32-valve DOHC heads, titanium connecting rods, and superchargers were built by the thousands in the years they were offered. Despite a handful of super rare models (1963 Z06, 1969 ZL1), even the hottest Corvettes were available to the masses. There was no years-long waiting list.
Finally, while some Corvette historians lump the 1953–1962 cars into a category generally called the C1, I feel that finer divisions are warranted. Here, the 1953–1955 cars are considered as one group, while the 1956–1962 models are treated as another. Thus, this book uses eight chapters to cover the eight distinct generations as I see them.
Keep in mind that with a project like this, the most challenging task is deciding what to leave out, not what to include. Each chapter is divided into five sections: Legend and Lore, Body and Interior, Engine and Driveline, Suspension and Brakes, and Number Crunching and Press Commentary. In each, I’ve loaded an interesting cross section of data. But again, I barely scratched the surface of all there is to know and learn about America’s original sports car. I hope you enjoy the book as much as I enjoyed writing it!
1953–1955 C1a: From Motorama to Main Street
1 Was the Corvette really America’s first mass-produced fiberglass-bodied sports car? Or did the Kaiser Darrin 161 beat it to the punch? It’s a common debate among car enthusiasts. Although Kaiser formally introduced its fiberglass Darrin on September 26, 1952, customers had to wait until January 6, 1954, for actual delivery. By that date, Corvettes had been cruising the streets of America for six months; the first regular-production units (as opposed to engineering/styling prototypes) rolled off the Flint, Michigan, line on June 30, 1953.
Heavy preproduction publicity was no substitute for cars in driveways. The fiberglass-bodied Kaiser Darrin trailed the Corvette into the showroom.
2 Oh, what might have been. In an official GM new-product press release dated January 16, 1953, the name Corvette is spelled Courvette. Had the odd spelling occurred once, we might chalk it up to a simple typographical error. But the Courvette nomenclature appeared several more times in the same document. Interestingly, 26 years earlier, on June 23, 1927, the General Motors Art and Colour Section was established, with creative genius Harley Earl in charge. The British spelling of the word “color” was intentional and added exotic flair. Although officially renamed the General Motors Styling Section in 1937, the memorable Art and Colour moniker is still used informally.
3 The man responsible for naming Corvette was a Chevrolet public-relations executive named Myron C. Scott. Despite his significant contribution to automotive history, Mr. Scott wasn’t compensated beyond his normal salary. By contrast, over at Ford, division manager L. D. Cruso initiated an in-house name-storming contest which Ford designer Alden Giberson won when he suggested the name Thunderbird. Initially, a new suit worth $250 was at stake, but records show Giberson accepted $95 cash and a pair of trousers from Saks Fifth Avenue, instead.
4 The Corvette’s first public unveiling took place on January 14, 1953, in the third-floor Grand Ballroom of New York City’s prestigious Waldorf Astoria Hotel. Part of the GM Motorama car show, one group of spectators frustrated the venue’s security detail by repeatedly slipping past the ropes and brazenly tape-measuring the show car’s dimensions and snapping numerous photographs. A little digging revealed the intruders to be product planners and engineers from Ford. Its two-seated rival, the Thunderbird, went on sale on October 22, 1954, more than 20 months later. Undoubtedly, details gathered by the Waldorf Astoria snoops helped shape the Thunderbird’s final configuration.
With more than 20 months to study and scrutinize Chevy’s new Corvette, the designers behind Ford’s competing Thunderbird drew plenty of clandestine, and overt, inspiration from GM’s groundbreaking triumph.
5 Hello, OnStar? Releasing the Corvette amid the paranoia of the McCarthy era, General Motors allegedly placed hidden tape recorders throughout the 1953 Waldorf Astoria Motorama display. Its purpose was to gather unfiltered comments about the cars from viewers. This technique is still used by automakers at car shows and media drive events seeking candid opinions about new products. Some say modern onboard security and navigation devices such as OnStar have similar capabilities . . . say nice things to your new Corvette. Somebody might be listening.
6 One visitor at the Corvette’s January 1953 NYC debut was a recently unemployed 43-year-old engineer who’d just returned home from a work sabbatical in England. There, he helped Sydney Allard develop and race his hand-built sports cars at Le Mans. However, the contract ended, so he returned to the United States seeking employment. Approaching middle age, this visitor was so taken with Corvette’s potential that he applied for a job at General Motors. This man’s name was Zora Arkus-Duntov.
7 Many Corvette fans mistakenly believe that Arkus-Duntov was the father of the Corvette. However, GM design legend Harley Earl deserves the credit. Deeply impressed by the post–World War II British sports cars that he saw during visits to his son’s affluent college campus, Earl decided that Chevrolet needed a sporty model to boost its image with younger buyers. Arkus-Duntov, on the other hand, can be seen as the man who steered the Corvette program in the right direction for the next 20 years. He wrote, “Since we cannot prevent the people from racing Corvettes, maybe it is better to help them to do a good job at it.”
8 Arkus-Duntov’s employment at Chevrolet spanned from May 1, 1953, to December 25, 1974, ending only due to GM’s policy of mandatory retirement at age 65. Among the speakers at his January 13, 1975, retirement banquet were GM design chief Bill Mitchell and the wonderful and ever-present Linda Vaughn, Hurst’s Miss Golden Shifter and general automotive ambassador.
9 The Corvette displayed at the January 1953 Waldorf Astoria show was a running prototype with an identification tag bearing number EX-122. After touring the United States on the 1953 Motorama show circuit, EX-122 remained at General Motors as an engineering “plaything” until it was sold to a private party in April 1956. As the car that attracted Arkus-Duntov’s eye and led directly to his employment at Chevrolet, this car’s significance cannot be overstated. It still exists and is in caring hands.
10 In his 84 years (born December 25, 1909, died April 21, 1996), Arkus-Duntov witnessed the Russian Revolution of 1917, joined the French Air Force, escaped from Nazi-occupied France, and even devised a hemispherical cylinder-head conversion kit for the Ford flathead V-8. Ever heard of the Ardun OHV Ford? Yep, that’s him . . . a decade before his 1953 switch to General Motors.
11 Despite erroneous reports to the contrary, Ford did not fund Arkus-Duntov’s Ardun flathead V-8 hemispherical cylinder-head conversion program. In fact, after an arranged meeting in about 1947 at which Arkus-Duntov demonstrated a converted flathead to Ford engineers, they declined becoming involved. The Ardun project was funded entirely by Arkus-Duntov and his backers. Ironically, the undoing of the Arkus-Duntov hemispherical head conversion package was the Ford flathead engine block that the heads were bolted to. With only three main bearings, it lacked the structural integrity to support the elevated power unleashed