![]() Think the Cadillac LaSalle, Cadillac Eldorado and the Chevrolet Biscayne. The late ‘50s would yield the longer, boxier luxury models favored by Sinatra and Co. FX4’s would remain a London staple through the mid-’80s. Nonetheless, the decade saw classy releases like the Mercedes-Benz 220, Rolls Royce Silver Dawn, Saab 92 and 93 and Toyota Crown, as well as the emergence of Austin FX4 taxis, wherein the cab driver could cordially reach back and open the door for the passenger without exiting the vehicle. Tree-huggin’ Ralph Nader publishes Unsafe At Any Speed, a dossier heavily critical of the entire industry’s safety standards, suicide doors among them. Greater concerns for rider safety follow, sparking an invitation for meddlesome government regulation. Horsepower replaces luxury as the most valued trait in an auto. If the door’s latch opened while the passenger was leaning against it, he fell out. Kit Foster, past president of the Society of Automotive Historians, touts a less “romantic” tale: It was a time before seat belts. While controversial, Dave Brownell, former editor of Hemmings Motor News, will agree this is where the name hails from: suicide doors make pushing someone out a piece of cake. One group of people who celebrated a live-large ideology and these big boats on wheels that came with it: gangsters. Models released included the Packard One-Ten, Bugatti Type 57, Chrysler Royal, Lincoln Zephyr, Peugeot 301 and Cadillac Series 65. High times for motor culture, with suicide doors more the rule than exception. ![]() The center-opening offered an elegant appeal to coaches and made it easier for women wearing long, billowing skirts - bustles and all - to enter and exit.Ĭadillac Series 65 / Image from Stanford University Libraries Carriages culled their blueprints from then en vogue French doors. ![]() When vehicular composition was in its infancy, designers drew inspiration from the architecture of other transportation modes of the era. But from whence did they come? Where the hell’d they go? When are they coming back? ![]() The physics of the suicide door are simple: it refers to a any door that is rear-hinged, such that it opens from the front, rather than the back. Which is why, in the world of internal combustion, the world will always lust for suicide doors, favored method of vehicular entry of JFK, Mad Max and Kanye West, to name of few. ![]()
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