It has been referred to as the best automotive evaluate of all time. Nevertheless you rank it, “Flip Your Hymnals to 2002” by David E. Davis Jr. modified the automotive world within the U.S. and catapulted BMW of North America into the highlight. It was so insightful that it even led to Davis being fired.
However we’ll get to that in a second.
The 12 months was 1968, and the automotive Davis was testing wasn’t the insane Turbo and even the Tii. These fashions have been nonetheless years away. This was merely the bottom mannequin 2002, which maybe made the best way it drove all of the extra revolutionary to Davis and a complete technology of automotive fans.
A 12 months earlier, the journal had declared BMW’s 1600-2 “one of the best $2,500 sedan Automobile and Driver ever examined.” With the bigger and extra highly effective 2.0-liter engine, the 2002 grew to become, as Davis wrote, “most definitely one of the best $2,850 sedan in the entire cotton-picking world.”
This highlight ultimately turned one of the vital obscure automotive manufacturers imported into the U.S. right into a family identify. However on the time of publication, issues have been very completely different for BMW of North America (BMWNA). BMW hadn’t formally exported its vehicles to the U.S. previous to World Conflict II, and only some have been imported by personal prospects. Through the Occupation, American service members found sporty BMWs just like the 328 and 327, however they didn’t carry sufficient of those vehicles residence to make a lot of an influence. BMW’s postwar product technique didn’t improve the marque’s visibility through the Fifties, nor did its disjointed distribution system. Whereas Fred Oppenheimer’s Fadex Company had short-term success with the Isetta microcar, Max Hoffman failed to search out an viewers for BMW’s V8-powered 507 or some other fashions aimed on the American automotive purchaser. The early-’60s Neue Klasse sedans and 2000 CS coupe additionally missed the mark. By 1966, BMW had offered simply 1,253 vehicles in the USA.
All of that modified with the launch of the Sort 114 (because it was recognized internally). Thanks partially to Automobile and Driver’s glowing evaluation of the 1600-2, BMW’s U.S. gross sales almost quadrupled in 1967, reaching a complete of 4,564 vehicles. Curiously, almost all of those have been 1600-2s, not the bigger, extra sensible four-door fashions.
Nonetheless, BMW remained a little bit of an fanatic’s secret. Nevertheless, with the April 1968 problem of Automobile and Driver, that every one started to alter. As one of many “Huge Three” automotive publications, together with Street & Monitor and Motor Development, Automobile and Driver had round a million subscribers and unimaginable energy to affect readers—lots of whom have been probably tiring of the massive American muscle automotive phenomenon.
Nevertheless it wasn’t simply the standard of Davis’s insights that made the evaluate legendary. It was the best way his prose transported readers to a time, a spot, and a way of thinking.
To provide you an concept of the ability of this evaluate: it was this piece that finally sparked a grassroots motion that led to my father shopping for a 2002 within the early ’70s. That automotive, in flip, gave me the BMW bug once I was a small boy within the early ’80s. I can solely think about numerous readers have related tales. However sufficient about that—let’s dive into the evaluate. Listed below are a number of excerpts so that you can decide for your self:
As I sit right here, recent from the elegant embrace of BMW’s new 2002, it happens to me that one thing between 9 and ten million People are going to make a horrible mistake this 12 months.
As far as I’m involved, to hell with all of ‘em. In the event that they’re content material to stay within the automotive darkish, allow them to. I do know in regards to the BMW 2002, and I think fans will purchase as many as these pink-cheeked Bavarians of their leather-based pants and mountain-climbing footwear want to construct and ship over right here. One thing between 9 and ten million squares will miss out on this neat little 2-door sedan with all of the cojones and brio and elan of vehicles twice its dimension and 4 instances its value, however some ten thousand eager varieties will purchase them in 1968, so the bulk loses for as soon as.
Depress the clutch. Simple. Like there was no spring. Snick. First gear. Take away weight of left foot from clutch. Place weight of proper foot on accelerator. The minute it begins shifting, you realize that Fangio and Moss and Tony Brooks and all these different huge racing studs retired solely as a result of the dreaded that sometime you’d have one in every of these, and when that day got here, you’d be indomitable. They have been proper. You’re indomitable.
David E Davis
As for David E. Davis Jr., “Flip Your Hymnals to 2002” cemented his repute as one in every of America’s best and most influential automotive journalists. Sarcastically it additionally received him fired from Automobile and Driver, due to his criticism that the 2002’s radio—made by Automobile and Driver advertiser Blaupunkt— “couldn’t choose up a Manhattan station from the far finish of the Brooklyn Bridge.”
He took a job with promoting company Campbell and Ewald, then returned to Automobile and Driver in 1976, this time as editor in chief. In that position, he’d write nonetheless extra favorable evaluations of BMW cars, and he’d additionally transfer Automobile and Driver headquarters from New York Metropolis to Ann Arbor, Michigan. There, Davis petitioned town to renumber the journal’s new workplace constructing as 2002 Hogback Street, barely out-of-sequence on the road grid however a high-quality homage to the automotive that made his profession, and which put BMW on the radar of discerning American fans.
You possibly can learn the complete authentic evaluate right here. And for a full retrospective on David E. Davis (who handed away in 2011) head over to Automobile & Driver.
BMW 2002 Photograph Gallery
