Customer Reviews

The Automobile Age

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I am not an automobile enthusiast. In fact, until I read this book I was somewhat of an unenthusiast, but I loved this book. It is scholarly and authoritative without being cumbersome or boring. I have taken oral histories of older people who told me how much the automobile changed their lives, but this book gave me a tremendous understanding as to how and why the automobile not only changed our lives, but helped to define our role in the world. Flink does not leave out anything of importance, covering the themes of culture, the world wars, the international competition, and all the important individuals. He de-mythed some of the misconceptions I had (about Henry Ford's various roles, for example), and truly explains how the automobile industry got to where it is today. The only drawback at all about this book is that it was written to include information up until 1985, so is not entirely up to the current day. Nevertheless, the reader can use this book as the Bible of car history. A very enlightening volume.

Flink doesn't like cars. Flink believes that the major automobile manufacturers have brought great harm upon American society. IF you can get past that, then I recommend this book to anyone serious about the relationship between American culture and the automobile industry. If you are a car lover or even a dispassionate expert you may have trouble with the technical errors. For instance, Flink argues more than once that the 1964 GTO was proof of GM's uncaring attitude toward the public because they put their "biggest motor" (which the 389 was most certainly not) into the 1963 Tempest. The problem with this argument is that alhtough the body of the 1963 and 1964 Tempest are very similar, the chassis and suspensions are completely different designs. Likewise, he argues that American manufacturers' continued to use of bias-ply tires several years after Mercedes began to use radial tires because they didn't care about the safety of their customers. The fact that professional racing teams continued to use bias-ply tires well beyond those years puts a bit of a damper on that argument. Other, similar arguments suffer similar problems. Although it is true, for example, that American manufacturers were slow to include seat belts as standard equipment in their cars, Flink doesn't mention that Ford attempted to use safety as a major marketing point for their 1956 cars and the public was indifferent at best and suspicious at worst. ("Why does this car need seatbelts? Isn't it as safe as a Chevy?" etc.) This would be a much better book if Flink had no personal opinion about American auto manufacturers and could offer a more balanced and weighted evaluation of the pros and cons.
What this book DOES offer is a remarkably detailed look at the inner workings of the major auto manufacturers in the U.S. thoughout the 20th century, and for that reason alone I recommend it to anyone who is interested in the interaction between American culture and the American automobile industry.

I'll be brief. The book is an academic tome. It's subject matter trancends the scholarly to be a thought provoking page turner! I would recommend this to the technically minded or voracious readers for although Mr Flink avoids the academic foot note syndrome, its target audience is still those who want to put it in their footnotes and bibliograghies.

No, really, I did enjoy it; it's just not a book I'd recommend to anybody I know as I am not acquainted with any literary inclined techologists.

The writing in this book could be worse, but it could also be a heck of a lot better. Flink takes interesting subject matter, the history of American car culture, and dries it out like beef jerky. This is something any of us could have an interesting conversation about, but the book treats the subject the way most scholastic discourse gets treated -- something to excite your fellow scholars and as something to put the rest of us to sleep. Maybe this is inevitable and maybe all the good research he put in the book has left him distanced from the real world... he gets 3 stars because his insights are intelligent and he packs a lotta memorable facts in there -- did you know the American Highway System is the most expensive public work in human history? Because it's written as history, though, this book only scratches the surface of the next logical question: Why are we so willing to pay so much for our ugly asphalt monstrosities?

I read this for a class in Americans and technology, and at least it wasn't as horrid and painful a read as the pulitzer-prize winning (WHY?!) "the heavens and the earth" by Walt McDougall.

"The Automobile Age" is the most complete, authoritative book about the cultural and historical aspects of the automobile on a world-wide scale. It is no wonder why the book has reached its fifth printing since 1988. It's a marvelous, fascinating and richly detailed book about the most important and influential machine in our lives and its impact in the last 120 years.

There are 20 chapters plus an epilogue, "The Future of the Automobile" in this indexed work, full of illustrations that take a logical flow of direction. It begins with "The Automotive Idea," giving the reader a knowledgeable base with which to understand that the automobile was not the creation of just one person, but of many brilliant minds over the past few centuries. It is almost hard to imagine the extent that the automobile has undergone to arrive in its present state, a hybrid of early chariots, bicycles and, believe it or not, simple tools. Despite what the car hater may think, Flink points out that, regardless of the minority opinion the development of the automobile was a requirement. It had to happen. Basically the development of the car was a collective effort with no other ultimate expression. From Chapter 3, "The Emerging Industry" and Chapter 4, "Fordism", on through "Hard Times" in Chapter 11--citing the impact of the Great Depression on the automotive industry--and on to Chapter 17, "Japan as Number One," the book is difficult to set aside as it educate about how foreign markets began to take over in the 1960's and 1970's what was thought to be a singularly American creation.

"The Automobile Age" is nothing short of a magnificent accomplishment. I can't even think of what the author omitted from his work without getting ridiculously far off base. Everything he discusses is relevant to an automobile-based culture, and it even has such facts as production numbers, costs of early cars, annual family incomes and how they managed to buy a car, and so on. I would absolutely recommend it for any class involving transportation or engineering, as these and other important subjects are inescapable in a modern world. It is a must-read for any automotive mechanic or driving school instructor, and is highly recommended for the average driver (or any driver, for that matter). There is far too much information to be absorbed in a single reading, and is best read in sections. It has a logical, chronological flow from chapter to chapter, neither leaving the reader behind nor getting too far ahead. There are few books written as well as "The Automobile Age," and is one reason to believe that the future of nonfiction as literature is assured. Top recommendation for all readers 14 and over. If you have not read it or don't own it, Buy it today. This book is an education in itself, and the price is far less than even a single college credit. Few things like Flink's book come at such a bargain.