Vehicles of the Imagination: Published and Unpublished Transportation Concept Drawings

Author Steven M. Johnson has been described as a cartoonist who successfully predicted many future products. This book contains more than 1,500 concept drawings, mostly unpublished, on the subject of vehicles. These were drawn over a 45-year period, when he maintained a sideline business as an inventor-cartoonist. His ideas are said to be brilliant, prescient, amusing, or simply ludicrous. He has always had a fondness for automobiles. As a senior in high school in dry, sunny California, he had at one time a collection of five rust-free autos, and often drove his 1929 Model A Ford Roadster to school. In the mid-a1950s a used car in running condition cost no more than $150. The book shows napkin scribbles, index card notes, and carefully illustrated concept drawings of vehicles that he has imagined. Not trained as an industrial designer, he considers himself a wannabe inventor. Here, he shares an enthusiasm for vehicles in a book that will be appreciated by those who like odd, quirky humor as well as by nostalgic dads, young mechanics, and hot rod and classic car collectors.