing is the hottest sport around right now. And here’s the lowdown on it.
By Tom McCahill
FROM a spark that a couple of years ago was not much bigger than the glimmer in a bridegroom’s eye, the sport of racing unmodified or strictly factory-condition stock cars has blazed forth into a roaring prairie fire of popularity. Hot rods, midgets, jalopies, modified stocks, sports cars and even the big Indianapolis racers are getting a real run for their money from this newest racing craze. During a comparatively short season from April to November, the un-souped-up stock cars attract no fewer than 5,000,000 cash customers to tracks all over the country, making them the Number One crowd-grabbers in automobile racing today. Read the rest of this entry »
MI Tests the New Crosley
Tom McCahill, Mi’s auto expert, puts the new Crosley through its automotive paces.
EVER since I started on Mi’s automobile test series in 1946 hundreds of letters have come in asking about the Crosley and other miniature pieces of transportation. So here is the dope on the Crosley. To get it I came to Florida, where they seem to be the most popular—and here I am writing this in Palm Beach. Read the rest of this entry »
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