Date: Wed, 18 Apr 2001 13:39:27 +1200
Reply-To: Andrew Grebneff <andrew.grebneff@STONEBOW.OTAGO.AC.NZ>
Sender: Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From: Andrew Grebneff <andrew.grebneff@STONEBOW.OTAGO.AC.NZ>
Subject: VW van: the REAL Car of the Century (long)
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The following is quoted from Australian car magazine "Wheels", October
1999; author is Paul Cockburn, column is "Cock & Bull". I use his spelling
and punctuation. I sent it to LiMBO I think last year, and they were going
to print it in "The Transporter" newsletter.
Very well, knowing of my brash instincts, I guess it's not
surprising that nobody's asked for my vote. I refer, of course, to the
search for the Car of the Century. Experts of every stripe have been
canvassed, which both explainsmy omission and tells you straight away why
the whole damn exercise is doomed to farce. These will be the same experts
who, in Europe, once acclaimed the NSU Ro80 (which killed its maker stone
dead) as a walk-away winner, who crowned Leyland's P76 (which killed the
local Leyland operation) as Australia's Car of the Year and who, in
America, hailed the Corvair (which killed everyone who turned the key) as
the new beginning.
The only thing, sadly, that these murderous stinkers didn't wipe
out between them was the credibility of experts. Meanwhile, the rest of us
delivered our own verdict by rolling the fizzing remnants of these and
their other appalling choices into a cave and sealing them with a vary big
rock. Those of you who came in late owe us more than you think...
However, undeterred, the scholars are at it again. And, as usual,
they've little chance of getting it right. Pressed to narrow the entire
automotive output of the known world down to its 26 finest accomplishments,
they went and stuck the Ro80 back in. Even among the runners, their
favourites are woeful. Ford's Model T was a much more impressive
manufacturing advance than it ever was a motorcar, the genuinely dreadful
Volkswagen Beetle had more impact on advertising than it did on automotive
evolution and the Mini, while admittedly making more advances than either
(though not as many as popularly imagined), was essentially of European
rather than international importance.
But unless the French get the fix in for Citroen, it's dollars to
donuts the mullahs will convince themselves that one of these three will be
the Car of the Century. But not me. because experts, by definition, judge
on fact alone and the car, unique among products in its companion role,
demands more than merely qualitative assessment. It must also fit humanity
well. From the tundra to Tasmania, the Car of the Century must have
benfitted millions. That benefit could only be realised by obliging man's
imagination while requiring little of his attention; by accomodating his
troupe and his tools with the strength of a hammer, the stride of a horse
and the obliging soul of a whore. The favourites for the gong barely meet
even these simple criteria.
Yet one vehicle did so easily. And much more.
The real Car of the Century occupied but a foot (300cm) more road
space than a Beetle, yet it could carry a string quartet, their instruments
and their entire audience in comfort down anything anyone ever called a
road. It trod lightly and sipped gently long before those virtues were
valued. It had fully independent suspension decades before the mainstream
embraced it and could drive over mud and snow and sand with a tractive
ability that still impresses. It matched the Beetle in reliability,
exceeded the Model T in versatility and trounced the mini in space
efficiency. And, if its descendants bear witness in their numbers, it was
arguably more influential than any of them.
And yet it didn't even make the experts' top 100.
Without exception, their choices merely addressed the function of
transport, an admirable ability but one already achieved by saddling
beasts. The Car of the Century made light of that simple task by, in its
later versions, being able to reel in the highway in excess of any speed
limit in the world; and, on arrival, it could park in more places in more
cities than virtually any other contender.
But transport was just one of its facilities. At rest it could be a
workshop, an office, a meetingplace, a storeroom or a home. Its verastility
allowed it to be more things to more people than any other vehicle built.
And that was the secret of its greatness.
It served the needs of students and cementers. It was a muse for
poets and a mule for plumbers. It was equally beloved by the vicar and the
vagabond, the police and the protestor. Made in its millions, it still
championed individuality. Built to work, it was also synonymous with fun.
It took us to the limits of our wanderlust, and, rarely missing a beat, it
brought us home again. Generations found their country and lost their
innocence in its homely company. And blessed it for both.
Introduced 50 years ago, its honesty and its humour are still so
compelling that my daughter is saving to buy one as I write. And how could
I argue against it? I had one and I suspect that a good number of you did,
too. Hell, even the experts probably had one. They've just forgotten. buy
if by some bizzarre circumstance our world was limited to just one car, I
guarantee they could offer no saner choice. Nor one that fitted humanity so
beautifully.
The Car of the Century is as obvious as the initial letters of the
first seven words of this column.
Andrew Grebneff
165 Evans St, Dunedin, New Zealand
fax 64 (3) 479-7527
<andrew.grebneff@stonebow.otago.ac.nz>
www.goingplatinum.com/member/vw1
www.my-successcenter.com/member/vw1
www.aciimoney.com/index.shtml?vw1
VW & Toyota vans, Toyota diesels and Macintoshes rule
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