Happy Anniversary, Corvette!
Today is the 71st anniversary of the Chevrolet Corvette’s public debut! The first prototype Corvette was shown in public during the GM Motorama held at the Waldorf Astoria in New York City on January 17, 1953.
That first prototype was named EX-122 and the motoring public was instantly taken in Chevy’s new two-seater sports car creation. The story goes that GM hid microphones in and around the display so that they hear the comments from attendees at the show. The new Corvette was such a hit that GM greenlighted “Project Opel” for production and six months later the first customer cars were completed.
One of the key differences between the prototype EX-122 and the 1953 Corvettes was the side trim and badging as shown above. EX-122 has a downward pointing spear and the scripted “Chevrolet” next to it. On the ’53 production cars, that spear was changed to point upwards and the Chevrolet script was removed.
GM’s VP of Design Harley J. Earl says the idea for the Corvette came to him during a visit to Watkins Glen in 1951 where he was showing off the LeSabre concept. Earl said he was impressed by the small European sports cars participating in a grand prix-style road race at the famous track in New York. From there, he got Chevrolet’s Engineering Chief Ed Cole on board with the project and together they were given the go-ahead to develop the concept for the 1953 GM Motorama.
In late December 1952, the prototype was completed. It was officially known as the Corvette after being named by Chevy photographer Myron Scott. Chevy wanted the car to start with a “C” and supposedly rejected 1500 suggestions. Myron came across the word Corvette after going through the dictionary, which was described as a small, lightly armed warship. Considering that many Americans just finished their service in the U.S. Armed Forces following WWII, the suggestion was perfectly timed.
The final Motorama Corvette was shown to GM executives in early January 1953. The only change suggested was removing the American flag from the original logo. A new logo was designed in a hurry and featured two crossed flags – one being the Chevy bow-tie and the other being a fleur-de-lis which paid homage to the French background of Chevrolet namesake Louis Chevrolet. The original American Flag Corvette logo can be seen on display at the National Corvette Museum.
You can’t see him in this crowd picture but one of the attendees of the 1953 GM Motorama show was a Belgium immigrant named Zora Arkus-Duntov. Zora was so taken with the Corvette and its potential that he wrote a letter to Chevrolet Chief Engineer Ed Cole. Ed Cole was so impressed with Zora that he offered him an assistant staff engineering position and the rest is history!
Source:
Photos by GM/Chevrolet
Related:
Corvette Made Its First Public Appearance 70 Years Ago Today
Happy Birthday, Corvette! America’s Favorite Sports Car Turns 70 Today
[VIDEO] Flint-Made 1953 Corvette Returns Home to for Back to the Bricks
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I was at that show with my Dad, I was 5 years old and was mesmerized at that Corvette , it was beautiful , I remember my Dads comment about it, ” It’s a plastic car General Motors will have a hard time trying to sell them “. He didn’t like them and never ever rode in any of the 8 I owned .
Question:
Are there any 1952 EX-122 prototypes
with the spear facing down with the Chevrolet
script in existence?
There is only one EX-122 prototype and that car is still owned by the Kerbeck brothers. Kerbeck used to display the car at Carlisle, but we haven’t seen it now that Ciocca has taken over the dealership.
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