One of the most iconic names in automotive history, Shelby became an international star in the 1950s as a race car driver, earning Sports Illustrated’s “Sports Car Driver of the Year” honors in 1956 and 1957, then winning the 1959 24 Hours of LeMans in an Aston Martin with co-driver Roy Salvadori. A hereditary heart condition put an end to Shelby’s driving career in 1960, but the lessons learned while driving world-renowned sports cars gave him the idea to build his own car using an AC Ace body and a small-block Ford V-8 engine. The result was the Cobra, a name that Shelby said came to him in a dream, and a company called Shelby American.

Photo Gallery: Carroll Shelby: 1923-2012 – Mustang Monthly Magazine

Doane Spencer, Joe Nitti, Neal East, Bob McGee—names forever synonymous with the hot rods they built or bought in the ’40s and ’50s. Their projects have become icons of the genre, and while you might name another couple hundred hero cars that have been storied ad nauseam, the workaday rods by Joe Average radically outnumber those exalted examples. This story is here to honor the anonymous.

Photo Gallery: Real Hot Rods of the 1950s – The Genuine Article – Hot Rod Magazine

In last month’s Get The Picture? column, we shared a number of ideas for retro-style, sign-painted lettering. This month, same deal, only with numbers. You know why it’s cool to have a number on your door? Because it means you have a race car—or at least that you want your rod to look like one. Here we present a variety of Bonneville, Midget, circle-track, and hot rod styles from now and then. —

Photo Gallery: Get the Picture – We’ve Got Your Number – Hot Rod Magazine

You know Ed Roth, the ’60s freakjob beatnik hot rodder who clearly sniffed too much resin while creating fiberglass show cars like The Outlaw, Mysterion, Road Agent, Surfite, and such. He’s seen here, scrawling the wall at a party in the early ’60s. You also know him as the father of Rat Fink and other weirdo monsters that were airbrushed and later silkscreened onto the must-have T-shirts for every teen gearhead of the time.

Photo Gallery: Kustom Kulture Archival Photos – Roth Weirdos – Hot Rod Magazine

Photo Gallery: Kustom Kulture Archival Photos – Roth Weirdos – Hot Rod Magazine

It was decades ago, but HOT ROD used to cover NASCAR. You graybeard readers will remember it well: There were annual race features on the Daytona 500 and Riverside, tech articles on the latest trickery from Junior Johnson and Smokey Yunick, and monthly roundy-round columns by Steve Kelley and Joe Whitlock. It was great racing with awesome cars, and HOT ROD was all over it. So what happened? Why doesn’t HOT ROD do NASCAR anymore?

Photo Gallery: When Nascar Mattered – Hot Rod Magazine

Photo Gallery: When Nascar Mattered – Hot Rod Magazine

RADICAL.George Barris and me. Sounds like a ’60s flick starring Peter Sellers with cameos by Sonny and Cher, but what I mean is that Barris and I might be the only two people who liked the “Chrisman Coupe” after George finished its 1959 pearl-white and tangerine makeover. This little kid loved the wire front wheels, those crazy spats, and the goofy, half-gullwing doors that showed up in a 1960 episode of The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis and on the Aug. ’61 cover of Car Craft.

Photo Gallery: The Chrisman-Barris-Dobie Gillis Coupe – Hot Rod Deluxe Magazine

Photo Gallery: The Chrisman-Barris-Dobie Gillis Coupe – Hot Rod Deluxe Magazine

STYLE. Countless hot rods have been built in chicken coops over the years. However, few are as sleek or as beautifully constructed as the ’50s dreamboat you see here. Clearly, this was no ordinary chicken coop, and Arthur Bentas is no ordinary farmer. A genuine Yankee craftsman, he fabricated the Raven over a nine-year stretch, largely from scratch. The Chelmsford, Massachusetts, chicken coop was the same, special place wherein Arthur and his brother operated the Bentas Bros. Co., makers of the Kavalla Kart, a well-known machine in New England and elsewhere during the huge karting fad of the late ’50s and early ’60s.

Photo Gallery: 1950s Kustom Roadster- The Raven Returns – Hot Rod Deluxe Magazine

For the past 10 years, street rodding has gone through a number of styles-high tech, dare to be different, phantoms, retro, and now… rats. Rat rods are patterned after hot rods pieced together by owners/builders prior to or just after World War II. These home brews were crude, dangerous, and less than welcome on SoCal’s wide, straight streets. But they were fun, fast (for the time), and very frugal.

Photo Gallery: Don “Rockerhead” Montgomery – Hot Rod Magazine

Photo Gallery: Don “Rockerhead” Montgomery – Hot Rod Magazine

Snatch that jaw back off the floor. Youbetcha—in 1967, Tasca Ford had ragged GT350 and GT500 Mustangs stacked up like they’d been pitchforked into the back lot. The sign at the upper left of the lot says,“Bargain Basement.” Just freaking wow.

Photo Gallery: Shelby Mustang Stash – Hot Rod Magazine

My mom knows who Linda Vaughn is. It’s a pretty safe bet that yours does, too. The iconic Miss Hurst Golden Shifter has been a part of the racing and automotive scene since the early ’60s; she knows everyone we regard as heroes (and many more we don’t), and she never disappoints with her insanely accurate memory. Meet her once, even for just a moment, and there’s a good chance she’ll remember your name and what you talked about a decade later. She has probably the most recognized face (and let’s be honest, the most recognized breasts, too!) in the world of motorsports, having represented Hurst and several other companies for five decades now, after George Hurst stole her from her Miss Firebird responsibilities and made her the second Miss Hurst Golden Shifter, initially to promote the company, but eventually to promote everything about motorsports, hot rodding, and our way of life.

Photo Gallery: Linda Vaughn – Miss Hurst Golden Shifter in Her Own Words – Hot Rod Magazine

Photo Gallery: Linda Vaughn – Miss Hurst Golden Shifter in Her Own Words – Hot Rod Magazine