Although several fine sports vehicles such as the Stutz and the Mercer, were manufactured in this country during the early part of the 20th century, by the 40s the American driving public had been seduced by the Creature Comfortable large land cruisers that Detroit was offering.

During WWII, however, our solders got their first taste of the vehicles that Europe had to offer. These cars had been developed because of the type of roads and scarcity of gasoline overseas and therefore were entirely different from what they had left at home. They were much smaller rough riding and could negotiate the many winding roads more easily. That made them fun to drive. Many solders learned to love them and when they returned to America after the war, they yearned to continue the excitement that they had found with many of Europe's fun to drive open sport automobiles. It was quickly discovered that they were still being offered the status quo from Detroit.

This new found demand for these more sporty type cars spurred a drastic increase in imports of foreign cars to meet the needs of these young veterans. The little MG became the hit of the early post war period. Still conservative Detroit didn't get the message. It wasn't until a lot of little companies sprang up across the land in the early 50s in an attempt to fulfill this burning demand, that Detroit was finally prodded into making a meager attempt at building a sporty type car. General Motors was the first of the big three to bring out a sports car in 1953 made of the new material fiberglass. By 1955, Ford finally made the big push with an Americanized version of the sports car. That same year, General Motors almost scrapped their entire sports car project, after a bleak production of 590 Corvettes. They made last ditch effort in 1956 by adding a few creature comforts such as roll up windows and a removable hardtop to keep up with the more popular Thunderbird. Just the right amount of creature comforts added to the basic European sports car concept and G.M. had a huge success on their hands. So was born the sports car as defined by American standards. This web site has been established to honor the people and companies who pioneered those early attempts from 1949 to 1957.