History "Hot Rod". What is the origin of the Term??

Nov. 5th

 

Great Thread and Great Debate - Don't you just love the HAMB

 

Rods were the pre war Roadsters used on the lakes and the flats. Mostly the coupes and other cars came along later after the war. Stripped down, sleek and ready for action they were Hot Rods. You can ask Paris Hilton what Hot means, but I think you get the idea. Baskerville got it right altho some of the other things mentioned were probably part of the evolving process too. I got that same thing from Veda Orr. When the press had to choose between all the names used to describe those hoodlem's street racing cars I think they went with Hot Rod over Hopped up Jalopy or Gow Job or the others just for the evil sounding nature of it in a headline and they needed something they could use all the time. People tend to simplify. Like "Get me a coke outa the fridge" is something you'd say even if you wanted an RC Cola out of the Maytag.

 

From the Cragar website, quoted from Brock Yates; "A contraction of hot roadster"

Kind of an interesting read..... http://cragar.com/download/reinventing_the_wheel.pdf

 

November 5. Some cool pics, starts P 86. Online at http://books.google.com/books?id=r0wEAAAAMBAJ&lpg=PA87&pg=PP1#v=onepage&q&f=false

 

We were calling them "Hot Rods" in 1949 when we formed the first Hot Rod Club in Missouri.
bill

 

My Great uncle, William Tell Martinelli, was a Swiss immigrant that came to San Francisco in the Great Earthquake aftermath. A mechanical engineer, Uncle Bill was a dedicated land speed racer, and converted a generator to a starter, retro fitted onto his early 'teen Cadillac...
One of the first stories he told me about his Model T dry lakes racer was inspired by my '30 roadster, channeled over '32 rails. (this was in '55, Uncle Bill had moved onto a Jag Coupe, a road racer.) He remarked about the "Hot Rod" term, and said that when unwinding the babbit bearinged 'T's how the rods would overheat, and the 'fellows' referred to a hopped-up 'T' as "Hot Rods", (meaning that was the condition of the engine...) as in "it's got hot rods". He said the term was shortened to 'hot rod', meaning the vehicle 'possessed' this condition, or had a resultant set of these.

 

thats the best!

 

See my profile for more info on this wood from hanks speed shop
s

 

Do you know anything else about Hank? I’m researching a 32 ford he had his hands on in the 60’s

 

Hot Rod is a term that has been around longer than most of us have been alive a colloquialism if you will,I years past what part of the country you lived had a impact on what hot rods were called in your area.

Back before HOT ROD magazine,which in my honest opinion had a huge impact with how the monaker derived,
There wasn't too much in the print media about modified cars, remember this is a huge country and Hot Rod magazine didn't come along until 1948, depending on what part of the country you resided you only had the local guys calling their cars gow jobs, hop ups, strip downs, etc. there wasn't a universal term at that time.

In my way of thinking Robert Peterson & Wally Parks & hot rod magazine helped make the term HOT ROD the name that described the cars we love.

This is just my opinion and is not carved in stone. HRP

 

a "gow job" refers to a modified or souped up car, particularly from the 1920s and 1930s, before the term "hot rod" became common. HRP