Along with the Harley-Davidson motorcycle, hot rods and custom cars are powerful symbols of resistance, rebellion, and the high-octane lifestyle. Since the 1950s, these flashy restyled automobiles have occupied a unique place in American popular mythology. Cool Cars, High Art: The Rise of Kustom Kulture checks out this particularly male subculture with an up-close look at customized car art and the artists who create it. Through amazing technical mastery, coupled with a uniquely American imagination, these motorheads transform mass-produced products of industry into unique hand-crafted pieces of art called "rods" and "customs." This first full-length study to focus on the practice of hot rodding and car customizing argues not only that this "kustom kulture" deserves consideration as a source of legitimate art forms but also that the rise of American car customizing reflects the attitudes and ideas of the teen culture that emerged in the 1950s. While tracing the evolution of styles, this book examines specific cars and the progression of car culture through the 1990s. Cool Cars, High Art: The Rise of Kustom Kulture argues moreover that in this car art the theories of modernism meld with popular culture. In their beauty, in the sophistication of their designs, and in their formal play, these transformed, re-imagined cars parallel the ideas, techniques, and achievement of high-art modernists. And as high art progresses into postmodernism, so too does customized car culture. Despite the longevity and the magnitude of Kustom Kulture, this far-reaching contribution to American art has largely been ignored by mainstream critics. While postulating the cause of this anomaly, this book questions what is meant by art and how preconceived notions of gender, race, and class often prevent the recognition of creativity in places where imagination is not anticipated. John F. DeWitt, an associate professor of English and the acting director of the liberal arts program at the University of the Arts in Philadelphia, is the author of several books of poetry. He has been published in The New American Review and New Geography of American Poets.

2009 Outstanding Academic Title, Choice Since the mass production of Henry Ford’s Model T, car enthusiasts have been redesigning, rebuilding, and reengineering their vehicles for increased speed and technical efficiency. They purchase aftermarket parts, reconstruct engines, and enhance body designs, all in an effort to personalize and improve their vehicles. Why do these car enthusiasts modify their cars and where do they get their aftermarket parts? Here, David N. Lucsko provides the first scholarly history of America’s hot rod business. Lucsko examines the evolution of performance tuning through the lens of the $34-billion speed equipment industry that supports it. As early as 1910, dozens of small shops across the United States designed, manufactured, and sold add-on parts to consumers eager to employ new technologies as they tinkered with their cars. Operating for much of the twentieth century in the shadow of the Big Three automobile manufacturers—General Motors, Ford, and Chrysler—these businesses grew at an impressive rate, supplying young and old hot rodders with thousands of performance-boosting gadgets. Lucsko offers a rich and heretofore untold account of the culture and technology of the high-performance automotive aftermarket in the United States, offering a fresh perspective on the history of the automobile in America.

Born in Los Angeles and raised in the epicentre of the California hot rod explosion, Ed Roth created automotive forms purely from his own imagination. He transformed car design, reinvented American hot rod culture and put Detroit on notice. Each of his creations transcended function and form to turn the American automobile into rolling sculpture.

The folk artist describes his life and how he left his wild life behind after surviving a near-fatal car accident to follow in his family's footsteps to create paintings and sculptures of saints and scenes from the Bible with a modern-day interpretation.

A Companion to American Sport History presents a collection of original essays that represent the first comprehensive analysis of scholarship relating to the growing field of American sport history. Presents the first complete analysis of the scholarship relating to the academic history of American sport Features contributions from many of the finest scholars working in the field of American sport history Includes coverage of the chronology of sports from colonial times to the present day, including major sports such as baseball, football, basketball, boxing, golf, motor racing, tennis, and track and field Addresses the relationship of sports to urbanization, technology, gender, race, social class, and genres such as sports biography Awarded 2015 Best Anthology from the North American Society for Sport History (NASSH)

Repair, reuse and disposal are closely interlinked phenomena related to the service lives and persistence of technologies. When technical artefacts become old and worn out, decisions have to be taken: is it necessary, worthwhile or even possible to maintain and repair, reuse or dismantle them - or must they be discarded? These decisions depend on factors such as the availability of second-hand markets, repair infrastructures and dismantling or disposal facilities. In telling the stories of China's power grid, Canadian telephones, German automobiles and India's shipbreaking business, among others, the contributions in this volume highlight the persistence of technologies and show that maintenance and repair are not obsolete in modern industries and consumer societies.

This anthology of hot rod writings and excerpts chronicles the joys of hot rodding, the historical circumstances of its creation, and the major events, people, cars, and builders who brought hot rods to the national stage. From popular writers of the era to those covering today’s cutting edge innovators, this collection explores various themes within hot rodding through news articles, essays, fiction, interviews, and more, with more than 60 color and black-and-white illustrations and photographs to illuminate each excerpt and story. Writers include Gray Baskerville, Ed Roth, Wally Parks, Dean Batchelor, Robert E. Petersen, Tom Wolfe, LeRoi "Tex" Smith, and many more.

Vocals tinged with pain and desperation. The deep thuds of an upright bass. Women with short bangs and men in cuffed jeans. These elements and others are the unmistakable signatures of rockabilly, a musical genre normally associated with white male musicians of the 1950s. But in Los Angeles today, rockabilly's primary producers and consumers are Latinos and Latinas. Why are these "Razabillies" partaking in a visibly "un-Latino" subculture that's thought of as a white person's fixation everywhere else? As a Los Angeles Rockabilly insider, Nicholas F. Centino is the right person to answer this question. Pairing a decade of participant observation with interviews and historical research, Centino explores the reasons behind a Rockabilly renaissance in 1990s Los Angeles and demonstrates how, as a form of working-class leisure, this scene provides Razabillies with spaces of respite and conviviality within the alienating landscape of the urban metropolis. A nuanced account revealing how and why Los Angeles Latinas/os have turned to and transformed the music and aesthetic style of 1950s rockabilly, Razabilly offers rare insight into this musical subculture, its place in rock and roll history, and its passionate practitioners.