Motoring Weekly

The pioneering and the iconic

January 16 - 22, 2008
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It was the 1908 Model T Ford that really pioneered motoring for the masses, with more than 15 million sold over the next two decades, establishing it as one of the first global brands.

In Germany, the idea of a people's car was championed by Adolf Hitler before the Second World War, but only really blossomed when sales of the Volkswagen Beetle took off during the economic boom of the 1950s and 1960s.

By 1981, 20 million units had been shifted. When its popularity waned in Europe it was taken on by the flower power generation in the US. The Mini also generated mass appeal, a miniature masterpiece that became a symbol of the swinging 60s, cool but classless. The first were built in the UK in 1959 and by 2000 more than five million had rolled off the production line.







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