Buehrig became very close to the Duesenberg brothers and in fact was invited to live in the home of Fred's family and did so for over three years. His fabulous Duesenberg designs include the Shreve Archer Judkins Coupe, the Judkins Victoria Coupe, the Beverly Berline, the Derham Tourster, the Torpedo Phaeton, the Brunn Town Car, the Roliston Convertible Torpedo Victoria, the Whittell Speedster, the Derham Four-Door Convertible, the La Grande Phaeton and the Arlington, better known as The Twenty Grand. He also designed the famous "Duesenbird" radiator ornament.

In 1930, Buehrig took delivery on a new Ford and proceeded to give it something a little different, a body by Buehrig. Augie Duesenberg's racecar shop went to work and the car was cut in half and the back half discarded. Changes included the windshield and door hinge pillar being cut down three inches and a special engine hood four and one-half inches longer than the original. The back half was rebuilt. Then it was taken to the plant and given the same quality paint and trim used on the Duesenberg. Experimental balloon tires were added later as well as a redesigned radiator and other changes. MoToR Magazine wrote about the car and Buehrig drove it 89,000 miles before selling it in 1934.

In 1934, Auburn Automobile Company's line wasn't being received well by the public. Harold Ames, the company's vice president, brought Buehrig to the project to redesign the 1934 line. The result was the classic 1935 line introduced in mid-year. Later in 1935, Buehrig also produced the Auburn Speedster, which was so popular that it remained unchanged in 1936 except for the number on the grill.

In 1933, Buehrig had designed a "Baby Duesenberg" for the company that was to be a fast car and sell at a lesser cost. It had two outrigger radiators on either side of the car between the front fenders and the body. But, the twin radiator system proved inadequate under high ambient temperatures and he was taken off this project to design the 1935 Auburn. When asked to design a new Cord, he brought back to life some of his concepts for the Baby Duesenberg. According to Buehrig, "the opportunity to work out the design of the new Cord and to have it a front wheel drive vehicle gave me an assignment as ideal as an automotive designer could imagine." He also remembered the engineering department excitement was so great, many worked extra several nights a week while listening to Fred Allen, Amos and Andy and other popular radio programs. Everyone considered working on the Cord fun.

Though it was fun, the Cord project had many problems within the company and was killed while Buehrig was on his honeymoon in December of 1934. After his return, it was resurrected, but by this time the company had less than four months to complete 100 cars for the 1935 New York Auto Show. They made the deadline because the cars did not have transmissions, which were still being fully developed, and the phaetons were all shown with the tops down because these particular cars didn't have any tops.

None of this mattered. The Cord stopped the show. People were having to stand on surrounding cars just to get a glimpse of the beautiful Cord with its exciting new design.

Buehrig left Auburn Automobile and went to the Budd Company where he designed an economy car called the Wowser. It was never produced. His next position was at White Truck and the King Seeley Company. He eventually went to Studebaker, and while there, a private opportunity presented itself.

A group of men wanted Buehrig to design a car to be used for European-style grand prix racing in New York State. The result was the Tasco, an acronym for The American Sports Car Company. Buehrig was never satisfied with the design, which was done by a committee of investors rather than one designer. He considered the Tasco his personal Edsel. But, from this car came the design for a top, which became the removable T-top for Thunderbird and eventually Corvette. The only Tasco made is now on display at the Auburn-Cord-Duesenberg Museum.

Buehrig finally worked for the Ford Motor Company from 1949 until his retirement in 1965. While there, his projects included the 1951 Ford Victoria Coupe, a 1952 Ford all-metal station wagon and the Continental Mark 11.

Upon his retirement from Ford, Buehrig was asked to teach a course in plastics at the Art Center College of Design in Los Angeles. He taught there five years.

Not only has Buehrig received accolades from nearly every automotive publication in the country, but also he has the distinction of having his 810 Cord recognized by the Museum of Modem Art. In 1951, the museum printed in its catalogue "the originality of the conception and the skill with which its several parts have been realized makes it one of the most powerful designs in the exhibition...."

His designs will remain some of the most powerful in automotive history.

7his article is a brief synopsis of the book, Rolling Sculpture, written by Gordon Buehrig in conjunction with William S. Jackson.

xxxxxxx

Cord 810

This snapshot of the quarter-scale clay model was taken by Gordon Buehrig and Dale Cosper in July 1935. So perfect was the model that the production version of the Cord 810 differed only in details. Windshield and rear window became 2-piece designs, because curved glass wasn't available. Bumpers were replaced with a stock design that could be purchased from a supplier. Fender seams were not needed, and sheetmetal covering the transmission was reshaped.

The clay model was painted with red lacquer.

Gordon Miller Buehrig was born in 1904 in Mason City, Illinois. At 20, he got his first job in the automobile industry as chief engineer of the Gotfredson Body Company. In the next five years, he gained experience at Dietrich Incorporated, Packard, General Motors and Stutz. When he was only 25, Gordon Buehrig became the chief body designer for the most prestigious automobile in the United States, Duesenberg.

Buehrig became very close to the Duesenberg brothers and in fact was invited to live in the home of Fred's family and did so for over three years. His fabulous Duesenberg designs include the Shreve Archer Judkins Coupe, the Judkins Victoria Coupe, the Beverly Berline, the Derham Tourster, the Torpedo Phaeton, the Brunn Town Car, the Rollston Convertible Torpedo Victoria, the Whittell Speedster, the Derham Four-Door Convertible,
the La Grande Phaeton and the Arlington, better known as The Twenty Grand. He also designed the famous "Duesenbird'' radiator ornament.

In 1930, Buehrig took delivery on a new Ford and proceeded to give it something a little different, a body by Buehrig. Augie Duesenberg's race car shop went to work and the car was cut in half and the back half discarded. Changes included the windshield and door hinge pillar being cut down three inches and a special engine hood four and one-half inches longer than the original. The back half was rebuilt. Then it was taken to the plant and given the same quality paint and trim used on the Duesenberg. Experimental balloon tires were added later as well as a redesigned radiator and other changes. Motor Magazine wrote about the car and Buehrig drove it 89,000 miles before selling it in 1934.

In 1934, Auburn Automobile Company's line wasn't being received well by the public. Harold Ames, the company's vice president, brought Buehrig to the project to redesign the 1934 line. The result was the classic 1935 line introduced in mid-year. Later in 1935, Buehrig also produced the Auburn Speedster which was so popular that it remained unchanged in 1936 except for the number on the grill.

In 1933, Buehrig had designed a "Baby Duesenberg" for the company which was to be a fast car and sell at a lesser cost. It had two outrigger radiators on either side of the car between the front fenders and the body. But, the twin radiator system proved inadequate under high ambient temperatures and he was taken off this project to design the 1935 Auburn. When asked to design a new Cord, he brought back to life some of his concepts for the Baby Duesenberg. According to Buehrig, "the opportunity to work out the design of the new Cord and to have it a front wheel drive vehicle gave me an assignment as ideal as an automotive designer could imagine." He also remembered the engineering department excitement was so great, many worked extra several nights a week while listening to Fred Allen. Amos and Andy and other popular radio programs. Everyone considered working on the Cord fun.

Though it was fun, the Cord project had many problems within the company and was killed while Buehrig was on his honeymoon in December of 1934. After his return, it was resurrected, but by this time the company had less than four months to complete 100 cars
for the 1935 New York Auto Show. They made the deadline because the cars did not have transmissions. which were still being fully developed, and the phaetons were all shown with the tops down because these particular cars didn't have any tops.

None of this mattered. The Cord stopped the show. People were having to stand on surrounding cars just to get a glimpse of the beautiful Cord with its exciting new design.

Buehrig left Auburn Automobile and went to the Budd Company where he designed an economy car called the Wowser. It was never produced. His next position was at White Truck and the King Seeley Company. He eventually went to Studebaker and while there,
a private opportunity presented itself.

A group of men wanted Buehrig to design a car to be used for European-style grand prix racing in New York State. The result was the "Tasco", an acronym tar 'The American Sports Car Company. Buehrig was never satisfied with the design which was done by a committee of investors rather than one deigned He considered the Tasco his personal Edsel. But, from this car came the design for a top which became the removable T-top for Thunderbird and eventually Corvette. The only Tasco made is now on display at the Auburn-Cord-Duesenberg Museum.

Buehrig finally worked for the Ford Motor Company from 1949 until his retirement in 1965. While there, his projects included the 1951 Ford Victoria Coupe, a 1952 Ford all-metal station wagon and the Continental Mark II.

Upon his retirement from Ford, Buehrig was asked to teach a course in plastics at the Art Center College of Design in Los Angeles. He taught there five years.

Not only has Buehrig received accolades from nearly every automotive publication in the country, but also he has the distinction of having his 810 Cord recognized by the Museum of Modern Art. In 1951, the museum printed in its catalogue "the originality of the conception and the skill with which its several parts have been realized makes it one of the most powerful designs in the exhibition ....''

His designs will remain some of the most powerful in automotive history.

Gordon Buehrig's 55th year in the automotive design field was highlighted by Detroit entrepreneur Richard Kughn introducing the Buehrig Motor Car. It was designed by Buehrig and was meant to combine luxury with race car sleekness in the neo-classical style.

The Buehrig is a Carriage Roof Coupe hand-built of fiberglass. It is powered by a 350 cubic inch General Motors V8 engine with computerized fuel injection and a four-speed Turbo-Hydromatic 400 automatic transmission. The car sits on a lengthened Corvette chassis and weighs 3300 pounds.

To the first prototype, Buehrig added two very personal features: first, Sweden's national colors of blue and yellow were used throughout the interior in honor of his wife, Kay, who is of Swedish ancestry and second, he added a T-top, which he originally designed some thirty years earlier.

The Buehrig Motor Car was meant to be a limited production automobile, selling for approximately $130,000. However, the company fell victim to the astronomical costs of manufacturing and only four prototypes were produced.

Richard and Linda Kughn graciously donated the company's first prototype Buehrig to the Auburn-Cord-Duesenberg Museum. It sits proudly next to Buehrig's Cord 810 and the Tasco which is adjacent to the restored Auburn Automobile Company design studios which Buehrig headed in 1934-1936.

LARGE BEAUTIFUL AUTOMOBILE
In November, 1988 Gordon Buehrig entered a competition for The Rolex Awards For Enterprise 1990. His project title: Large Cars of the Future. The following are excerpts from the application form Buehrig filled out.

''I have little formal education to record. I graduated from high school in 1922 in my home town of Mason City, Illinois. I attended the Fall and Spring term at Bradley College (1922-23) now Bradley University. in Peoria, Illinois. I also attended the Spring term of 1924.

As a child I was fascinated with automobiles and about age ten I decided that I wanted to be an automobile designer. When I was nineteen I met an automobile executive in Chicago who advised me on my career. He said that before I try to design automobile bodies I should learn how to build them and that I should start as an apprentice in the body factory."

A brief description of the project: "Large Cars of the Future: A completely new concept which incorporates the use of two small engines rather than one large one to propel the vehicle. Why? By this arrangement the following advantages are achieved:

1. Approximately a 50% improvement in fuel efficiency.
2. Approximately 30% more people space in a vehicle of the same length and width.
3. Greatly improved ride due to optimum weight distribution.
4. Four wheel drive when desired.
5. Improved aerodynamic shape.
6. Greater dependability
7. A more diverse market.
8. A totally new look.

A detailed project description included:
"The LBA (large beautiful automobile) has a 3 liter V6 engine driving the front wheels and a 2 1/2 liter engine driving the rear wheels. On a trip the operator sets the cruise control at 70 miles per hour or at whatever speed he desires and shuts off the rear engine which automatically goes into neutral. By this arrangement. the car will operate at an estimated 30 miles per gallon. At 70 miles, the car only requires 20 horse-power. Note: A special device is required to put the rear automatic transmission into free wheeling when it is in neutral.

Although this is a completely new concept for large cars, it uses all present day technology and parts. In other words, no new inventions are required and present day state of the art methods of manufacture of both the chassis and the body are used. Consequently producing such a vehicle presents no unsolved problems to either the engineering department of a company or to its manufacturing division."

''The front engine is larger than the rear because it drives the accessories: the alternator to charge the battery, power steering, air conditioning etc. Synchronization of the two engines is not a problem. Friction between the tires and the road surface will keep the wheels turning at the same speed even if one engine is producing more power."

7his article is a brief synopsis of the book, Rolling Sculpture, written by Gordon Buehrig in conjunction with William S. Jackson.

xxxxx

GORDON BUEHRIG

This first Eyes on Design show (formerly Eyes on the Classics) paid tribute to automobile design of the past, present and future. It is therefore fitting that the first designer to receive our Lifetime Achievement Award is the man responsible for the styling of more automobiles that are revered and collected by classic car enthusiasts than any other designer.

The Detroit Institute of Ophthalmology and the Eyes on the Classics committee is proud to honor Gordon Miller Buehrig's vision and contributions to the art form of automobile design by presenting him with the Steuben Lifetime Achievement Award.

Buehrig, among the last of the great individual American car stylists, designed automobiles that make classic car lovers' eyes light up--such names as Duesenberg, Cord, Stutz, Auburn.

At the age of 24 he began developing sketches and then production drawings of what eventually became Detroit's rolling sculpture. Today, more than 60 years later, he continues to create clay models and drawings with the clean lines and pure beauty that epitomize classic automobiles.

Buehrig considers himself an automobile architect and sculptor rather than a technologist and engineer. Throughout his career, he chose opportunities to create individual new designs over those which offered financial security and career advancements.

Born in Mason City, Illinois on July 18, 1904, Buehrig has had a lifelong passion for cars. While in high school, he tried to create a speedster body for a 1904 Orient Buckboard by covering the car's wooden framework with canvas.

Buehrig's first design job was in November 1924 as a 40 cents per hour apprentice with the Gotfredson Body Company in Wayne, Michigan. There he learned about composite bodies, working as detailer and running the blueprint machine. In January 1926, he began earning more money at a new job as a draftsman with Dietrich Body Company. He quit that August, driving to California with his brother, in hopes of working for Walter Murphy. This was not to be. Buehrig returned to Detroit, in December 1926, worked for the Edward G. Budd Company and was laid off.

He soon found a job at Packard. There he split his time working as a detailer and as a full-size body draftsman, earning $200 a month.

In 1927, he took a $30-a-month cut in pay to become one of the first designers at General Motors' Art and Color Section, under the direction of Harley Earl. He immediately went to work designing the instrument panel of the 1929 "pregnant Buick."

Buehrig bought his first car in 1928 while at General Motors--a 1929 Buick roadster and soon found that making $80-a-month payments on the car left him very little to live on. Afraid to approach Mr. Earl for a pay raise, he interviewed with Stutz, and at age 24, was hired as the auto company's chief body designer.

He left General Motors on November 28, 1928. That week, Buehrig drove his Buick to New York for the Auto Salon, where, in the lobby of the Hotel Commodore, he spied the Model J Duesenberg. Buehrig says he never dreamed that he would soon be chief designer.

He joined Stutz in Indianapolis on December 10, 1928. While there, he designed the boat-tailed bodies for the three Stutz 1929 Le Mans entries. These were the first Buehrig-designed bodies built by Weymann American Body Company of Indianapolis. They later produced a number of Buehrig's Duesenberg designs. Buehrig's only design which reached production at Stutz was the rework of the cowl and windshield on roadster and phaeton models LeBaron created.

In 1925, young American men would have done most anything to get close to the American dream machines--the Duesenbergs. A meeting with Duesenberg sales manager Harold T. Ames led Buehrig to the ultimate dream for a designer becoming chief designer for the fastest, most prestigious and luxurious motor car in the country.

"The best fringe benefit of working for Duesenberg was being allowed to drive all the cars . . . I used to drive all night, with the top down, the moon up . . . just drive," Buehrig says today.

Buehrig's first challenge was to design more exclusive bodies for Duesenberg patrons. Three days after joining Duesenberg, Buehrig made a tour of the coach-builders facilities. Working with the sales department at Duesenberg, he prepared side view drawings of proposed designs which were presented to customers. When an order came in, Buehrig drew an eighth-scale body draft which was turned over to the selected coachbuilder to produce.

The first Buehrig-designed Duesenberg was a close-coupled coupe on a short wheelbase chassis. It was built by Judkins, as was his second design, a five-passenger coupe. The first popular Duesenberg, the Beverly Sedan, was built by Murphy and Rollston.

Buehrig's favorite "Doozie" was the Derham Tourster, a show car finished in goldenrod yellow with pale green fenders. Displayed at the Drake Hotel Salon and later at Los Angeles, it was purchased by actor Gary Cooper. Buehrig's next-favorite model and the only car he designed to a customer's specific wishes, was the Brunn Torpedo Phaeton built for Marc Lawrence. Considered by many to be the most elegant open Duesenberg, it became one of the first Model SJ's. The model was converted into the super-charged version in the summer of 1932, and reproduced in four more bodies by Weymann and A. H. Walter.

Working at Duesenberg did not mean Buehrig could afford to own one, so he designed a car for himself on a Model A Ford chassis--he lowered the top, transformed it into a convertible victoria and regained headroom by dropping the seats through the floorboards.

Buehrig left Duesenberg in 1932 as luxury car sales, which had been slowing even before the Depression, continued to lag. In the fall of 1932, Howard O'Leary, Harvey Earl's assistant at General Motors, invited Buehrig to rejoin the Art and Color Section at GM, which he did in February 1933.

At GM, the germ of the idea which became Buehrig's masterpiece--the 810 Cord--evolved. Buehrig, who liked clean engine compartments, wanted to seal the hood and use external radiators. That was the theme for his team's entry in an in-house GM design contest. While the idea did not win, it stayed with Buehrig.

Buehrig rejoined Duesenberg in the fall of 1933 to work again for Ames, who by this time was company president. Ames liked the marketing strategy for the revised La Salle, introduced in the fall of 1933. It was an inexpensive version using off-the-shelf parts from a higher priced production car, the Oldsmobile, while retaining the prestige of the La Salle name. Ames wanted to make and market a Duesenberg made from Auburn parts, and he wanted Buehrig to design the car.

On November 7, 1933, Buehrig drew two small pencil sketches of a stream-lined sedan, his idea for the baby Duesenberg, with sealed hood and external radiators. A prototype was started on an experimental chassis designed by August Duesenberg. The car, completed in the spring of 1934, was a clear reflection of Buehrig's sketches. But by this time Ames had more pressing problems. He took Buehrig off the project to provide a fast facelift to the 1935 Auburn line. During a fourth of July weekend, Buehrig and Ames reworked the Auburn design--straightening the belt line, changing fender dies, creating new hood louvers, smaller and better headlights and a new radiator.

Buehrig also designed the boat-tail 851/852 Auburn speedster, revered by car collectors today, using some of the 100 1933 Auburn speedster bodies which were unused at the Union City Body Company.

In the meantime, the baby Duesenberg had been transformed and was reintroduced as a front-wheel-drive Cord. Buehrig led a small group of designers, including Dale Cosper, Dick Robertson, Vince Gardener and Paul Lorenzen, to develop a quarter-scale model. The late Bart Cotter, then assistant chief body draftsman and later head of Fisher Body Engineering, "eye- balled" the full-size body drawings from a series of 10-inch sections. Tooling was started and most of the body dies were completed by late 1934. The result would be the Cord 810 whose bold and innovative styling would capture and hold the interest of classic car enthusiasts.

At about that time, Buehrig married Betty Whitten. When he returned from his honeymoon, he found the project halted, with talk about alternate programs with less expensive tooling. The Cord was saved through the efforts of Roy Falkner, president of Auburn, who sold the project to the company's board of directors with a set of photographs of the clay model. Buehrig and Cosper had taken and processed the photos during a frantic all-night session and rushed them to Chicago in time for the meeting.

The next challenge was to complete the required 100 production models in less than five months to show the car at the New York Auto Show. Auburn employees finished 100 hand-assembled cars by show time, but the transmissions were not completed and the cars could not be demonstrated. The Cord was the hit of the show and orders poured in. But it was six months before they could be filled and marketing of the car suffered, Buehrig reminisces.

Buehrig's small staff translated the basic four-door Cord design into a three-passenger convertible coupe and a five-passenger car billed as a "convertible phaeton sedan." The latter was actually a convertible victoria with rear quarter windows, a pioneer to the modern convertible style, The quarter window of the Cord Phaeton was solidly attached to the main bow and could not be opened when the top was up; it rotated to the down position as the top was folded.

The 812 Cords of 1937 included supercharged models which required new hood inset panels to accommodate the chromed external exhaust headers. Buehrig's design team also created a stretched-out sedan on a 132-inch wheelbase which was offered in two trim series--the Custom Berline and the Custom Beverly.

After serving as director of the design department at Auburn Automobile Company for slightly less than three years, Buehrig left the company in September 1936. A month later, he joined the Budd Company in the same capacity, where he concentrated on speculative prototype design. He stayed at Budd for almost two years, leaving to free-lance as a designer.

The next decade was a frustrating time for the designer who had carved a niche in auto design history with his creations of Auburns, Cords and Duesenbergs. The market for luxury cars was very small and auto design influence was concentrated at Ford, Chrysler and General Motors.

Immediately after the Bombing of Pearl Harbor, Buehrig became involved in aircraft component design, to which he brought his knowledge and expertise in surface development. At the end of the war, he worked briefly in the design department at Studebaker under Raymond Loewy, but was soon a free-lancer again, and even took a sales job as a manufacturer's representative.

By 1948, Buehrig wondered if he would ever get back to what he loved best, auto design. He did, with Ford Motor Company. In 1949, Buehrig went to work for Ford's John Oswald, then head of body engineering and styIing, as head of the body development studio. One of five studios at Ford Styling, this group was responsible for creating station wagons and convertibles from standard sedan bodies designed in the other studios. Buehrig's first assignment was the car which became the 1951 Ford hardtop.

Ford management asked the body development studio to create an all-metal station wagon patterned after the wood-paneled models in production. Buehrig's group did so, simultaneously proposing a wagon which did not copy-cat the "woodie." With sedan doors and other production panels, it cost $200 less to produce. Introduced in 1952, the Ranchwagon boosted Ford's annual station wagon sales from 7,000 to 140,000 units.

In 1952, Buehrig was named chief body designer for the Continental Mark II project and served in that position until 1957, when he became head of station wagon planning. Buehrig became interested in light cars and participated in the initial effort from which the Falcon became a reality.

From 1959 until retiring from Ford in July 1965, Buehrig was a principal design engineer in the materials applications group. He worked on special projects with an emphasis on exploring plastic body and chassis components. A vocal proponent of the use of plastics in automobiles, Buehrig continues to spread this gospel today to young designers around the U.S. and the world.

Buehrig's indelible mark on the automobile design world assures his place in automobile history. But fame, money and security have never meant as much to him as the challenge to design automobiles that are beautiful and functional.

The wealth of ideas, knowledge and expertise he has accumulated in his 60 years as a design genius keeps Buehrig busy today at his studio and garage in Grosse Pointe, where he lives with his second wife, Kay.

On a recent visit he showed final production drawings of one of his favorite design themes, a spacious, aerodynamically-styled wagon, with two small engines and a special driveline configuration to provide plenty of room for the low-seat passenger compartment. In Buehrig's garage are a Honda CRX coupe with automatic transmission along with a 1951 Ford Victoria hardtop coupe he designed, and a 1971 Corvette with T-roof, a special configuration which he created and patented after World War II.

"The mark of the really exceptional car designer is the degree to which his creations are coveted and revered long after they were built. Many of Gordon Buehrig's cars are in this class-true collector items. They were considered classic cars when introduced, and the feeling about them, the sense of distinction and value, has increased with the passage of time," wrote former American Motors Vice President for Styling, Richard A. Teaque in a prologue to a volume of Buehrig's work, "Rolling Sculpture".

Eyes on the Classics is proud to have many of Buehrig's classics, including the 810 Cord and the 1951 Ford hard top, displayed today.

The growing popularity of classic cars has led to the reproduction of many of Buehrig's greatest designs. The 810 Cord Roadster and 866 Auburn speedster are replicas of his originals. In 1979, business leader and classic car collector Richard Kughn launched the Buehrig, a replica sports car. One of the three prototype Buehrig's is displayed today.

Eyes on the Classics salutes Gordon Buehrig for his insight, sensitivity and creativity. He has given us examples which have created automobile legends. Gordon Buehrig is the finest example of a living legend.

xxxxxx

Designer Gordon M. Buehrig is issued a US patent for his "vehicle top with removable panels," an invention that would eventually appear as a "T-top" on the 1968 Chevrolet Corvette Stingray.
      Buehrig was a member of America’s first generation of automobile stylists. As a boy, he had always dreamed of designing cars, so at the age of seventeen he took a summer job with the Yellow Cab Company in Chicago in order to be around the greatest variety of cars possible. He held the job until the company discovered he was under-aged. Before he left Chicago, Buehrig called Clarence Wexelburg, designer for the custom body-building C.P. Kimball Company, and asked him how he should go about becoming a car designer. Wexelburg directed him to take classes in drafting, wood and metal shop, and art. Buehrig pursued all three at Bradley Polytechnic before leaving for Detroit in search of an apprenticeship, which he found at Packard. His inexperience limited him to unexciting work as a body panel designer, but it was at Packard that he made valuable connections in the design industry and where he first discovered Le Corbusier’s book, Toward a New Architectrure, a text that would influence Buehrig’s own aesthetic sense for the rest of his life.
      In 1928 Buehrig was the fourth man hired by Harley Earl for GM’s new Art and Color Section, the first GM department dedicated solely to design concerns. Buehrig didn’t stay long there, just long enough to share Earl’s frustration with the execution of the Art department’s designs. Of the 1929 Buick, the "pregnant Buick," Buehrig objectd: "Harley Earl’s original design was a masterpiece, but Art and Color was new and he couldn’t swing a lot of weight." Leaving GM’s fledgling Art Department may have been a mistake for Buehrig, as Earl would rapidly establish the department as the industry’s first design dynasty. But just as likely Buehrig’s inventiveness would have been harnessed by Earl, and while Buehrig would have become rich, he might never have achieved the boldness of his later designs.
      Buehrig, just twenty-four, left GM to become chief body designer at Stutz before moving on to the even more prestigious role of chief designer at Duesenberg. At the age of twenty-five he began designing America’s most high-profile car bodies. His crowning achievement came in 1936 with the Cord 810. Heavily influenced by Le Corbusier’s designs, the 810 had disappearing headlights, a hidden gas cap, and venetian blind louvers that accentuated the car’s lean "coffin-nosed" hood. It was an affordable future car. In 1951 the Museum of Modern Art picked the Cord 810 as one of eight automobiles selected worldwide to be exhibited as pieces of art. Curator Arthur Drexel wrote Buehrig that in the museum’s view, the 810 was "the outstanding American contribution to automobile design." Buehrig quietly changed the way cars look today. Ironically, his former employer Harley Earl would follow Buehrig’s work closely, often incorporating his innovations into GM’s designs. It was Buehrig who first erased the running board from the American car… and Earl who first got the credit.

xxxxx

Buehrig was born in 1904 in Mason City, Illinois, and began his automotive career in 1924 at Gotfredson Body Co. in Wayne, Michigan, which made bodies for the Wills St. Clair, Peerless and Jewett cars.

In 1927, he was hired by General Motors, the fourth designer hired for Harley Earl’s new Art and Color Department, the industry’s first styling operation. A year later, at age 24, he became chief body designer for Stutz, in Indianapolis, then the year after that became chief designer for the most legendary American nameplate of all, Duesenberg, also built in Indianapolis.

He designed such Duesenberg classics as the Beverly Berline, the Torpedo Phaeton, the Derham Tourster and the Weymann Boattail Speedster as well as the Duesenberg eagle hood ornament.

In 1934, he was transferred to Auburn, where he designed Auburns and Cords and produced his most celebrated designs, the Auburn Boat-tail Speedster and the 1936 “coffin-nose” 810 and 812 Cords. It is said that a poll of visitors to the New York Auto Show in 1936 where the Cord 810 was released was that twice as many people rated the Cord tops as the second place-getter, the Lincoln Zephyr.

After World War II, Buehrig moved to Ford, where he designed the ’51 Ford Victoria hardtop coupe and worked on the Mark II Continental. He retired from Ford in 1965 and taught five years at the Art Center College of Design in Pasadena, California.

He died in January, 1990.

Gordon M. Buehrig - Rolling sculpture: A designer and his work

Louis William Steinwedel & J. Herbert Newport Jr. - The Duesenberg

Gordon M Buehrig - 1935 - the dawning of a new Cord: Informal recollections of fifty years ago

Frederick E. Hoadley - Automobile Design Techniques and Design Modeling: the Men, the Methods, the Materials

Donald J. Bush - The Streamlined Decade

Gordon Buehrig - Tasco, My Personal Edsel, Automobile Quarterly Vol 12 No 2

S. Heller & L. Fili - Streamline

Biographies of Prominent Carriage Draftsmen - Carriage Monthly, April 1904

Marian Suman-Hreblay - Dictionary of World Coachbuilders and Car Stylists

Daniel D. Hutchins - Wheels Across America: Carriage Art & Craftsmanship

Marian Suman-Hreblay - Dictionary of World Coachbuilders and Car Stylists

Michael Lamm and Dave Holls - A Century of Automotive Style: 100 Years of American Car Design

Nick Georgano - The Beaulieu Encyclopedia of the Automobile: Coachbuilding

George Arthur Oliver - A History of Coachbuilding

George Arthur Oliver - Cars and Coachbuilding: One Hundred Years of Road Vehicle Development

Hugo Pfau - The Custom Body Era

Beverly Rae Kimes - The Classic Car

Beverly Rae Kimes - The Classic Era

Richard Burns Carson - The Olympian Cars

Brooks T. Brierley - Auburn, Reo, Franklin and Pierce-Arrow Versus Cadillac, Chrysler, Lincoln and Packard

Brooks T. Brierley - Magic Motors 1930

James J. Schild - Fleetwood: the Company and the Coachcraft

John R. Velliky - Dodge Brothers/Budd Co. Historical Photo Album

Stephen Newbury -  Car Design Yearbook 1

Stephen Newbury -  Car Design Yearbook 2

Stephen Newbury -  Car Design Yearbook 3

Dennis Adler - The Art of the Sports Car: The Greatest Designs of the 20th Century

C. Edson Armi - The Art of American Car Design: The Profession and Personalities

C. Edson Armi - American Car Design Now

Penny Sparke - A Century of Car Design

John Tipler - The World's Great Automobile Stylists

Ivan Margolius - Automobiles by Architects

Jonathan Bell - Concept Car Design

Erminie Shaeffer Hafer - A century of vehicle craftsmanship

Ronald Barker & Anthony Harding - Automobile Design: Twelve Great Designers and Their Work

John McLelland - Bodies beautiful: A history of car styling and craftsmanship

Frederic A. Sharf - Future Retro: Drawings From The Great Age Of American Automobiles

Paul Carroll Wilson - Chrome Dreams: Automobile Styling Since 1893

David Gartman - Auto Opium: A Social History of American Automobile Design

Nick Georgano - Art of the American Automobile: The Greatest Stylists and Their Work

Matt Delorenzo - Modern Chrysler Concept Cars: The Designs That Saved the Company

Thom Taylor - How to Draw Cars Like a Pro

Tony Lewin & Ryan Borroff - How To Design Cars Like a Pro

Doug DuBosque - Draw Cars

Jonathan Wood - Concept Cars

D. Nesbitt - 50 Years Of American Auto Design

David Gartman - Auto Opium: A Social History of American Automobile Design

Lennart W. Haajanen & Karl Ludvigsen - Illustrated Dictionary of Automobile Body Styles

L. J. K Setright - The designers: Great automobiles and the men who made them

Goro Tamai - The Leading Edge: Aerodynamic Design of Ultra-Streamlined Land Vehicles

Brian Peacock & Waldemar Karwowski - Automotive Ergonomics

Bob Thomas - Confessions of an Automotive Stylist

Brooke Hodge & C. Edson Armi - Retrofuturism: The Car Design of J Mays

Henry L. Dominguez - Edsel Ford and E.T. Gregorie: The Remarkable Design Team...

Stephen Bayley - Harley Earl (Design Heroes Series)

Stephen Bayley - Harley Earl and the Dream Machine

Serge Bellu - 500 Fantastic Cars: A Century of the World Concept Cars

Raymond Loewy - Industrial Design

Raymond Loewy - Never Leave Well Enough Alone

Philippe Tretiack - Raymond Loewy and Streamlined Design

Angela Schoenberger - Raymond Loewy: Pioneer of American Industrial Design

Laura Cordin - Raymond Loewy