Fuhrer''s car runs out of fuel

Volkswagen will soon c
17 July 2003

The old Volkswagen Beetle has ceased to be produced, 70 years after Adolf Hitler (1889-1945) first commissioned the strong and durable, dome-shaped, strange little "People's Car."

Earlier this month, Volkswagen officials announced that the last assembly line in the world of the old Beetle in the Volkswagen's massive plant in central Mexico will soon close down. Volkswagen will, however, continue to make the stylish New Beetle, which it introduced in 1997.

The history of the Beetle can be traced to Ferdinand Porsche, a German automotive engineer of the early 1930s who thought of a cheap, sturdy, small car that could do 100 kmph and could seat four people. Ironically the person who was responsible for the continuing existence of the much-loved Beetle was the most hated man in the world — Hitler.

Porsche's idea of the little car was supported by Hitler and he himself laid the foundation stone for the Volkswagen factory in Wolfsburg in 1938. Hitler became almost the little car's godfather, and called it the Kraft-Durch-Freude Wagen or "strength through joy" car, which was also the slogan of the Nazi party.

The old Beetle came equipped with air-cooled interiors, a four-cylinder engine, 24-bhp back-engine with back-wheel drive, airtight and waterproof system, an air-cooled engine without a radiator and an anti-skid mechanism, easy operations with low maintenance and mileage.

But by the end of World War II, Volkswagen was in ruins as well as the Beetle factory. The Allies handed over the factory to an ex-Opel executive, Heinz Nordhoff, in 1948. Nordhoff turned around the factory and fortunes of the car and soon three models of the Beetle were on offer — the Standard, the Deluxe and the Cabriolet.