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Thinking Small: The Long, Strange Trip Of The Volkswagen Beetle (2012)

by Andrea Hiott(Favorite Author)

3.93 of 5 Votes: 4

ISBN

0345521420 (ISBN13: 9780345521422)

languge

English

genre

History & Biography

publisher

Ballantine Books

review 1: Having driven my parent's 1968 Volkswagen to High school in the early to mid seventies - I have always had a love for the bug.This book tells the story of this car from it's development in Nazi Germany. You will read the story of the New York advertising agency (who's "Mad Men" were ironically Jewish) who developed the ads that challenged the US consumer thoughts that bigger cars were better.
review 2: This book written primarily on the history, development, and marketing of the good old VW Beetle. Beetle being the name affixed to it by us Americans. I was fortunate to own a 1971 model back in the day. For those who missed the experience of the "original" you missed something. The latest version in its cartoonish design doesn't come close in my opinion but the... morey recently have attempted to make a it a bit sleeker.Andrea Hiott did a great job of telling an incredibly interesting and engaging story about this icon of automotive history. The interrelated story of how the iconic in itself DDB agency falls a bit short but is still substantial enough to add to the overall intrigue of the entire story behind VW. Not as much was done on the technical developments of the car and the more recent history is covered briefly in the last chapter or so.It was amazing to me that Adolf Hitler the personification of evil and destruction in history could have played such a important role in pursuing the birth and development of the car which has had such a positive impact. But without the genius of Ferdinand Porsche and to some extent his son Ferry the VW Beetle would never have become what it did. The story of Volkswagen teetering on destruction itself during and following the war to the number two manufacturer worldwide is an amazing story, well done here, and a pleasure to read. less

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