| John Zachary Delorean was born in Detroit. His father worked on the assembly plant, so cars were always an influence for John. After going to school after school, he ended up in Chrysler’s automotive school. Most graduates moved right into Chrysler. John hated the big corporations, so he took a job with Packard. He redesigned many Packard models and made many patents. This caught GM's eye and they hired him for Pontiac. Even though John disliked the industry leaders, he was given a lot of leeway. This resulted in designing the GTO, and John became the father of the muscle car. This annoyed GM's subsidiary, Chevrolet, since they were reserved for the sports cars. So what did GM do? They moved John over to Chevrolet and by the time he was 42, he was the youngest vice-president. This didn't sit well with John though. He had many ideas that were overlooked and ignored. Even though this was a common practice in big corporations, John hated the politics. In the beginning of 1973 he left Chevrolet. He spent almost two years as a consultant and planning his own company. He wanted his car to be revolutionary. He wanted it to be a very safe, reliable car. Two things, which had upset him with Gm, he wanted to implement with his company. First were air bags. GM had researched air bags back in 1950. GM had decided not to use them cause they brought the cost of cars up. GM wasn't interested in making cars safer, so they abandoned the project. John wanted it to be a staple in his car. The other policy that irked John was the redesign of a car model every year. John felt that a car should only be updated every year with safety features and better parts. He was against GM redesigning car models every year for ascetics rather than necessity. He felt the consumer wasn't going to buy a new car every year just because they changed the grill or hood. He knew consumers held on to cars and only bought cars when they needed. The prototype Delorean had an airbag, but by the time production for the car started he was already in debt and was forced to have them removed to cut costs. As for consistency of the models, the 1981-1983 DMC-12 models are virtually the same. Most '83's had turbo charge to alleviate the slow speed of earlier models. The Gas flap had to also be taken out to cut production costs. After DMC folded, John spent more than a decade in courts settling bills left. He remained in retirement until all the creditors could be settled. In March of 2005 John Z. Delorean past away after complications resulting from a stroke. |
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