“Fake it before you make it” is nothing new. I read the original Car & Driver magazine article when it was published back in the 1970s.
Here are two Internet adaptations of the original article:
The transgender con-artist and her multi-million dollar 3-wheeled car scheme
Knowing people would want to see the Dale, Liz placed a mock-up on display at the Twentieth Century office. The Dale was roped off with enough space to hide the fact that the front wheels were actually just nailed to a 4×4 since the piece of crap didn’t even have an axle.
Boldfaced emphasis added by me.
Murder, Transsexuals, And The Price Is Right: The Story Of The Dale Car Hoax
So, technically, there’s some weirdness about the car, but, really, it’s nothing compared to the people behind the company. The company founder was 37 year old Geraldine Elizabeth (Liz) Carmichael, mother of five, and a widow of a former NASA structural engineer. Liz was a charismatic woman with a lot of presence, being significantly larger and more, um, robust, than an average woman, at 6 feet tall and 200 lbs. A huge Ayn Rand fan, Liz named the Twentieth Century Motor Corporation after another more or less equally fictitious company in Atlas Shrugged.
Boldfaced emphasis added by me.
Previously here:
Mike Cane's Atomic Supermen 