AUTOS: Low-Slung Beauty

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Brawny & Graceful. Vance is sure that the oversize car is on the way out, and that car design may change fast in the next few years under the spur of hell-for-leather competition already in sight. Studebaker will have to hustle faster than ever to keep its designers ahead. Fiber glass and plastic bodies already promise great weight-savings and economies. Rear-engine autos, which would cut production costs, are another possibility. Last year Studebaker queried 10,000 people, found to its surprise that 50% of them would not hesitate to buy such a car.

Four decades ago, in an ad for a new car, Studebaker proudly boasted that it had achieved the ultimate in driving pleasure. The open, chariotlike Studebaker-Garford "Forty," it said, represented "the end of experiment." But Harold Vance, who has done plenty of experimenting in the intervening years, makes no such boast today. "Our new sports and family cars," says he, "represent the beginning of a whole new experiment in getting the fun back into driving."