In 1909, a woman's place was, indeed, in the home. Women would not have the right to vote for another decade. Few women drove cars, and some doctors had suggested it was dangerous for women to even ride in them, pronouncing that women became too excited at speeds of fifteen to twenty miles an hour and would be unable to sleep at night. There was also the danger of "automobile face" - a perpetually open mouth that resulted in sinus trouble.

But the fervor surrounding the automobile would not be embraced solely by the male gender and motivated by the spirit of adventure, Alice Huyler Ramsey sought to do what had never been done before - she became the first woman to drive across the country in an automobile. ...

I was taking a walk last month and noticed in a ditch alongside the road several hubcaps looking lonely and forlorn. It reminded me of a car experience I had many years ago with a Pontiac I owned. As fate and a big bump in the road had their way with my car I lost a hubcap and thus began the process of finding a replacement. This was prior to web buying. My pocketbook could not handle a brand new one from a dealership so I began the quest of finding one by classic networking. ...

No one ever accused the brilliant and eccentric auto man, William Billy Durant of thinking small. Through his Durant-Dort company, he helped make Flint the carriage capital of the nation, he founded one of the largest corporations in the world in General Motors in 1908 and, after being booted out of control of GM for a second time, he founded his own car company, appropriately named Durant Motors in the 1920s.


So it was no surprise that in 1919, while still making the major decisions at GM, that Durant commissioned renowned architect, Albert Kahn, to build the largest office building in the world. He had to settle for second largest, but the GM Building is a tribute not only to the man who did things large, but the promise that the automobile business held for the future of Detroit “ the Motor City. ...

The year was 1994 and a Ferndale plumber, Nelson House, being community minded, decided the city needed a children’s soccer field. So he enlisted the support of the community to make this happen. The idea was a fund raiser focusing on a “remembrance time” when classic cars cruised the strip of Woodward Avenue. The idea was original, it focused on the heartbeat of “The Motor City” and everyone knew car enthusiasts or was one themselves. So the community organizations voted to make it happen. The premise was to recreate the nostalgic heydays of the 50’s and 60’s, when music, youth, food and Motor City steel dominated Woodward Avenue. ...

For those of us who have our black belt in shopping we know every season there are changes in fashion design and what the stores are showing; there is the Fall Fashion Collection and the Spring Fashion Collection. The change is meant to resurge our wardrobes, and increase the bottom line of designers and stores. The automobile industry has the same concept; change the design of the car and people will buy the new model. Due to the American automobile market reaching a saturation point a decision in 1924 to create annual model-year design changes came about. This meant a new styling development or change in a vehicle’s appearance and to some extent the ergonomics. Yes, it was primarily changing the looks of a car in a strategy planned to create “classic” cars and create the obsolescence factor in those vehicles with “ho-hum” value in the looks department. ...