I'm doing my senior research paper on hotrods and how they've impacted the car culture and the rest of society. My first aspect is about the history of hotrodding (origins of hotrods, major influences, etc.) and I'm having a hard time getting info. Anybody have any info on how hotrodding began? I could really use the help, and you guys are full of experience and information. Thanks a lot, Bob Galet
Yup, maybe even just after the first car was built, some guy said to himself "I can build one faster than that!" There has been much writen over the years about hotrodding how the early days were. Much of what is written about 'the beginning' is vague and good history starts shortly before World War II. I just finished the Hot Rod Chronicles which gives some history, I have several books with similar vague stories. You might try going to a good book store and looking through several books including some biographical types.
I did my senior paper on that in '98. There have been sooo many more books published on this subject since then. "The Birth of Hot Rodding" by Robert Genat, "The American Hot Rod" by Dean Batchelor, and "High Performance: The Culture and Technology of Drag Racing, 1950-2000" by Robert Post are just a few of the good ones. Just don't spend too much of the paper summarizing history without tying it into your thesis.
The affordability and availability of the Model T probably did more to plant the seeds of early hot rodding than any other one action.
Car Craft ran this series sept., oct., and nov 1966. Basicly starts with Ed Winfield and covers a lot of history.
If you read the books ,it started west and spread east. I think it started east and went west.The early races by the factories and inventers[hot rodders],model T speedsters,early speed parts and conversions ,circle racing,board tracks,beach racing,cross countryadventures,etc. all seem to be from east and midwest. Most Ca. guys say not so,because they had the weather,dry lakes,and perhaps more money,and a lot of pictures. I m not mad at nobody,just an opinion.
For college papers, the professor wants to see a bibliography, so my advice is to not write anything until you've read several books, and only use the books for quotes and extracts. Whatever you say, should be in-line with what your references say. Then add flair and style to interest the professor into giving you an "A". You're not writing a paper, you're doing research, and then do***enting it. Most universities wack this out during your first year, and you should be an expert on eye-wash by the time you're a senior The first hot rodders were at Harvard, where they put a ****'s tail on the windshield of their 1915 roadster.
You're going to have a seriously difficult time finding much in the way of primary sources. The secondary sources on the market (like the Genat or Batchelor books) don't use citations or bibliographies. Those authors were hot rodders themselves, not academics, so they didn't care about people being able to duplicate their research. Plus, I believe a lot of their information came from interviews with original hot rodders (or people who knew original hot rodders) and from do***ents in private collections. I sometimes fear the real history of hot rodding is going to dissolve into myth simply because there's no real academic interest in it. -Dave
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