Pere Ubu

 “Avant-garage” Rock with a Rust Belt Sheen

William Sundwick

Cleveland has produced more than the Rock-and-Roll Hall of Fame. Emerging in the 1970s, beneath the radar of its pop music mainstream, was an avant-garde, experimental music scene, epitomized by David Thomas and Pere Ubu.

Starting as a music critic, Thomas decided to try his hand at producing the music he wrote about when he formed the band Rocket from the Tombs in 1974. It didn’t last long, but its members liked the project. Both Thomas and guitarist Peter Laughner decided to join up with four other Cleveland area friends to start a new project in 1975. It’s not clear why they chose the name “Pere Ubu” for the new band – after the main character in the avant garde play by Alfred Jarry, Ubu Roi. Jarry’s 1896 play is pre-dada, and was received by a skeptical audience who considered it to be childish, like a nursery rhyme trying to pass itself off as meaningful. Indeed, some reviewers have made similar comments about the music of Pere Ubu!

I disagree. The band has coined the term “avant-garage” to describe its style. Thomas says it is a joke, intended to fool journalists who are looking for a sound bite, a “genre” in which to place Pere Ubu. They began with a style clearly in the garage rock mold – but, over time, evolved into a much more openly experimental, or avant-garde, sound. They are still performing, with many personnel changes, 44 years later. They’re still in Cleveland, an archetypal midwestern Rust Belt city. It shows in their music. David Thomas is there, as always (except for a hiatus in the ‘80s, when he went solo, and the band disappeared for a while).

Thomas’ distinctive vocal style, a screechy, anxious, dreamily disconnected-from-reality muttering, is nothing, if not avant-garde. In addition, the varied instrumental back-ups have included EML synthesizer and theremin through the years, especially since the ‘90s. This is experimental rock, not mainstream – critics have called it both “art punk” and “post punk.” Pere Ubu’s style was influenced by French musique concrete of the ‘40s and ‘50s, where pre-recorded non-musical sounds are incorporated into a larger musical tapestry. Pere Ubu uses this technique with synthesizer and theremin to create backdrops like science fiction B-film soundtracks from the 1950s.

The evolution of Pere Ubu’s style can be illustrated with seven examples. Their first singles sound much like “Final Solution” – strictly garage rock. Its lyrics relate adolescent anxiety about social mal-adroitness and raging hormones. “D-d-don’t need a cure” … “need a final solution!” But the EML synthesizer, played in those early days by Allen Ravenstine, is clearly there.

The band’s first studio album was released in 1978, The Modern Dance. It greatly expands the themes of the first singles. David Thomas practices his distinctive vocals. “Nonalignment Pact” is lighter than some tracks on the album, and still sounds like garage rock of the post-punk years. “At night I can see the stars on fire/I can see the world in flames/And it’s all because of you/Or your thousand other names” followed by a long list of women’s names, then the chorus, “It’s all because of you/It’s all because of you girl!” “Sign my nonalignment pact/Nonalignment pact/It’s my Nonalignment pact.” All played to bouncy dance music. “Street Waves” develops Thomas’ screechy voice, with lyrics that evoke a kind of “dance anxiety” – the obvious thrill from the electronic music (synthesizer in full gear), tempered by insecurity about the nature of any liaisons made in a supercharged urban environment.

Still on that first album, “Humor Me” strikes a different tone. It may be a precursor of things to come. It’s a vocal protest of the garage rock origins of the band, while carrying over many of the backup band signatures – synthesizer, drums, guitar chords. But the lyrics tell a story of social alienation and sexual frustration in a very different way. The chorus is a plaintive reggae chant, “It’s a joke, mon!” – as if the real anxiety felt by the singer is merely a joke to the rest of the world. Perhaps a truer insight into Pere Ubu’s soul than their earlier work?

By the mid-90s, Pere Ubu had been through a dissolution, deaths of several early band members, David Thomas launching a solo career, then re-uniting the band with different personnel. In 1995, they released Ray Gun Suitcase, which explores new musical themes with a noticeable swing to experimental sound –  tracks with theremin, played by Robert Wheeler, recalling those old B-films. “Folly of Youth” captures the spirit well, especially with its YouTube video. It wants to be a “suitcase” and “hang around inside your Greyhound terminal.” Alienation comes up again in “My Friend Is a Stooge,” with a shout out to T.S. Eliot and “Hollow Men.” It also touches the role of mass media in society, “My friend is a stooge for the media priests. He does the weather map for Channel 3.” He may even be a dog, since he “Stares at the rug if I leave him alone. Lays around the house in misery. He toes the line for the company.”

The album closes with a track which is downright depressing. “Down by the River II” uses some new devices, like electric cello, to create a melancholy sound – is everything hopeless? “The house on fire. The treaty broken. I call for the law. The law’s a token.” Then, “Trip is the worst. I don’t mean maybe. I call for the captain. She cries like a baby. As bad as it gets, it’s gotten worse. I want to run. I had to learn to crawl first.”

But it’s not the end. Pere Ubu goes on. The final verse in “Down by the River II” leaves us suspended in time, “Bye-bye. Bye-bye, baby, my friend. It’s time to leave and I don’t know when.”

Great opinion piece from Slate -- follow-up to "2020 Campaign Notes" -- Joe Biden, the counter-intuitive candidate?

All Dem presidential candidates sorted by three strategies? a) unity (Biden's bi-partisan "epiphany"; b) revolution (Bernie's political mass movement); c) change the system (Warren's anti-corruption measures, seriously almost more left than Bernie!)

2020 Campaign Notes

Warp & Woof Has Opinions

William Sundwick

Twenty-two candidates and counting*. That’s where we stand with Democratic presidential contenders for 2020. The first Democratic debate will occur late next month, and the bar for inclusion on the debate floor is low: either a 1% showing in three different authorized polls or 65,000 unique donors spread over 20 or more states. As of May 9, 18 of the 22 declared candidates had met one or the other of these easy requirements. There will be two nights, with each candidate assigned randomly to one. That means the leading candidates may not even be on the stage together in Miami.

So, what are we voters to make of this field? Do we know enough to distinguish platitudes from real policy proposals? Does it even matter? Perhaps the best way to choose in the primary is that “gut feeling” about the candidate that policy wonks despise.

It seems clear that not all 22 of the contenders really think they could become the 46^th President of the United States. Reasonable guesses about their motivations for running include advancement of their respective political (or financial) careers, or possibly a cabinet post in the administration of whichever one of them wins. We will see maneuvering as the campaign season progresses, with lower-ranking aspirants dropping out and throwing their support to one of the leaders, hoping for whatever rewards this may provide. It might be fun here to speculate on where the candidates fit on the political spectrum.

As it looks now, trying to accommodate both their backgrounds and publicly announced policy positions, a rough sorting of leading candidates – from left to right – might look something like this:

Sanders à Warren à Booker/Williamson à Harris à Buttigieg/Castro à O’Rourke/Gabbard à Inslee à Gillibrand à Klobuchar à Bennet/Hickenlooper à Biden/Delaney

Only 16 names appear in the schema above. Among the others:

•           Andrew Yang has made a splash with a fervent defense of UBI (Universal Basic Income, a set amount of money payed out to every citizen, no work requirement, via monthly check),
•          Mike Gravel (88-year-old former Senator) has a campaign run by two teenagers based on dismantling U.S. imperialism,
•          Tim Ryan and Seth Moulton (two Congressmen who opposed Nancy Pelosi for Speaker),   

•       E ric Swalwell (another Congressman who is trying to capitalize on his cozy relationship with MSNBC hosts, and focus on gun control),
•           Wayne Messam (mayor of Miramar, Florida – a bigger city than South Bend – and he’s African-American).

All of these are probably best seen as quirky opportunists, devoid of a solid place in the left-right spectrum.

Without going into nitpicking about how I came up with my idealized spectrum, it’s worth noting that none of the major candidates, except perhaps the two front runners, Sanders and Biden, see any advantage in clearly articulating where they see themselves on this spectrum. Bernie is happy to be the darling of the Left. Biden is happy to anchor his support among older “moderates.” They both believe that victory in November 2020 will belong to whomever can capture that respective territory. The rest aren’t so sure, so they appear to shift ground from speech to speech, interview to interview. That makes it difficult to place them on a spectrum.

Nobody knows the most “electable” posture for a candidate – it may not even be related to any policy positions. It may come down to who they are, not what they propose. It seems supporters of one candidate or another will be totally convinced that THEIR candidate is MOST electable. Polls show a range of results for one-on-one matchups against Trump, but they tend to defy easy analysis. Most major candidates can probably beat Trump. If there is a bias toward beauty vs. age, that certainly doesn’t explain Sanders and Biden sitting on top of those polls. Youngsters Buttigieg and O’Rourke do relatively well, but they’re not at the top. Gabbard has gone nowhere.

A presidential landslide would be good. That is what’s needed to retake the Senate. More Republican incumbents this time will be facing re-election contests (22), fewer Democrats (12). Unfortunately, most of those Republican Senators have well-established constituencies, difficult to break unless an extremely strong top-of-ticket Democrat is nominated in Milwaukee. Mitch McConnell is up for re-election in 2020, and could be defeated even if the Senate doesn’t flip.

Should impeachment be on the table before the election? Speaker Pelosi, as of now, is reluctant to embrace it. Yet, some presidential candidates are endorsing it (Warren, Castro, Harris, Moulton). Of course, the presidential candidates saying they support impeachment means it’s not an issue if they win! Perhaps that’s why it’s easy for them to support it, but hard for the current Speaker of the House.

Warp & Woof has opinions on the election campaign. Rule number one: don’t worry about labels. Republicans will call any and all Democratic policy proposals “socialist” – Bernie’s embrace of the “Democratic Socialist” label means nothing to voters, unless they plan on voting Republican anyway. And, his supporters need only point to real leftist commentators who dispute that he even is a true-blue Democratic Socialist (more a social democrat, in the European mold). But, if your middle class, or upper middle class, sensibilities cause you to feel funny about a socialist label, there is always Elizabeth Warren, who has virtually indistinguishable policy proposals from Bernie (even more radical, in some cases), but claims, like FDR, to be “saving capitalism.”

Moving rightward along the idealized political spectrum above gets you nothing except hedging your bets on what focus you want. It’s more a matter of style than substance. Jay Inslee, for instance, is the “climate” candidate, but his detailed climate plan* differs little from Beto’s, introduced a few days earlier. Booker is the “cities” candidate, but we all know that the American economy relies on more than urban production -- if there’s more money concentrated in cities it’s because that’s where the capitalists are. Gillibrand wants to be the “women’s” candidate, but half of us are men. Pete is very slick – but who is his base? (If well-educated LGBTQ folks, fine, but how many of them are there?)

Warp & Woof thinks it’s obvious that going all the way to the right, for Uncle Joe, would be tantamount to an abject surrender to Republicans – even if he wins. He didn’t represent the best of the Obama years, but was likely a “balance” V.P. candidate.

*latest news, since drafting this post, Montana governor Steve Bullock and New York mayor Bill De Blasio have announced (#23 and #24, respectively). Neither of them has earned a place in my spectrum yet. And, Jay Inslee has revealed a second climate plan, more comprehensive than the first, falling just shy of where the Ocasio-Cortez/Markey Green New Deal landed in February.

Amazon is coming! (reference: "Amazon Comes to Arlington," April 7, 2019 post)

New data from Bloomberg -- sales of ICE vehicles has already peaked in world, will represent 40% of U.S. new car sales by 2025 (50% in Europe and China), reason: cheaper batteries! (reference: "Drive Better Electrically" March 21, 2019)

Next Step in Car Shopping

Advance to the Test Drive?

William Sundwick

This year’s Washington Auto Show was in April. Held later than last year, it began to push into 2020 model year marketing territory. Nevertheless, it provided a useful opportunity to further explore the 15 vehicles that had found a place in my Crossover Shopping spreadsheet for 2019. They were all there, under one big roof at the Walter Washington Convention Center.

Indeed, planning our Friday evening outing to the show forced a decision: which stands to visit among the 15 contestants? My boredom with the process, after three years, made it easy to cancel two manufacturers from our schedule, and my wife readily agreed; we wouldn’t bother with Hyundai or Mitsubishi.

That still left a heavy burden of covering seven other stands on two floors in less than four hours before the show closed at 10:00 P.M. (We literally forgot one important display, Nissan, despite our intentions).

What we learned from this year’s show allowed us to reduce our 15 original entrants to five finalists. Each of the five comes from a different manufacturer, so advancing to the test drive, step four of my systematic process of shopping for a new car, would require some time – visiting five different dealerships.

First, the eliminations from the original list of 15 – Hyundai primarily because the Santa Fe, although new for 2019, struggles to match competitors’ fuel economy ratings, and has nothing else to set it apart from them. Mitsubishi, I feel, is still a questionable investment for the future, with reviews panning its quality and reliability. Beyond those two makes, which didn’t even warrant our attention at the show, those we saw also allowed us to eliminate more.

Scratch everything from GM – Buick, Chevrolet, and GMC – mostly due to brand image for Buick and GMC (my wife is sensitive to what sits in our driveway, no trucks, no stodgy Buick), and size/style for the Chevy Equinox (it squeaks in on the low end of my threshold for cargo volume).

Going for style is probably shallow in a new car purchase, but two eliminations were primarily due to styling. Both the Equinox and new Toyota RAV4 were, in comparison to competitors, well … ugly! The Equinox’s bustled rear quarter combined with squarish roof line just rubbed me the wrong way, reminding me of a pop-up camper. And, the RAV4, while entirely new from last year, looks like (wait for it!) a Toyota. The previous generation RAV4 had a

pleasant appearance much like its hot-selling competitors, not so this new version. Often, over the years, Toyota styling has been disturbing, very angular, depending more than others on frivolous details and faux-aggressiveness – the new RAV4 fits that unfortunate mold perfectly. It also seemed to have a cheaper interior, practical perhaps, but lacking the upscale feel of many competitors.

I also had no problem eliminating some of the larger contenders. After seeing them at the show, both my wife and I decided we could do without the Ford Edge or Subaru Outback. Yes, they’re bigger than the Escape and Forester, respectively, but the Edge is significantly more expensive than the Escape for that extra room, and Outback comes in a bigger package than Forester, but with virtually the same cargo volume!

VW’s models went in the other direction. The eliminated entrant was the smaller Golf AllTrack wagon -- like Equinox, possibly too small. And, it’s certain to be discontinued (along with all Golf wagons) for 2020. Besides, the larger Tiguan seems to sell for about the same price.

Due to my inadvertent snub of Nissan, and difficulty in eliminating something I didn’t see, the five finalists have now become:

•        Ford Escape (carry over for 2019, all new next year)
•          Honda CR-V (solid contender, as always) 
  
  
•          Nissan Rogue (can’t eliminate, although nothing exceptional save Hybrid fuel economy)
•          Subaru Forester (very impressive new body, almost indistinguishable from last year – “don’t mess with success”)
  
•          Volkswagen Tiguan (cars were locked in display! But, peering
  
  through windows and looking at stickers resulted in a thumbs-up)

Stickers on all five finalists are in the same ball park for comparably equipped models. But the Auto Show cannot convey any sense of drivability. Performance, handling, visibility can only be judged after a test drive at a dealership. These days, the usability of electronics, infotainment systems, safety features also can only be explored in a test drive.

Therefore, the test drive is the next step. It won’t happen until after the June visit of in-laws from California, however. My wife must be fully involved, and she is now concerned primarily with her sister and brother-in-law’s visit. Maybe we’ll take them along?

If it waits too late into the summer, we may be pushing up against the 2020 model year – resetting the cycle back to spreadsheet updates and research. There are multiple dealerships in Northern Virginia we might visit. For close-in Arlington, Falls Church, and Alexandria there is Koons, Jerry’s, and Ourisman Ford; Bill Page, Brown, and Landmark Honda; Passport Nissan; Beyer Subaru; and Alexandria VW. Tysons contributes Priority Nissan, Stohlman Subaru and VW. If we choose Fairfax or Springfield, we can hit Sheehy or Ted Britt Ford, Brown or Priority Nissan, Farrish or Sheehy Subaru, and Fairfax or Sheehy VW.

It’s not likely that we’ll need to drive more than one version of each of the five finalists – we’re not looking for any unusual combination of equipment, except possibly a Hybrid Rogue. So, choosing a map direction and hitting all the dealers in that vicinity might work. But it likely would require more than one afternoon, we could go twice or three times.

Is there an easier way to make our decision? The drive is the thing, it seems. Choices of color and equipment are reasonably uniform among all. Both my wife and I will be drivers, and both of us will be passengers. There will be one or two car seats in the rear. The driver will evaluate instrumentation, performance and handling, while the passenger evaluates electronics, general comfort, climate controls, and interior detailing. Only a test drive can afford this opportunity.

Since we intend to keep this car for more than ten years – as has been our habit for the last thirty years -- the answer to the question, “is there an easier way?” is emphatically no!

Our House, a History

35 Years in Our Arlington Home

William Sundwick

Our 1983 marriage presented us with two one-bedroom condos in Arlington, Virginia. We chose to live in mine (a tad nicer?), while my wife put hers on the market. The plan was to start shopping for a house, townhouse, or at least a 2-bedroom Fairlington condo, immediately. My completing school and returning to the Library of Congress from sabbatical delayed that search for a few months.

I had already been living in Arlington for ten years by that time, and my wife in her condo on Columbia Pike for five. We had been a couple since 1979.

First big question was: where do we want to live? Next question: what can we afford there? One-bedrooms in South Arlington, in those days, were selling in the mid-$20s to low-$50s. Mine, in Fairlington, was on the high end, hers on the Pike, the low end.

We had some savings, too – and, a promise of help with down payments from both sets of parents. There were no outstanding debts except for a modest car loan held by my wife (on her 1980 Chevette) -- school, a 36-hour master’s program at AU, was, amazingly, already paid up!

Therefore, our real estate agent, Mary Lee Berger, of Better Homes Realty, advised us that we should be looking in the $110 - $130 range. We were cautious about debt, however, and looked askance at the higher end of that estimate. Our limit was the low end – even lower if we could do it. Interest rates on mortgages in those days were topping 13%. As we started looking in Arlington, Alexandria, Falls Church, and Fairfax County, we soon discovered that going lower might not be possible (in any dwelling we considered acceptable).

There were two almosts, a townhouse off Carlin Springs Rd. and another in a new development called “Alden Glen” way out Lee Highway past Fairfax City. They were both priced in the $90s, but less than favorable locations and construction quality, it seemed.

We were starting to get anxious. Obvious solution, said Mary Lee, be more flexible with the financial constraints! She started mentioning single-family homes in North Arlington and Alexandria. We were skeptical of this risky step. Del Ray neighborhood? Come on!

We didn’t take her seriously but played along. She directed us to a house just coming on the market in a North Arlington neighborhood called “Madison Manor.” Never heard of it. We accompanied her on a visit. It was a pleasant neighborhood near the Westover Shopping Center, with its quaint small-town angled parking on the main through street, Washington Blvd. We knew that strip mall because of the Black Forest Inn, then a noted bakery as well as restaurant, who had catered our wedding cake in January 1983.

We discovered the local elementary school, McKinley, only a block from the house. This seemed like a plus, should we have kids. It was a good school, too, Mary Lee assured us. Another attractive detail about the neighborhood, originally developed in the 1940s as a couple dozen brick colonials and cape cods, was the easy walk to a future Metro station at East Falls Church, scheduled to open the following year. We both thought that walking to Metro, then riding straight to the Library of Congress door, was a major selling point.

Alas, as expected, it just wasn’t in our range – listed at $123,900. Mary Lee, however, assured us that the sellers, a husband/wife Arlington Police couple, were eager. Bargaining possible?

The house was incredible – eight whole rooms (albeit small) in a center-hall brick colonial. And nicely done built-in storage in the finished basement. One large family had lived in the house for several years in the 1960s, finished the basement, and used it for bedrooms for some of their six children -- before code required egress windows from basements. What would we do with all that space? No way we could afford it. But it even had a fireplace in the living room, and “ESIK” (Eating Space In Kitchen -- a bar built into one wall in the galley kitchen, maybe space for a high chair). There was also a spacious yard, front and rear, with lots of azaleas, a dogwood in front, tulip poplar providing shade in the rear, and a gravel dog run connecting driveway with aluminum shed (husband was an Arlington K-9 officer, wife a detective). The front yard was bigger, a pie-shaped corner lot, where one street comes to an end at a “through street” winding down a hill (quotes around “through street” – there are no through streets in Madison Manor). Very pleasant house, very pleasant neighborhood. Surely, Mary Lee couldn’t drive the hard bargain we needed, could she?

She did. We closed the deal for $115K. Still more than we wanted to pay, but it seemed like a veritable dream house to us. And, so it was, when we moved in. That was August 1984.  When our two boys (born 1985 and 1988) started getting bigger, however, and we all started accumulating “stuff,” things changed. But we stayed. So did the neighbors next door, who had bought their house one year before us – raising their two kids in tandem with ours. They have become family. Both families have built on – something Madison Manor (and other Arlington neighborhood) people do.

We engaged in two separate expansion projects. The first one, in 2002, finally made the boys’ bedrooms livable for teenagers, and gave us a “bonus room” (family room and bath) off the living room. Dave Merrill, a neighbor who had a daughter same age as our youngest, was our contractor – outstanding attention to detail, craftsmanship, and sensible project planning. We did make the mistake of not having a surveyor do a new plat, and ran into a penalty (both time and money) when the next door neighbors on the other side (not “family”) ascertained the foundation was outside the minimum setback – forcing us to dig it up and start over. That was on us.

But we have enhanced our living experience immensely from that addition over the last 17 years. I’m writing now from my office in an alcove off that bonus room. Our younger son negotiated his entire high school career from his bigger room, his older brother left for college shortly after completion of the project but did return home for a couple years after college.

The timing of our second big expansion project may have been a little too late for the boys to fully appreciate it, but it has given their parents the opportunity to have the large kitchen, complete with central island, that they always wanted – and, a luxurious master suite with two full closets, two separately located sinks, and vaulted ceiling. This 2009 addition paved the way for a later minor expansion of the shared hallway bath on the second floor into the original master bedroom, now a guest bedroom.

If we could get our act together to furnish the boys’ rooms, we could claim (honestly) a four-bedroom, 3 ½ bath home! We have not. We are empty nesters now, with no young families to visit us– only old people. The boys’ rooms are denuded of furnishings, except for storage. They have both become very large closets.

Next project will be finding a contractor for a final basement redo. We need to get rid of paneling and dropped ceiling. Another part of the plan will be knocking down the wall between the separate laundry room and what we call the “den” (after its original purposing as children’s bedroom with built-in storage). We want to turn a three-room basement into two rooms.

Then will come downsizing. Not sure when, but we must face the inevitable. Much of our planning now is aimed at marketplace issues. What will sell? Maximum return? We didn’t do so well in that regard with our first two additions. Zillow makes it look like we’ve invested more than we’ll get back.

But who knows? Amazon’s arrival may jack up house prices in Arlington, they say.

What Makes People Buy That Car?

Marketing Trends in the Auto Industry, a Photo Essay

William Sundwick

They were called “horseless carriages” for a reason. The earliest automobiles had open bodies fashioned from wood, sometimes with a folding top, like popular carriage designs of the time.

Soon, however, there emerged more luxurious closed bodies, often only the passenger cabin, with the driver still exposed to the elements. But these “cabs” were generally considered to occupy only the top end of the market, or livery vehicles.

The Model T Ford then created a “mass market” for automobiles in the United States. But roughly by the end of the First World War, closed bodies became more commonplace – even for the Model T. Ford had competitors by this time, many makes were marketed to less than upper-class buyers. And, as the maturing auto industry moved through the 1920s, there seemed to be a stock selection of body styles. There were coupes (with or without jump seats in the rear), sedans (two or four doors, but with full back seat), town cars and limousines for the chauffeur-driven elite (passenger

compartments separated from driver by full glass partition), and roadsters (no back seat, except possible “rumble seat”) or phaetons for the “open air” crowd (old style “touring” bodies with four doors and spacious rear seat).

These different body types appealed to folks now driving longer distances, often between cities. Both comfort and reliability became the most common marketing pitches for all auto-makers. In the U.S., General Motors, Chrysler Corporation, Nash, Hudson,

Studebaker and Packard all laid claim to significant portions of the market in the ‘20s and ‘30s. (Ford, the originator of the market, was overtaken in market share by both GM and Chrysler by the time World War II began).

Closed bodies (coupes and sedans) dominated the market from the onset of the Great Depression in 1930. Comfort and quiet, along with new features like radios, heaters, and window cranks made the passenger cabin a much more parlor-like experience, even in the popular-price segment where Chevrolet and Plymouth became the new market leaders.

Styling of auto bodies underwent some drastic changes in the 1930s. It was not just the enclosed quiet of the cabin that characterized cars of that decade, but major marketing initiatives around

“streamlining” and appearance of speed (if not reality) pitched by all manufacturers as a desirable look of the future. As always, the future was more appealing to younger buyers. And, younger buyers were coming in greater numbers as we approached entry into World War II. The most extreme futuristic streamlining, like Chrysler’s “Airflow” design of 1934, seemed avant-garde by the standards of the time.

Through the decade, running boards gradually disappeared from all cars, pontoon fenders with fared-in headlights became the norm, smooth curves replaced boxy shapes in all body styles. Horsepower ratings also began to be advertised during the 1930s and became a major marketing strategy after the war.

Tasteful, curvy streamlining and pontoon fenders began to fade post-war, as a brash new generation of designers took over in Detroit. GM’s Harley Earl (the dean of that earlier generation of stylists) retired, and people like

Raymond Loewy (Studebaker fame) took his place.

While a spacious, comfortable cabins continued to be important to the post-war auto buyer, new demands from the growing popularity of family vacations by car took on more importance. Trunks had to accommodate ever more luggage – not to mention golf clubs! This, in turn, caused another aesthetic shift in the appearance of auto bodies. Long hoods (to accommodate powerful V8 engines) were supplemented by long trunks. Cars got very large. The cabin area, now diminished as a percentage of the overall length, was made to seem bigger by much more glass. Wrap-around windshields and rear windows. The literal disappearance of side window frames (when

lowered) made the “hardtop” body style (two or four door) the most popular configuration in the ‘50s and ‘60s.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, there was a reaction to the apparent excess of the huge cars, powerful engines, and lots of chrome. Beginning even before the war, a niche market for imported small cars (usually from Britain, like Austin, Morris, MG) started to develop, especially in coastal cities. By the early ‘50s, this market had grown enough that many British automakers were equipping their export

vehicles with left-hand drive, aimed specifically at the U.S. and Canadian markets.

While the price of gasoline was never a constraint in the U.S., as it was for the native designers in Europe (not to mention their narrower urban streetscapes), the general cultural reaction against bigness and flashiness grew to such an extent that Detroit had to respond. But, since product development cycles in the auto industry are attenuated over several years, the new Detroit “compacts” didn’t arrive until 1960. By that time, Volkswagen Beetles had become a common sight in most of America. Rambler led the way somewhat earlier and could show a growing market share in the mid-to-late ‘50s as proof.

Keeping up with changing tastes of a young, more suburban, market in the fifties and sixties led to some important trends. Two body types that grew into an impressive social mainstay were convertibles and station wagons. Both body styles imbued a certain social status to their owners – convertibles implied youth, daring,

and enough affluence to have one car (of two) dedicated more to fun than practicality. Wagons frequently had three rows of seating,
for growing numbers of kids, not necessarily your own, but the neighbors’! For a while, it was thought that kids enjoyed facing the rear window in that third-row seat, although some safety concerns were later raised about that configuration. Even without the third row, wagons were great cargo carriers -- virtual car-truck hybrids! They were great for suburban shopping and family vacations, able to accommodate long things, like surfboards or plywood paneling for the basement.

Automobile marketing became more mysterious, at least in the eyes of this observer, in the 1970s.  Convertibles began to disappear – supposedly killed off by the insurance industry. And, while big cars with big engines continued to dominate Detroit, small imports retained a large following. What is strange, both for the domestic bodies and imported offerings, is the popularity of two-door models. For some reason, and I’ve been unable to find a psychological study explaining it, two-door bodies

across all segments of the market, outsold four-door bodies. Why? What possible advantage would buyers of that era see in having only two doors? Ingress and egress to the rear seat was harder. But even large cars with much rear seat leg and hip room, seemed to have popular two-door variants. Many of the two-door cars had tiny rear quarter windows, giving rear seat passengers privacy, perhaps, but decreasing visibility for driver. It seemed a perverse design trend, and it continued into the 1980s.

The coming of the BMW (and others, both foreign and domestic) four-door sport sedans in the ‘90s effectively killed that mystery market for two-door cars. There was no longer any connection

between “sportiness” and having only two doors.

Of course, throughout the history of the automobile, there have been many smaller niche markets: electric cars in the teens, sports cars from the 1920s on, drag racing wannabes in the muscle car era of the ‘60s and early ‘70s, and early 4x4s (Jeeps and pickups). Trucks moved from a rural niche market for private transportation into the mainstream with the coming of the smaller Japanese pickups in the 1980s.


The original Jeep was the first SUV. But Toyota, Nissan, then GM, Ford, and Chrysler all discovered

these truck-based wagons. The Chevy Suburban had been around since before the war but was relegated to one of those niche markets until suddenly, in the mid-70s, competition blossomed. Jeep Cherokees, Chevy Blazers, Ford Broncos, Toyota 4-Runners and Nissan Pathfinders all roared into the 1980s as the new best sellers.

 They were, indeed, trucks. They were all built on a pickup frame, with a body (two-door at first, later expanded to four doors) that
included a bouncy, but roomy, rear seat.

As trucks developed their own market segment, complete with luxo-cruisers, monster off-road vehicles, and compacts for urban living, it occurred to the intrepid auto designers that a true car-truck hybrid might fuse the enthusiasm of the SUV buyer with the family buyer who had previously settled for a matronly minivan. The “crossover” was thus born.

2018 Buick Enclave

2018 Honda CR-V

Crossovers emerged in a variety of form factors, from large three-row quasi-minivans (Buick Enclave, Toyota Highlander, Honda Pilot), to compact two-row versions (Toyota RAV-4, Honda CR-V, Subaru Forester), to sub-compact little cars (Fiat 500X, Honda HR-V, Ford EcoSport). Compact crossovers are now the hottest selling market segment of all, with larger and smaller versions close
behind.

2019 Ford EcoSport

It seems that a combination of a “high ride” (you look down on traffic) and the practicality of a large open cargo area (accommodates bulky items) are the main selling points. The main distinction between a crossover and an SUV is that the crossover always has a unitized body-frame, like other car bodies, but unlike the separate platform frame of truck-based SUVs. Hence, the ride is more car-like.

This is where we have come after more than 100 years of automotive market segmentation and design whims. Practicality combined with comfort and freedom have always ruled the marketplace. Of course, my unsupported impressions are subject to dispute. I’ve always been partial to the Harley Earl period at General Motors, myself!