In the early 1950s, America’s carmakers had a problem: their sporty convertible automobiles weren’t selling. Chevrolet, in particular, was in an overall sales slump. The marketing gurus were struggling. It was post-War, USA consumers were beginning to prosper, and the notion of owning an automobile that was fun seemed a no brainer. Or so the advertising wizards assumed. But if so, why were all three companies getting data from their dealers nationwide that sporty convertible car models — their “funmobiles” — weren’t moving off dealers’ car lots? And yet convertible sportscars in Europe were selling like hotcakes. This insistent riddle had ad agencies and marketing departments of the Big Three wrapping themselves in brainstorm fits and adding rounds to their traditional three-martini lunches.
Enter: Dr. Ernest Dichter, the “father of motivational advertising.” Dichter, whose psychological studies of male motivations provided the marketing rationale for the famous Playboy Magazine centerfold, turned his attentions to automobile consumers. Contracted by Chrysler Corporation to find out why the snazzy new Plymouth convertible wasn’t selling, he advised that every Plymouth dealer should put a shiny red convertible in their showroom, but stock up on Plymouth station wagons. Dichter’s calculous; that the dealers would attract young male husbands with their sporty convertibles, but that practical wives would force the purchase of the station wagons. Sales of Plymouth station wagons and sedans increased, due to buyers’ psychological associations with the red Plymouth convertible siblings. GM and Ford were watching.
To Chevrolet’s Zora Arkus-Duntov, there was more to this equation — that the Plymouth convertible wasn’t compelling enough. His view: it wasn’t a sportscar and it wasn’t a performance car, therefore didn’t pack enough visceral appeal for the husband to convince the wife that they should buy it. Duntov had a more radical idea: an American sportscar that would out-do its European counterparts and was so exciting that Americans absolutely had to have it!
GM designer Zora Arkus-Duntov’s “Chevrolet Corvette” debuted as a concept “dream car” in 1953 at the General Motors Motorama show in New York. Following its dramatic unveiling, 300 Corvettes were hand-built at GM’s Flint, Michigan factory and were released to the public on June 30, 1953. Although American drivers immediately fell for this sleek high performance American sportscar, there was no assurance that it would sell. GM marketers reasoned that not everybody who wanted a Corvette could buy one, but that the public’s swoon over it would elevate the Chevrolet brand and thus pep up sales of the brand overall.
Produced under the code name “Project Opal,” the Corvette was definitively American when compared to the era’s British sportscars, featuring a fiberglass body and a 3.9-liter [235-cubic-inch] straight-six engine mated to an unimpressive two-speed automatic transmission. And after the new sportscar’s promising reception at GM’s 1953 Motorama show, the Corvette was ordered into production by the GM Brass for customers, who ooohed and awed at it, but few immediately purchased it. 183 of the first 300 hand-built Corvettes were initially sold; an inauspicious start to the bloodline that became America’s sportscar. With its six-cylinder “Blue Flame” engine producing 150-horsepower and its two-speed automatic transmission (the only one offered), all Corvettes were initially available only in Polo White and sported a red interior. Due to positive market reaction to the car (despite questionable sales), GM decided to stick with its experiment and move the Corvette into full production.
Within a year the Corvette was becoming a sensation, and sales led to 1954 modifications that made the car more convenient for consumers while at the same time spiking performance for frisky drivers. This officialized the first generation Corvette and lasted for ten years. By then the Chevrolet Corvette was becoming a motorsports icon. For 1963, the second-generation Corvette debuted with an overhaul of its design and over 300 horsepower, modeled after the Chevrolet “Sting Ray” racecar. This included the first year of the Corvette Coupe, soon to be available with Chevrolet’s “big block” V8 engine.
By 1965, Corvette V8s were generating 425 hp! Fully aware that the Corvette was appealing to the racing community, Chevrolet soon offered the Corvette Sting Ray with a race-ready package (dubbed “Regular Production Option,” RPO Z06). This package added a vacuum brake booster, a dual master cylinder, power drum brakes with sintered metallic brake linings, larger shock absorbers and a bigger front anti-roll bar. Limited to Corvettes equipped with the most powerful 360-hp variant of the V-8 engine (250 hp standard) and a four-speed manual transmission, 199 RPO Z06 models were made available in 1963. From this point on, the Corvette would become synonymous with racing — from local/regional competitions to championship racing throughout the USA and Abroad.
For 1966, Chevrolet increased the Corvette Sting Ray’s engine bore to 7.0 liters [427 cubic inches], with a reported 425 horsepower, followed by a second 427 V8 in 1967 that produced stratospheric power. Dubbed L88, this top-of-the-line “bent-eight” was pegged at 430 horses on paper, but the real number was closer to 560 horsepower!
It was crystal clear by the Corvette’s second decade that the racing background of Zora Arkus-Duntov, its illustrious designer, would assure that the Chevy Corvette would end-up on the racing stage. A veteran of the 24 Hours of Le Mans in Allards and Porsches, Duntov set the Corvette on a path that would ultimately bring his progeny class honors in the 24-hours of Le Mans — and in countless other events and racetracks around the world in the years and decades to come. Along the way, a great many racing variances of the Corvette — or ‘Vette as we’ve affectionately come to know it — have blistered the tracks of North America and countries around the world, setting records and wowing crowds. These include such cars as the 1960 Cunningham Corvette, the 1963 Grand Sport Corvette, the 1960 Corvette Z06, the 1967 Corvette Le Mans, the 1968 Owens Corning Corvette, the 1970 Daytona Corvette and a dizzying lineage of Corvette racecars that have persistently sped-up our heartbeats year after year, decade after decade. 70-years and counting; the Chevrolet Corvette promises to run at non-stop RPM into the distant motorsports future.
