Monday, October 30, 2006
Where To From Here?
I've been a car guy for most of my life. I'm not what you would call a "grease monkey" in that I do not particularly enjoy working on cars. I just enjoy cars for what they are. Most of the cars that have really caught my interest have been the good old American bread-and-butter cars. You know, the Fords, the Chevrolets, the Pontiacs and so forth. More recently, I have become a big fan of Saturn. Suffice it to say that the American automobile has a very cherished place in my heart.
What really started me off in this direction was something my dad brought home in early 1988. It was a brand new, brown Ford Taurus GL. Now, in my short ten years of life, I had never seen a more beautiful creation on four wheels. I was very accustomed to seeing Chevy Caprices and Pontiac Phoenixes and Ford LTD Crown Vics running up and down the street. Boxy was in and that was how it was going to stay. They were an evolution of the huge, barges that roamed the streets in the late '60s through the '70s. Now, we were well into the '80s and we were pretty much at a standstill as far as automotive styling was concerned. That is, until Ford dropped the bomb on the rest of the automotive world and introduced the Taurus. Like I said, the design of the Taurus captivated my young imagination in ways that no other product (not even toys) had ever done before. It looked futuristic, like a spaceship, even. It looked like it could double as a shuttle pod for the USS Enterprise. Those fantastically sculpted fenders, the unique door frames, the aerodynamic mirror pods all beckoned for the car to be moving.
Even the interior was a work to behold. With the sculpted dashboard that blended into the doors with a most organic sense, it made everything else look practically stone-aged. With one fell swoop, the squared-off, boxy styling that had captured the American (and foreign) auto markets was passe. The seats in the Taurus were even different that what I was used to. They were less like the living room sofa and more like something from a futuristic airplane or science fiction space ship. This first Taurus was truly a work to behold.
And behold it they did. For quite a while, the Taurus was the car to have. You knew your family was cool if you had a Taurus. By the 1990s, the Taurus was the best selling car in America. It was the slap in the face to all the foreign manufacturers that the U.S. auto industry desperately needed. People flocked to the Ford dealerships to just look at the Taurus. Many, many hard-working American folks bought the Taurus and enjoyed it as a faithful family car. Sure, it had its issues. It seemed to be troubled by a faulty transmission. But that did not stop Ford from making and selling nearly 7 million of them during its 21-year run.
Then, somewhere along the line, tragedy struck for the venerable Taurus. Trucks became the dominant sales force in the American auto market. People were fascinated with four wheel drive and V8s and decreased passenger volume. The car to have was no longer the Taurus. The car to have was the F-Series Pickup and the Chevy C/K and the Suburban and the Explorer. People bought these vehicles with visions of taking off-road trips to exotic places. Few ever took such trips. They simply replaced their Tauruses with bigger, fatter and more opulent trucks. The American (and even foreign) auto industry listened carefully. Soon, instead of smartly styled cars, oversized behemoths ruled the road. A man and a wife with a child or two would not think of owning a Taurus; they had to have a Suburban. So, the poor Taurus fell to neglect and lost its competitive edge it once enjoyed. Sure, Ford continued faithfully to produce them. People still bought them. But, they were now more of a butt of jokes than the once-proud highway clippers that graced the asphalt. The foreign cars ended up surpassing the Taurus in style and grace.
Fast forward, if you will, to the present day. As of Friday, the 27th of October, 2006, there are no more new Tauruses being produced. The factory that produced the last Taurus was shut down. 1,950 people were laid off. The Taurus became a relic of the past. Now, cars are styled differently. The sharp edges are coming back into full feature on new car models. Gas prices have driven the truck market back down and cars are (almost) cool again. However, ever so slightly, can one still see the echo of the Taurus in almost every new car sold. No single vehicle in history has ever had the kind of endearing effect on future generations than did the Taurus. Ever since I first laid eyes on my dad's brown Taurus back in 1988, I have compared all car models against the "wow" factor produced by that one example. I have yet to find one that moves me the way that one did.
Now with the Taurus silently absent from the new car fleet, where do we go from here? What new products can the American people produce that will change the world in such a way? Do we concede victory to the Japanese and the Germans? For the sake of all that is holy and pure in this world, I hope and pray that we do not. Americans can produce products that are better in every way than their foreign counterparts. The Taurus demonstrated that. We just have to do it again.
What really started me off in this direction was something my dad brought home in early 1988. It was a brand new, brown Ford Taurus GL. Now, in my short ten years of life, I had never seen a more beautiful creation on four wheels. I was very accustomed to seeing Chevy Caprices and Pontiac Phoenixes and Ford LTD Crown Vics running up and down the street. Boxy was in and that was how it was going to stay. They were an evolution of the huge, barges that roamed the streets in the late '60s through the '70s. Now, we were well into the '80s and we were pretty much at a standstill as far as automotive styling was concerned. That is, until Ford dropped the bomb on the rest of the automotive world and introduced the Taurus. Like I said, the design of the Taurus captivated my young imagination in ways that no other product (not even toys) had ever done before. It looked futuristic, like a spaceship, even. It looked like it could double as a shuttle pod for the USS Enterprise. Those fantastically sculpted fenders, the unique door frames, the aerodynamic mirror pods all beckoned for the car to be moving.
Even the interior was a work to behold. With the sculpted dashboard that blended into the doors with a most organic sense, it made everything else look practically stone-aged. With one fell swoop, the squared-off, boxy styling that had captured the American (and foreign) auto markets was passe. The seats in the Taurus were even different that what I was used to. They were less like the living room sofa and more like something from a futuristic airplane or science fiction space ship. This first Taurus was truly a work to behold.
And behold it they did. For quite a while, the Taurus was the car to have. You knew your family was cool if you had a Taurus. By the 1990s, the Taurus was the best selling car in America. It was the slap in the face to all the foreign manufacturers that the U.S. auto industry desperately needed. People flocked to the Ford dealerships to just look at the Taurus. Many, many hard-working American folks bought the Taurus and enjoyed it as a faithful family car. Sure, it had its issues. It seemed to be troubled by a faulty transmission. But that did not stop Ford from making and selling nearly 7 million of them during its 21-year run.
Then, somewhere along the line, tragedy struck for the venerable Taurus. Trucks became the dominant sales force in the American auto market. People were fascinated with four wheel drive and V8s and decreased passenger volume. The car to have was no longer the Taurus. The car to have was the F-Series Pickup and the Chevy C/K and the Suburban and the Explorer. People bought these vehicles with visions of taking off-road trips to exotic places. Few ever took such trips. They simply replaced their Tauruses with bigger, fatter and more opulent trucks. The American (and even foreign) auto industry listened carefully. Soon, instead of smartly styled cars, oversized behemoths ruled the road. A man and a wife with a child or two would not think of owning a Taurus; they had to have a Suburban. So, the poor Taurus fell to neglect and lost its competitive edge it once enjoyed. Sure, Ford continued faithfully to produce them. People still bought them. But, they were now more of a butt of jokes than the once-proud highway clippers that graced the asphalt. The foreign cars ended up surpassing the Taurus in style and grace.
Fast forward, if you will, to the present day. As of Friday, the 27th of October, 2006, there are no more new Tauruses being produced. The factory that produced the last Taurus was shut down. 1,950 people were laid off. The Taurus became a relic of the past. Now, cars are styled differently. The sharp edges are coming back into full feature on new car models. Gas prices have driven the truck market back down and cars are (almost) cool again. However, ever so slightly, can one still see the echo of the Taurus in almost every new car sold. No single vehicle in history has ever had the kind of endearing effect on future generations than did the Taurus. Ever since I first laid eyes on my dad's brown Taurus back in 1988, I have compared all car models against the "wow" factor produced by that one example. I have yet to find one that moves me the way that one did.
Now with the Taurus silently absent from the new car fleet, where do we go from here? What new products can the American people produce that will change the world in such a way? Do we concede victory to the Japanese and the Germans? For the sake of all that is holy and pure in this world, I hope and pray that we do not. Americans can produce products that are better in every way than their foreign counterparts. The Taurus demonstrated that. We just have to do it again.
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