The original 1967 Dodge Deora can be seen at the Henry Ford Museum in Dearborn, Michigan, right now. It was one of the first 16 die-cast models released in 1968. It was designed by the same person who made the first Hot Wheels. It was made in Detroit and helped the hot rodding business in Southern California. The Beach Boys’ 1963 album Little Deuce Coupe featured a cover photo of a bright blue ’32 Ford with a strange front end and four headlights. The music was as nice as a breeze off the sea in Southern California, but the car looked as Nordic as a pair of winter boots in December. The “A Brothers” Larry and Mike Alexander in Detroit made this hopped-up Deuce. It’s not the first time that Michigan has had an impact on Californian and other car cultures. At the moment, the 1967 Dodge Deora, another famous design by the A Brothers, is being shown at the Henry Ford Museum of American Innovation. All of the sheetmetal techniques used at the time were applied to cut, section, channel, and paint a highly modified Dodge A100 pickup truck in eye-catching gold. One of the most impressive things about it might be how the driver gets in—by lifting the window and going in through the front door. It was added to the National Historic Vehicle Register last year, along with the Tucker 48 prototype, the DMC DeLorean Time Machine hero car from Back to the Future, and the 1911 Marmon Wasp, which was the first car to win the Indianapolis 500. This customized pickup is obviously attractive from the outside, but the best way to understand its historical importance is to take small, pocket-sized steps. Allow us to go back in time to Detroit in 1963. At that time, a young artist named Harry Bentley Bradley had just completed his first six months at General Motors. Bradley was meant to do more than draw up a few small changes for the next year’s Cadillac range. As a child, he improved his drawing skills while he was sick with polio. Besides that, he was breaking official GM company policy. While he was still in industrial design school, he wrote for hot-rodding magazines. When he started working for General Motors, he was expected to do the flashy paint jobs and cut roofs. But instead, he kept sending in art under a fake name. When the A Brothers hired Bradley to work with them on the first of 10 projects, they just called him “Designer X.” Bradley kept designing hot rods while he was in a General Motors fellowship program at Stanford University in 1964. He wrote this Deora for the A Brothers, who put it to work and later showed it off at the 1967 Detroit Autorama. Actually, it may have been more important that it helped Bradley get his new job as chief designer for Mattel’s hit new toy, Hot Wheels. The Dodge Deora was one of 16 new designs introduced in 1968. Fifteen of them were Bradley’s ideas. There was also a famous plastic model kit of the truck, but the 1:64 version was what Hot Wheels fans really wanted. It let them dream of Southern California hot rod culture, even though some of it came from Detroit. The original Deora, which is one of the most famous display cars ever made, is still fully functional, with its original slant-six engine and three-speed manual gearbox. Even though two much more modern versions came after it, the 1967 original is still the best. The best parts of the East and West sides came together to make Hot Wheels. The Henry Ford in Dearborn, Michigan, is also open seven days a week, from 9:30 a.m. to 5:00 p.m.
