 |
| Citroen 2CV |
Here's a serious video about the 2CV, unlike the Comedians In Cars Getting Coffee one previously posted. I love the 2CV as much as Chris Harris does (and for the same reasons), and enjoyed this sympathetic take:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=76ktMcCDZvk&index=2&list=PL239B84BD346EEEFA
In an automotive culture far less international than it now is, the Citroen 2CV was "the French people's car:" their Volkswagen Beetle or Model T Ford. Although a generation newer, it was far closer in spirit to the Model T. The Beetle was intended to get mostly urban families down Germany's new Autobahns between cities. The 2CV was intended to get French farm families into and out of their fields, and into town for market day. Like the Beetle, it was delayed by World War Two and didn't become a cultural icon until the 1950's.
Although it was in production until 1990, I saw very few 2CV's in my two trips to France in 2002 and 2010. The Autoroutes had made them obsolete. People in France who can't afford modern cars ride motorcycles or scooters. In the mid 1990's, a couple of guys who flagged a corner with me at Blackhawk Farms brought a restored one to the track. In two-tone grey and maroon paint, no less. With the sunroof open all day and doubtless on back roads only. It must have been a 3-hour trip from Chicagoland.
2 comments:
Really? Really?? I'd rather have a Jeep CJ7. Then again, I was born in Detroit, not in a French farmhouse. Not that there's anything wrong with that..........(a thinly veiled Seinfeld reference)
Just not a Jeep guy, I guess. And the 2CV's engineering was innovative.
Post a Comment