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Thinking of buying a car? Or maybe you’re already driving one, cursing potholes and gas prices. Either way, you might not know the strange roads the automobile has taken to get to where it is today. From bold women behind the wheel to backdoor laws you never questioned, here are six offbeat car facts that’ll make you see traffic a little differently.
1. The First Road Trip Wasn’t Karl’s Idea
Mercedes-Benz is often credited with inventing the modern car. In 1886, Karl Benz built the three-wheeled, gasoline-powered Benz Patent-Motorwagen. But it was his wife, Bertha, who actually believed in it. Without telling her husband, she packed up their sons and took the car on a 12-hour journey from Mannheim to Pforzheim. Along the way, she cleaned the carburetor with a hatpin, fixed a fuel line with her hairpin, and even bought fuel from a pharmacy. That trip helped prove the car was more than a mechanical curiosity. It was a future.
2. Blame the Pedestrian
In the early 20th century, cars were new, loud, and dangerous. Pedestrian deaths were rising—and the public was furious. So car manufacturers did what corporations do: they launched a PR campaign. They popularized the term jaywalker to blame those on foot for accidents. The word “jay” was slang for someone foolish or out-of-place. Suddenly, if you got hit, it was your fault for not staying in your lane—even if crosswalks didn’t exist yet.
3. You Can’t Buy a Car in Some States
In most of the U.S., you legally can’t buy a new car directly from the manufacturer. You have to go through a third-party dealership, often with a markup. It’s not just tradition—it’s the law in many places. Dealership lobbyists helped pass legislation to protect their turf. That’s why companies like Tesla have faced lawsuits and bans in some states when trying to sell direct to consumers. So much for cutting out the middleman.
4. Build-It-Yourself Sports Cars
Before Lotus became synonymous with sleek, featherlight racing machines, they were selling kits. Not fancy ones, either. Buyers had to assemble the cars themselves—wrench in one hand, manual in the other. Why? To dodge the high purchase tax in the UK. As long as it was technically “parts,” it wasn’t taxed like a full vehicle. It wasn’t until the late 1960s that Lotus started doing full manufacturing and selling pre-built cars.
5. Ford’s “Any Color” Rule Had Nothing to Do with Style
“Any customer can have a car painted any color that he wants, so long as it is black.” That famous Henry Ford quote wasn’t just a stubborn style choice. In reality, black paint dried faster than other colors, which helped speed up production on the Model T’s assembly line. Efficiency won over variety—and black became the unofficial uniform of early car ownership.
6. The Porsche Family Still Runs Volkswagen
Volkswagen AG isn’t just any car company. It’s the biggest automaker in the world by revenue, and it owns brands like Audi, Bentley, Bugatti, and Lamborghini. But at the heart of this automotive empire sits a family—the descendants of Ferdinand Porsche. Yes, that Porsche. The man who gave the world both luxury sports cars and, oddly enough, the original Volkswagen Beetle. More than a century later, his family still holds majority control.