MacMinn

http://deansgarage.com/2009/sports-cars-of-the-future-by-strother-macminn/

Strother MacMinn        From Coachbuilt.com.

 

As a young boy growing up in Pasadena, California, Strother MacMinn spent every spare moment drawing pictures of cars or pestering salesmen at car dealers to share their brochures and knowledge of the treasures in their showrooms. It was on one such occasion that a kindly gentleman at the Pierce-Arrow agency provided a turn of fate for Strother by disclosing the whereabouts of a service entrance into the Walter M. Murphy Studio, where he met and became friendly with Franklin Hershey.
Franklin Hershey, one of the best designers in that custom body shop, was so taken with young Strother’s sketches that he invited him into a whole new world by having him come to his office Saturday mornings where he showed him the basics of professional body design. This friendship and guidance continued after Hershey moved to Detroit to work at GM, and throughout Strothers’ prep school, summer classes at the Art Center School in Los Angeles and high school years. It eventually led to Strother’s first working job in 1936 in the Buick studio at General Motors Art & Colour Section with Franklin Hershey as his boss.
With corporate approval from GM’s German division, Harley Earl set up a new studio in 1937. Strother MacMinn, John Coleman and George Jergenson, with Frank Hershey in charge and Hans Mersheimer of Opel as design liaison officer, were given the assignment to style the upcoming 1938 Opel Kapitan. It was an exciting enterprise because of its new approach to international styling and included advanced ideas such as built-in headlights, stretch fenders and a clean body form. (That basic model, with face-lifts, remained in production into the early fifties.)
It was with skill and enthusiasm that MacMinn participated in the development of design proposals for GM’s inter-city bus client, Greyhound Lines, Frank Springs styling department at Hudson Motors, Ed Anderson’s Oldsmobile studio, and many others on his long list of credits.
But, according to MacMinn, the best job offer anyone ever had was his part-time teaching job in 1945 at the Art Center College in the Industrial Design department. MacMinn feels nothing can compare with the excitement and stimulation of sharing enthusiasm and knowledge with dedicated, professionally oriented young design students. Perhaps that is why he has been teaching part-time for the past 41 years.
In addition he has worked independently as a designer of: aircraft seats, household products, and fiberglass boats. And as a consultant in 1979, he helped to found the first Southern California advanced concept satellite auto design studio for the Toyota Motor corporation.
Since 1953 MacMinn has written and illustrated articles for Road & Track, Motor Trend, Automobile Quarterly, and Car Graphic magazines in addition to historical catalogue essays for the “Automobile and Culture” and “Detroit Style: Automotive form 1925-1950″ exhibits in Los Angeles and Detroit.
Strother MacMinn’s lifelong love of the automobile has led him to own a 1937 Cord 812 phaeton and a 1929 Rolls-Royce P-1 Derby phaeton. He kept and still drives the 1951 Jaguar XK-120 roadster that he bought for $2400 in 1953.


Mac's last project
http://www.gatsbyonline.com/main.aspx?page=text&id=689&cat=auto