April 1951: Tomorrow’s Atom Car!
Our predecessors found a crackpot professor
who was “telling his automotive students that
within their lifetimes there will be atomic energy
to contend with as a motive force for personal
transportation.” Atomic Energy Commission
member George Granger Brown found the
notion pretty far-fetched, given that such a
car “would be around 20 by 40 feet in size and
weigh many tons.“ Frank Markus
May 1951: The Fabulous Bugatti Atlantique
The car is one of the most incredible of all time.
I’m guessing this is Ralph Lauren’s car, and the
original red is now buried under 70 coats of black
on black. Then you have the lovely Pacific Ocean,
the photo likely shot in Pacific Palisades looking
toward Santa Monica. The clincher, though, is a
man’s arm coming out of the driver-side window
and lighting the woman’s cigarette! Times have
changed, that’s for sure! Jonny LiebermanOctober 1952: Unique Cars for Sportsmen
This issue is the first to feature a Jeep on
the cover—and I don’t think the Jeep brand
could have asked for a better MT debut.
The illustration of the Willys Jeep perfectly
communicates the vehicle’s adventurous spirit,
which lives on in its modern descendant, the
Jeep Wrangler. The cover shows that four-
wheeling (or six-wheeling, as shown here) has
always been—and hopefully always will be—an
important trend for us to follow. Alex Nishimoto
November 1957: Driving GM’s Hot ’58!
My idea of a magazine cover is that it should
arouse interest, capture imagination, and
inspire flights of fantasy. Many times, these
images are overproduced to the point of
appearing to be advertisements. This cover
instead uses the Ernst Haas method of blur-
motion photography to provoke heart-pumping
emotion with the speeding Pontiac. Evidently,
the idea was ahead of its time, because we
didn’t use a blur-motion cover shot again for
seven more years. Mark Rechtin
SEPTEMBER 2019 MOTORTREND.COM 81