As "other brands were adopting the most garish, exaggerated fins, Earl decided to remove them on the 1960 Cadillac, feeling that fins of this size had lost any aesthetic appeal. These finned creations would remain the staple of car design until the early 1960's "Muscle Cars"" would take over. These fins would lead the men responsible for this styling at each of the "Big Three"" automakers, Harley Earl [GM], Virgil Exner [Chrysler], and George Walker [Ford], to elevate themselves, "to be considered the Michelangelos of mass production. Or if you prefer, they were its "Pep Boys "- Manny, Moe, and Jack, who managed to make every Tom, Dick and Harry randy for creased steel and burnished chrome.".
After tail fins established the movement towards garishness, many other styling efforts also contributed to the tremendous success of the automobile during the 1950's. Decadence became the word to describe American automobile styling. American designers portrayed the "car of the future,"" with many of their design inspirations centered around sex, the military or the combination thereof. These automobiles emerged in "full regalia of fantasy bullets and bombs, breasts, portholes and jets, spears and wings. "Assembly lines rolled off car after car with "frenched"" headlights and "toothy" chrome grilles "-- these "monsters with bedroom eyes "clearly exhibit the blending of the two design staples of sex and the military." American designers had decided to give the country a "cubic zirconium "in place of diamonds." This was achieved by adding the styling features once only available to the very wealthy, by creating them as carbon copies and thus making the styling available at a reasonable price to the mass middle class. .
The Role of Attainable Pricing for the Masses.
If styling inspired the automobile's rise, than cheaper pricing enabled it. Immediately following World War II, "Americans did not hope for affluence-yet, but they clearly wanted something beyond adequate.