Preston Tucker and His Battle to Build the Car of Tomorrow

June 1, 2016
In 1947, long before Elon Musk began shaking up the automobile industry with his Tesla electric-powered sedan, another colorful entrepreneur named Preston Tucker rolled out his own revolutionary car of tomorrow. Dubbed the Tucker '48, after its designer and the year it was built, the vehicle featured several never-before-seen innovations, including a rear engine, padded dashboard, disc brakes, and independent suspension. Lehto, whose previous auto-related works investigated NASCAR racing and the doomed Chrysler turbine car, provides an absorbing portrait of Tucker and account of his spirited mission to introduce a post-WWII set of wheels that would dazzle American consumers, until suspicions were aroused in government regulators who became intent on sabotaging Tucker's dream. With access to detailed archives unseen by previous biographers, Lehto follows Tucker's rise from mechanic to car salesman to visionary businessman to disgraced industrialist. Car enthusiasts of every stripeincluding Jay Leno, who was inspired to provide a thoughtful introductionwill appreciate Lehto's meticulous research, which re-creates a lost era and cogently and accurately presents the full dramatic story of one of the auto industry's seminal innovators.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2016, American Library Association.)