Exner was a designer at Chrysler who helped change how the cars looked after World War II. The idea was to make Chrysler cars look more modern and exciting, not just boxy and old-fashioned.
Studebaker was another car company in the U.S. before Exner went to work at Chrysler. It matters here because it explains where he came from before leading Chrysler’s design work.
Chrysler is the car company in this story. They used special prototype-style “idea cars” to show off design directions and get people excited about what might come next.
In this context, “idea cars” are Chrysler prototypes made to explore new design ideas. The key point is that they were more than just models on a stand—they were meant to be practical and workable.
A concept car is a one-off or limited prototype built to show what a company might do in the future. It’s not usually meant to be a normal car you can buy right away.
This phrase means a car that’s basically just for show—pretty to look at, but not really usable. The host says Chrysler wanted their prototypes to actually work and feel like something you could ride in.
C.B. Thomas worked for Chrysler in charge of selling cars abroad. The host says his connections helped shape decisions about how and where Chrysler could build or market these cars internationally.
Pininfarina is an Italian company that designs and builds car bodies. Here, Chrysler brings them in to help build concept cars, but the episode says another firm ended up doing the XX500 work.
Gia is an Italian company that helped build these special concept cars. The episode says Chrysler liked their quality so much that Gia ended up doing the XX500 and later projects too.
Car
Chrysler K310
The Chrysler K310 is a Chrysler concept car from 1952. In the episode, it’s tied to the people and planning that led to the later concept cars like the Norseman.
The Ford Falcon is a mid-size car that Ford made in different versions. Some versions were wagons, which are cars with extra space for cargo and passengers. It’s mentioned because it was a well-known model line with multiple body styles.
Running gear and drivetrain are the parts that make the car move and connect the engine’s power to the wheels. The episode says Chrysler shipped those parts to Italy so they could be installed into the concept car bodies.
The Ford Taurus is a regular-size sedan that Ford made for everyday driving. It became known for having a nicer-looking and more comfortable interior, even on cheaper versions. The podcast brings it up because it helped set expectations for how budget cars could feel inside.
This part is about the Stockholm and why its design made the trip rough for passengers. They talk about what it had (and didn’t have) and how that changed the experience.
Stabilizers are parts that stick out under the water to help stop the ship from rocking side-to-side. Less rocking usually means fewer people get sick.
Turin is a city in Italy. The hosts mention it because that’s where the workshop was located that was building the Chrysler concept car.
Car
the Norsemen
The Norsemen is a Chrysler concept car the hosts are talking about. In this story, it stands out because it tries a different body design—specifically, it doesn’t use the usual support piece for the windshield.
The A-pillar is the vertical metal post at the front of a car that supports the windshield. If a concept car removes it, the car has to be redesigned so the body still stays strong and safe.
A cantilever roof is like a part that sticks out and is supported from one side. Here, the episode explains it’s designed to react in a crash by changing how the roof is held.
A pillarless design means the car’s roof doesn’t use the usual front posts. It looks more open, but it’s harder to build safely because the car still needs to be strong in a crash.
“Under tension” means the parts are being pulled tight. The episode says the roof is held in place by that tightness, and in a crash the system is designed to let the roof move.
PPG is a company that makes car glass. A “crush-proof” windshield means it’s designed to better survive crash forces, and in this concept it also helps hold up the roof system.
A retractable window can slide away instead of staying in one fixed position. This concept retracts the back window into the roof, which is harder than it sounds because it has to seal up properly.
Hideaway headlights are headlights that can tuck into the car when you’re not using them. The benefit is a cleaner look and less wind resistance.
Car
Norseman
The Chrysler Norseman is a famous concept car from the 1950s. In this episode, they’re describing it as a one-off showpiece with futuristic design and special engineering details, not just a styling exercise.
The Chrysler Imperial is a large, luxury car made by Chrysler. It’s known for having a more upscale interior and a distinctive dashboard design. In the podcast, it’s mentioned to compare size and cabin style to another car.
Wheelbase is the distance between the front and rear wheels. A longer wheelbase usually changes how the car rides and feels, and it also affects how much space you can fit inside.
A “hemi” engine has a combustion chamber shape that helps the engine burn fuel more efficiently. “331 cubic inch” is just how big the engine is inside—its displacement.
The driveline is the mechanical system that sends power from the engine to the wheels. In this concept, the belly pan is shaped to cover and streamline the parts underneath that do the power transfer.
This is an automatic transmission with only two forward gears. “Powerflite” is Chrysler’s transmission design, and the episode is saying this concept used a two-gear automatic.
Radar is a detection system that uses radio waves to “see” other objects. It can tell you something is out there and roughly where it is, but older versions may not show enough detail to avoid trouble.
A “T-bone” collision is when one vehicle/ship strikes another broadside, forming a shape like the letter “T.” Here, the Stockholm hits the Andrea Doria on the side, which is especially damaging because it concentrates impact forces into the struck hull area.
A watertight compartment is like a sealed “room” inside a ship. If the hull gets damaged, the goal is to keep water from spreading everywhere so the ship can stay afloat.
The “car show circuit” refers to the sequence of auto events where automakers display concept cars and new designs to generate buzz and feedback. Here, Chrysler planned for the Norseman to tour these 1957 events before it went to proving grounds for engineering evaluation.
Destructive testing means you test a part by stressing it until it breaks. The goal is to learn what the design can really handle, not just whether it looks good.
Nantucket is an island near the U.S. East Coast. The episode says the ship carrying the Norseman sank in the Atlantic off Nantucket, which is part of why the car ended up being “found” only much later.
“Cut up for scrap” means the wreck was taken apart so the metal could be reused. The hosts are using it to explain that the ship was eventually dismantled.
They mean the wreck has deteriorated so badly that almost nothing of it is left. Underwater, materials break down at different speeds, so you may only find a few remnants.
LIVE
Automotive history is a lot of fun to study because of its intersections with myriad other
elements of the world.
Cars are intertwined with so many things in modern society there are always stories to
tell.
The mashup of automotive and maritime history can sometimes be a stretch, but not today.
This is the story of a car, a missed deadline, two ships, and how one Italian built Chrysler
idea machine, a beautiful styling exercise known as the Norseman, ended up on the bottom
of the Atlantic Ocean on July 26, 1956, having never physically been seen by the very people
who imagined it and styled it.
The story of the Norseman doesn't start on the fateful day it ended up as fish food,
instead it really starts all the way back in the 1930s with a guy named Virgil Exner.
Hardcore automotive history geeks will know the name Exner as he is one of the most decorated
in some circles and most controversial in other circles, automotive designers and stylists
in history.
His career began at General Motors, working under the legendary Harley Earl in their design
department, gifted both in that discipline and the ability to navigate the corporate
Leviathan that was GM in the 1930s.
A few years later, he was the chief stylist for the Pontiac line of cars.
Ever industrious, he left General Motors in 1938 to work for Raymond Lowey & Associates,
a business that was on the rise and would one day become one of the most powerful design
firms in the world.
His concentration would be to work on the designs for Studebaker cars primarily.
With the intervention of World War II, there wasn't a lot of car designing going on and
by 1944, he left Lowey's company to work for Studebaker directly.
His influence is very prominent in many of the late 40s Studebakers that Lowey gets most
of the credit for, but really, Exner penned a lot of those cars.
In 1949, he departed Studebaker to take a job as the head of styling at Chrysler.
His major effort here was to evolve a line of boxy, frumpy Chryslers and make them modern
and as dynamic as the cars that were starting to appear from other companies as the automotive
industry really completed its transition from wartime work to full civilian concentration.
Chrysler first started producing their so-called idea cars in 1940.
Today, we'd call them concept cars or dream cars or some other name, but the tradition
at Chrysler would span the decades in excluding the years where the country was at war, idea
cars were definitely part of their program.
These were the kind of magical styling exercises that got the public excited about a brand
and gave them some looks into the future and trends and different things, ideas that could
be highlighted in the coming years or generational influences for new models.
Exner's philosophy in these cars was simple, but carried a dastardly level of difficulty
to properly execute.
They needed to be more than just a simple change of appearance, but less than an inoperable
far-flung concept.
They had to have new bodies, not reworked factory ones.
They had to incorporate new practical styling concepts that could be executed in some form.
They had to add usable passenger enhancements and comforts and they had to be fully functional.
In short, these were more than just rolling static display models made in-house.
The how-to-build-them-and-the-where-to-build-them took a historic turn in 1950 because of a man
named C.B. Thomas and C.B. Thomas held the seemingly unrelated position as the head of
Chrysler's export department.
He was the guy who was in charge of selling cars everywhere, but the United States and he,
with friends all over the world, had strong contacts in Italy and what he learned would
start us down the path to the sunken Norsemen.
Thomas learned that Italy, packed with old-world craftsmen and still in the throes from the
disaster of World War II, could provide labor and skills to bring Chrysler's design dreams
to life for pennies on the dollar from what they'd cost stateside.
When he presented his findings to the company Brass, namely Chrysler President K.T. Keller,
saying with confidence that the cars could be crafted for about 10 percent of what they'd
cost to build in-house at Chrysler, the company decided to give it a shot.
Hedging their bets, Chrysler decided to hire two companies to build cars.
One was the legendary Pininfarina and the other was Gia.
The car that Gia was tasked to build was known as the XX500 and reportedly Gia's quality of work
was so high they won out over Pininfarina and it would be Gia that Chrysler would partner with
for the ensuing years and the ensuing builds.
Virgil Echster was not involved in the 1950 project as he was too new in his job,
but he was instantly engaged with the relationship with Gia and his own project,
which was 1952's Chrysler K310. The relationship would produce cars like the dramatic Falcon,
the oddly endearing Plainsman wagon, the Flight Sweep 1 and 2, and the centerpiece of our story,
the Norseman. The process used for all the cars up to the Norseman were produced with the same set
of rules. Chrysler designers would pen the car, create a perfectly scaled and finished plaster
model, and then ship it along to Italy with the technical drawings for Gia. From there,
the craftsman would create a full-size wooden buck and the body would be made by hand.
Other elements like the chassis and some other things would be supplied and completed by Chrysler
and then shipped over, other times they'd be completed by Gia. The running gear and drivetrain
would always be sent from the USA and the Chrysler plants to Italy for fitment in the car.
Now the deadlines of one year to the next would be predicated on the auto show season
in the United States where these cars would be toured around the country and displayed from
coast to coast, serving their role as previously mentioned as halo cars or future cars to capture
the public's interest. The masterpiece that Gia was working on to complete in the later part of
1956 for the upcoming show season leading into and through 1957 was called the Norseman and it
was one month behind schedule. By 1956 the Andrea Doria was one of the best known ocean liners in
the world. A project started in 1950 as Italy with support from the United States began to rebuild
the merchant marine that had been all but decimated during World War II. The ship was near 700 feet long
a 62,000 horsepower embodiment of Italian national pride and served as the flagship of the Italian
line. Before the war Italian ocean liners were among the best in the world. A ship called the
Rex at a transatlantic speed record in 1933 and was celebrated in Italy like any sort of national
sports hero would have been. The Rex was among the estimated 50 percent of Italian merchant marine
vessels sent to the bottom of the ocean during World War II. Andrea Doria was to be her glorious
replacement and spiritual successor on the high seas. Built from scratch in Genoa with Italian
labor, design and engineering, its steam turbines and their 62,000 horsepower output would also
breathe pride back into the recovering nation. Like all things properly Italian, it wasn't just
fast. It was stylish filled with art, culture and panache. It was the first ship built with three
Lido decks each one having its own swimming pool. The decks descended the back of the ship like a
grand staircase. Leading Italian designers were hired to create an interior atmosphere that was
elegant, luxurious, cultured and functional. All three classes of service from the ultra
swanky first class to the more modern cabin class. Even the budget minded Taurus class
were presented in such a way no other liner on the high seas had ever done before.
Art and architecture were blended in magnificent ways. There was gold and polish everywhere,
glass doors, furniture that was of the highest style of the era and so much more.
By the time the sea trials of the Andrea Doria began in 1952, the Italian line was in a full-on
advertising blitz. Working relentlessly to sell potential passengers on all this amazing ship
had to offer no matter your travel budget. On the operational side, the ship was equipped with 16
lightboats, radar, 11 watertight compartments and all the leading edge elements of the day.
Along with all this, it had one more interesting thing built into it, a propensity to list heavily,
especially when its fuel tanks which were located at the bottom of the hull were empty,
like at the end of a particular trip. Even the models used in the design phase had shown
this proclivity in large tank testing. The other potentially concerning thing was that
the watertight compartments were more like open tanks. They didn't seal at the top and as was
determined by engineers, if they were full and the ship listed more than 20 degrees,
they'd spill over the top into other compartments. Also, if the Andrea Doria was listing more than
15 degrees in either direction, the lifeboats on the opposite side of the lean would, you know,
not be usable. All this being said, the ship handily passed at sea trials, achieved a top speed
of 26 knots and on January 14, 1953, the Andrea Doria made her first Atlantic crossing to great
fanfare, crowds and celebrations at all her stops along the way. The reviews and breathtaking
experience of passengers, both well-heeled and otherwise, made her one of the hottest
tickets on the high seas. Her capacity of 1,241 passengers and crew of 563 weren't just traveling,
they were traveling in high style. By the time the Andrea Doria took to the ocean with passengers,
the MS Stockholm of the Swedish-American line had been rolling, yes, literally,
rolling over the Atlantic for five years. In so many ways, the Stockholm was everything
the Andrea Doria wasn't. It was smaller, some saying that it had the look of an overgrown yacht
rather than an ocean liner. It held just 395 passengers with a crew of 220. At 525 feet long,
it was the smallest of the transatlantic ships of this era and it was that way for a reason.
Before World War II, the vessels of the Swedish-American line were as grandiose as the Andrea
Doria in their size and specter of luxury and design. But in the timeframe that this ship was
conceived and built, air travel was starting to pillage the ocean liner passenger business
badly. Leadership at the Swedish-American line decided a smaller, more modern,
more modestly outfitted ship would be the way forward. Yes, it was smartly appointed,
but in comparison to machines like the Andrea Doria, it really didn't compare. It was the
Volvo versus the Ferrari. One interesting first for the Stockholm was that every passenger cabin,
no matter the class of service, was on the outside. This meant that everyone had a porthole
or a window to see out of, even in the crew quarters. Another interesting piece of its
construction was that, because it was going to be spending plenty of time in cold waters,
it was based in Sweden, remember, the ship had a heavily reinforced icebreaker level
strengthened prowl. And the prowl is a part of a ship's bow that you actually see above the water
line. It was designed to break ice and in the event it had to grunt its way out of a frozen
northern port, it was equipped to do that. It was kind of unusual for an ocean liner,
but it was also understandable for all the practical reasons of where the ship would be
based out of. While the Stockholm may have been better equipped to bust out of a frozen harbor
than other cruise ships, it was lacking some basic equipment, especially stuff needed to
comfortably tour the North Atlantic. The Stockholm lacks stabilizers, which work under the water
like a set of wings to help steady the ship. And without them, it was a big problem right off the
bat. In fact, the first ocean crossing with passengers for the Stockholm began in late
February 1948, which was among the most violent times for a ship to cross the famously rolling
Atlantic Ocean, especially one that, well large, in fact, the biggest ship that Sweden had ever
produced to that point, was still pretty small compared to, you know, every other ocean liner
in the world. The ship pitched and rolled horribly through the waters of the North Atlantic,
leaving passengers sick and apparently causing the loss of life of one person on board. Adding
insult to injury, when the ship got to New York, it was met with zero fanfare and the collective
reaction of, that's it, from the American branch of the line. They saw the Stockholm to be too small,
too plain, and too underwhelming to be a sales hit with American passengers. The Stockholm was
quoted as being called in actual maritime publications as being the, quote,
worst roller on the North Atlantic. And this seemed kind of a quick way to get to the scrap heap,
as opposed to being a successful long running ship. But a shift in approach changed everything
about the Stockholm. Of course, this machine would cross the North Atlantic, but it would
spend most of its time sailing from New York to the Caribbean. And with those commerce seas,
the stock of the Stockholm rose quite quickly. As the injury of Doria was being launched in 1952,
the Stockholm was heading into dry dock. Passenger capacity of the Stockholm,
which was minuscule compared to the Doria, was expanded by 178. A movie theater was added.
Interior design elements were upgraded and it was sent back out to work. In 1955,
those magical stabilizers would finally be added to the Stockholm to the delight of passengers.
It would make the ship much more capable in rough seas. And its reputation as a nice, but
not overly nice way to hit the high seas, well not tarnished, was firmly established.
Now, these two ships were crossing the ocean in a world of their own and doing it in unique ways.
But as that was happening, the men in Turin at the Gia works were under the gun during the summer
of 1956. Their most ambitious idea car yet for Chrysler, a beautiful creation known as
the Norsemen, was giving them fits. Well, that may have actually been Chrysler management at this
point. This time they didn't send a model. For the first time in their long time working relationship,
Chrysler only sent drawings for the craftsmen to build the buck and then form the body over.
They didn't send the model and the model would make it far quicker for these guys to measure up
and then upscale and create the buck from. So with none of that, they were running a little bit
behind schedule. As hard as they were thrashing, they were behind and the ship that the car was
supposed to leave Italy on was absolutely going to be long gone by the time they were done.
The Norsemen was an incredible design exercise. Its most wonderful feature was the fact that it
had no A-pillar supporting the windshield, something that every car known to mankind from then to now
has used. William Brownlee, the assistant manager of the Chrysler design studio that drew the car,
first suggested this element. Virgil Exner and Chief Stylist Cliff Voss were not wild about
the idea because they perceived it as being dangerous and they perceived the public as
thinking it would be dangerous to have this hanging roof with no A-pillars to support it,
but they did allow it to proceed. A man named Dio Luton created this profile image of what
the look would consist of. In reality, it would be far more stunning.
Let's start with the roof. The centerpiece of the design was the cantilever mounted roof,
which ended up as a pillarless program up front. Two quarter inch steel rods were used in the
corners of the custom made PPG crush-proof windshield to hold the roof under tension,
meaning hold it down. As was the theory, if there was a crash, those rods would break,
allowing the roof to spring upward and a literature produced by Chrysler claimed that
it could support eight times the weight of the car. Is that dubious? It may be, but then again,
I don't know. The back window, some 12 square feet in area, was retractable into the roof of
the car, which was another design feature that gave the Kia guys fits. This car is magnificent
overall. The body was made completely of aluminum to save weight. It sported beautiful lines,
running front to back, hideaway headlights, the oval shaped front grille, a narrow bumper with
subtle teeth, flared wheel openings, and those mild fins at the rear highlighted the oval shaped
tail openings that also showcase some significant chrome bumper sections. Where other cars had
cost Chrysler $20,000 from Kia, this masterwork was cresting $150,000 in total spend, and that
is in 1950s dollars. There were 50,000 man hours of work into the creation of the Norseman,
with a 227 inch total length, 82 inch total width, and sitting 56 inches high,
the car rode on a significant 129 inch wheelbase which was the same as a Chrysler Imperial of the
day. The interior with its futuristic dashboard, leather bucket seats, and other appointments
was a match for the drop dead gorgeous looks of the exterior. The chassis was custom and the car
had a completely smooth belly pan for aerodynamics under the floor, which also sat under the driveline
components. The engine was a 331 cubic inch hemi that made 235 horsepower and a transmission that
was a two speed powerflate automatic. And yes, this was a fully functional car as Exner and
Chrysler executives wanted. Now for the color. Well no one really knows, and that's the honest
truth. The original plan said two tone green. Virgil Exner wanted silver with a red interior
and black roof accents. Italian journalists who snuck a peek while it was in country said it was
blue. No color photos of the car were ever taken and any color photo you see of the Norseman
is a retouch. In fact, the scant few images of the car have been showing you here all that exist
on earth. Gia did not spend a lot of time taking photos or publicizing this car in any way because
they knew it would be a huge hit and covered on the US tour by Chrysler. Plus they were already
behind schedule and after all it was just another job to these guys. There was more pressing stuff
to do like getting the Norseman crated up and headed to the docks. Well the crew at Gia may
have missed their first shipping date. They didn't miss the second one. As luck would have it,
the Andrea Doria would be imported Genoa at the right time. It had space available in its climate
controlled storage area and having this amazing display of Italian craftsmanship traversed in
the ocean on the pride of the Italian line kind of had a nice ring to it. Right? On July 17, 1956,
the Norseman fully crated was loaded into the Andrea Doria for its trip to New York City
and the awaiting Chrysler executives, none of which, down to the very men who designed it,
had ever seen the thing in any real form. 50,000 man hours of work over 15 months was now sailing
off into the distance and unbeknownst to anyone involved on board or on land, too infamy.
On the morning of July 25, 1956, the Stockholm left New York City to cruise across the Atlantic
for the 103rd time in her life, destination Gothenburg, Sweden. The time was just before noon.
The ship's captain had left the bridge by the evening with third mate Carson Johansson manning
the bridge and helmsman Peter Larson at the wheel. They were making about 17 knots in clear skies
until they sailed into a thick fog bank. The time was about 10 pm. As this was happening,
the Andrea Doria, making some 22 and a half knots through the fog and signing its horn,
was heading west into New York City. Captain Pierrot Colomé was the man in charge of the
Italian liner as it proceeded through the fog. All was calm and then each ship experienced
the same situation at the same time. Their onboard radar systems began to indicate the
presence of another vessel and the blips were getting closer. These early radar systems were
basically good for an alert and a basic direction of travel but really had no details as to much
of anything else. They were now about 50 miles off the coast of Nantucket and closing in on
each other with a combined speed of about 40 knots. Neither attempted to radio each other for
reasons that remain unknown to this day. In the minutes leading up to disaster, the Andrea Doria
made a turn to the left in a southward direction, expecting to pass the Stockholm starboard side
to starboard side. Unfortunately, the Stockholm also turned southward and their fate was sealed
when this move was made. In the last moments before impact when visual contact was made,
the Andrea Doria maintained speed in an attempt to outrun the crash while the Stockholm cut the
engines and tried to throw the screws into reverse to slow itself down. At 11.10 pm the
unthinkable happened. The Stockholm T-Bone the Andrea Doria and a couple of hundred feet of
Atlantic water. The reinforced front section of the Stockholm multiple inches thick and prepared
for ice breaking duties ran through the side of the Andrea Doria like a saw, penetrating some 40
feet of her just over 80 foot width. The speed of the Andrea Doria as it was passing took the first
30 feet of the Stockholm wither on the way by. That chunk quickly fell into the depths of the sea
that ships anchors and chains wholly intact. The now bowless Stockholm appeared to be in as dire
straits as did the Andrea Doria which had a massive gaping hole on her side. Five crew members of
the Stockholm were lost in the impact while 46 people aboard the Andrea Doria were gone when
the hull penetrated its side. It is in this and the ensuing moments that an incredible series of
events transpire that will result in more than 1,100 people being saved from the doomed Andrea Doria
and the fate of the Norseman are sealed. Two things happened immediately after contact.
On the Stockholm damage assessment people ran to the front of the ship to find out that they
did not have a front of their ship. Taking on water fast and settling hard toward the nose,
it would seem as though that thing was doomed, right? Wrong. As the ship was taking water into
only one watertight compartment, it was easily sealed off and pumped out. Once this was managed,
the Stockholm sat at normal depth and level on an even keel. It was perhaps ironically the first
ship to send aid to the Andrea Doria that would ultimately sail back to New York City under
its own power and be repaired in dry dock with a new bow for the cost of $1 million in 1956.
The photos are among the most stunning and modern maritime history. In an age of visual
manipulation, images from a time of pure visual truth are even more astonishing. This thing didn't
sink. Not then and not, well, we'll get to that. But that's the future. In the present, we have a
disaster to attend to. The Andrea Doria was mortally wounded. When the reinforced prow of the
Stockholm pierced the Doria, it did more than just take out passenger rooms. Five fuel tanks
were ripped open and the seawater was pouring in within calculable volume and doing so instantly.
Meanwhile, the nearly empty tanks on the other side of the ship were like balloons and immediately
the Andrea Doria began listing hard to the starboard side. It was past 20 degrees by the time the
radio call went off for help. If everything had gone wrong for this ship, one thing went right.
It was sinking in an area of the maritime world that had very heavy traffic,
close naval support, and the Coast Guard was right and ready. As I am not a naval engineer,
I'm not going to go into the full details of why the ship sank, but save it to say
the entire side of it was ripped open by being rammed by another ship.
Other videos do a better job of things like this than I ever could, but just understand there was
a massive hole in this thing and it was a situation that no one and no vessel would ever overcome in
these circumstances. The rescue operation is the most incredible part of this story. That
end the media. 30 minutes after the impact, give or take, the captain ordered everybody to
abandon ship and that order went out across all decks. The list of the ship made lifeboat loading
hard and limited all boats to only one side of the vessel. The US Coast Guard and New York City
sprung into action. The Stockholm sent her lifeboats and the next thing you knew freighters and naval
ships were jumping in. The disaster took place in one of the busiest shipping lanes in the world
and that was a blessing. Beyond the Coast Guard and naval ships, there was another ocean liner
that was on the line. The SS Isle de France, a grand monster of a ship that was listening
into all the traffic around the Doria, was considering what to do. Her captain knew that
if he turned around and headed back toward New York City, he'd need to refuel, delaying his ship
and also costing the line a bunch of money, but he also knew the responsibility he had as a sea
captain. Initially skeptical, he did turn around and sped toward the disaster after
understanding the seriousness of the radio traffic he heard. His ship ended up saving more than
750 people from the sinking Andrea Doria. He was also able to definitely maneuver his massive ship
as a kind of maneuverable wave break to calm the seas for rescuers as they were helping people.
In one of the most amazingly mechanically-based miracles of the 20th century, a total of 1663
passengers and crew had been offloaded and rescued from the Andrea Doria. Amazingly,
the captain was still on board. As is the tradition and an honorable thing to do,
the captain is always the last to leave a wounded vessel, stricken or otherwise.
After all were evacuated, he decided that the Andrea Doria could be towed in and clearly,
she was doomed. I am guessing the Norseman did not exactly enter into his consideration at this
moment. By 6 am, the captain and his remaining close crew exited the ship with their records
and documents. By 10 am, the ship was wholly on her side and absolutely doomed. At 10.09 am,
July 26, 1956, the Andrea Doria disappeared forever. As you can now discern, the Norseman
was the least of the losses in this nightmare. There are dozens, if not hundreds of videos
that can tell you more about the incredible details surrounding the Andrea Doria sinking, so
I am going to leave that work to them, but there are some interesting things to consider on our
side of the fence. Maritime sinkings have been happening since man first figured out how to
float. Why was this one so massively reported? Well, for starters, it was among the first to
ever be close enough to the shore to be covered in real time with still photos and actual video.
Black and white news worldwide showed the film of the ship sinking. Newspapers from coast to coast
latched onto the harrowing photos and real time images of the wreck happening. Previously, most
shipwrecks, especially of the passenger carrying kind, had been so far from prying eyes that they
were only represented in drawings and descriptions from survivors. This was being played on the front
of cameras. Wartime sinkings had this type of video, but this? You were seeing news virtually as it
happened in 1956, which was such a foreign idea. Chrysler's media and PR people understood the power
of this moment and they did send out a release the day the ship sank, letting everyone know that the
Norseman was on it. They were straight ahead, kind of unemotional and reported the fact that the car
was lost in the sinking and they also reported that it was insured, which I guess was important for
somebody. Now one guy that was not told about any of this was Virgil Exner. He had actually suffered
a heart attack on July 25th and had no knowledge of the sinking of the ship or the loss of the car
for five days because his family didn't want him to know to add additional stress to an already tough
situation. No attempt was ever made to remake or replace the Norseman. And if you stuck around this
long, you were in the right to learn the ultimate irony of this story. The plan for the Norseman was
to have it travel around through the 1957 car show circuit and then to be brought to Chrysler
Proving Grounds to see if the roof design actually worked. And that means destructive testing.
If you can believe it, the fate of the Norseman sinking to the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean
off the shore of Nantucket was far more peaceful and far less violent than the end that was planned
for it by the guys who designed it in the first place. Chrysler was going to wreck this car.
The ocean got the chance first. From 1940 through 1961, Chrysler had 28 idea cars.
Gia made 24 of them. And there is a post script on the story of the Stockholm that needs to be told.
The tough nose ship was able to sail back to New York City under its own power without escort. It
was able to literally sail into the dry dock where the Bethlehem Steel ship repair company jumped on
this job and had a new bow made for this ship, which some say is not as good looking as the first one
in a handful of months. But the most incredible thing about the Stockholm is that it continued to
sail. Not until the 60s or the 70s or the 80s or the 90s or the 2000s or 2010s. It sailed all the
way up until it's scrapping in 2025. It was redone. It was changed. It was reconfigured.
But the Stockholm, the basic bones of it that sailed out in the 1940s and had its nose ripped off
in 1956 were on the high seas and was on the high seas until 2025 when it was cut up for scrap.
There's nothing left of the Norseman. It's been visited by divers and it's gone. Those divers
reported many years ago that the body was all but evaporated. The wooden crate was gone and all
that remained were basically the tires and maybe the glass. That's the story of the Dodge Idea
car at the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean 50 miles off the shore of Nantucket. Now you know. And as
always, knowledge is horsepower. I'm Brian Lones. Thanks for watching. See you next time.
About this episode
A story that starts with Virgil Exner’s design career and Chrysler’s postwar “idea cars,” then follows how the Norseman concept was built in Italy with Italian coachbuilders and shipped across the Atlantic. The episode pivots to the Andrea Doria and Stockholm collision that sank the Norseman on July 26, 1956. Chrysler had planned a 1957 show tour and destructive roof testing, but divers later found the wreck nearly gone—cut up for scrap in 2025.
It was late 1956 and craftsmen in Turin were thrashing to complete the latest, mosrt beautiful, and most complex project they had ever done for Chrysler.
It was a concept car called The Norseman and it was both an exceptional design and a near impossible build.
After missing its first shipping date, the job was finished a month later and the car ewas hurriedly placed on the Italian luxury liner Andrea Doria, one of the best known ships in the world, for its trip to New York City. No one outside of the factory in Turin that produced it had ever seen the car in person. It would be a grand reveal.
The Stockholm was a much smaller ocean liner, in fact the smallest to be sailing the high seas in that class of ship at the time. A little more dowdy than the Andrea Doria, it was a tough ship with an ice breaking prow that could smash its way through just about anything.
This is the story of the disaster that befell these two ships and sent one of the most beautfiul Detroit dream cars, concept cars, or idea cars ever created to the bottom of the sea forever.
