Every year a new fad makes its mark at Raccoon Forks High: often noisy, outlandish, expensive, or silly, but never dangerous or destructive. At this sleepy school, even the drag racing fad was comparatively tame . . . until David “Outlaw” Galt transferred from Capital City High. Usurping Mike Revere’s position as the best boy with the best car—and stealing the girl who went with it—Outlaw set off a power struggle the likes of which Raccoon Forks had never seen. But Mike was willing to drive his way to victory, no matter the cost.
Crash Club is another Felsen novel that captured the heart and soul of 1950s hot rod culture. The lean, mean story follows Revere’s hard-driving path to rodding redemption, riffs on some meaningful messages, and unleashes a fast and furious read. Dig in and learn what millions of readers already know; the world’s most popular hot rod novels are a hopped-up high-horsepower thrill ride.
‘If a Buick Special ever got a fierce ambition to become a Ferrari – and tried hard enough – it would be likely to end up just about like this.”
Car and Driver magazine – September, 1963
Such prophetic words from Car and Driver magazine back in 1963 underscore the goal of three California twenty somethings who sought to build a world-class grand touring sports car. And, for a while, found themselves on equal ground with Europe’s best.
Their concept: A marriage of Italian style and the mechanical excellence of a premier American manufacturer – Buick – to create a true gran turismo sports car with head-turning looks, outstanding performance and comfort, and something that, up to then, was not common among European exotics: Reliability!
Their challenges were legion: A complex product combining hand-crafted bodies with mass-produced engines and transmissions on an assembly line spanning two continents and an ocean. A limited capability for product development and testing. And the need to create a marketing program to promote the car to an enthusiast public as well as develop a distribution channel to get the car into their hands. All this with limited operating capital.
The result? The Apollo was highly praised by both road testers and owners alike. “Workmanship is of the highest quality…comparable to cars costing twice that of the Apollo” crowed one magazine report. “…the Apollo handles as well or better than a 2+2 Ferrari, an Aston Martin DB4 or a Sting Ray Corvette,” exclaimed another. High praise indeed from the critical press!
And the owners? “I dearly love my Apollo!” enthused singer Pat Boone. And this from another owner: “It’s a wonderful work of art. You can see the quality. You can feel the excitement they felt when they were hammering it out, putting it together and driving it for the first time. It is a milestone, a one-of-a-kind car and no one can really compare anything to it. It stands on its own.”
This is the story of the Apollo GT. The American Ferrari.
Details: 8.5″ x 11″, 138 pages. 87 color and black & white photos and illustrations.
“Of the rail lines created at the turn of the 20th century, in order to build interurban links through Southern California communities around metropolitan Los Angeles, the Pacific Electric grew to be the most prominent of all. The Pacific Electric Railway is synonymous with Henry Edwards Huntington, the capitalist with many decades of railroad experience, who formed the “P. E.” and expanded it as principal owner for nearly its first decade. Huntington sold his PE holdings to the giant Southern Pacific Railroad in 1910, and the following year the SP absorbed nearly every electric line in the four county area around Los Angeles in the “Great Merger” into a “new” Pacific Electric. Founded in 1901 and terminated in 1965, Pacific Electric was known as the “World’s Great Interurban.”
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NEW- UPDATED EDITION
A must for every Giulietta owner or potential owner!
Owners of Alfa Romeo Giuliettas and Giulias of the 1950s-60s were on their own in the 1970s when I served as editor of Alfantics, the newsletter of the Capital Chapter of the Alfa Romeo Owners Club, and the Alfa Owner, the newsletter of the national club. My position enabled me to observe how owners talked about and worked to keep these cars running, whether as daily drivers, restored for weekend outings, or on the track. By 1983, when my Alfa Romeo Giulietta 750 and 101 series Giuliettas and Giulias; 1954-1965 was released, my hoped-for $12 price had, sadly, morphed into $40. As soon as my book was out of print, people were paying uupload p to $400 a copy. Nowadays, I see copies offered at $100-to-$300 on the Web. This revised and updated edition continues to answer the need I saw back then and advance the story I set out to tell at the original price. This long-awaited rerelease contains more than 48% new material .
“The Belle Epoque (The Beautiful Age) coincides with the period of Edwardian extravagance so well depicted in the now famous TV series “Downton Abbey”. During this era, at the turn of the 20th century, Paris was the epicentre of fashion and art , London of society and class, Vienna of intellectual activity. New York’s own golden age was based on money, that classic American value!
There was an ebullient atmosphere everywhere , decadent and magnificent at the same time, coinciding with the momentous changes brought by modern inventions including wireless communication, the automobile, and the airplane. The privileged and moneyed classes enjoyed lives of extravagant luxury in sharp contrast to the desperate lives of the under classes, urban and rural. This contrast was even more evident in Sicily, where so many still endured medieval conditions. Palermo was one of Europe’s capitals of the period, visited regularly by royalty including the Czar of Russia and Germany’s Kaiser.
During those same years Vincenzo Florio, scion of Sicily’s leading family, created his eponymous race, the Targa Florio. He was only 23 when its first edition took place in 1906, but the honor committee included the presidents of the Automobile Clubs of the United Kingdom, France and Germany. Florio intended Sicily to be at the center of the blossoming new world of auto racing . He succeeded beyond his wildest dreams, and his story is being made into a movie titled ” Pistons, Passions & Sicilian Pleasures”. It will recount the early life of Vincenzo Florio and his friend and protege Felice Nazzaro, destined to become one of the greatest drivers of all time.
As a prelude to the release of the film, Upfolds Publishing announces the publication of the companion book..
The book narrates the experience of making this film. It is rich in illustration both historical and modern. The photographic artist Becca Parker captures both the beautiful landscapes of Sicily and the excitement of one hundred year old racing cars, reliving the passions of the Targa Florio, the oldest race in the world.
The book is a hard covered coffee table style in high definition.
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