the timely accidental death of actor james dean

James Dean / publicity photo / public domain

Alec Guinness, Blessings in Disguise. Pleasantville NY: Akadine Press, 2001, pp. 34-35—

When we got there [at an Italian bistro in Los Angeles]…there was no table available. As we walked disconsolately away I said, “I don’t care where we eat or what. Just something, somewhere.” I became aware of running, sneakered feet behind us and turned to face a fair young man in sweat shirt and blue jeans. “You want a table?” he asked. “Join me. My name is James Dean.” We followed him gratefully, but on the way back to the restaurant he turned into a car park, saying, “I’d like to show you something.” Among the other cars there was what looked like a large, shiny, silver parcel wrapped in cellophane and tied with ribbon. “It’s just been delivered,” he said, with bursting pride. “I haven’t even driven it yet.” The sports car looked sinister to me, although it had a large bunch of red carnations resting on the bonnet. “How fast is it?” I asked. “She’ll do a hundred and fifty,” he replied. Exhausted, hungry, feeling a little ill-tempered in spite of Dean’s kindness, I heard myself saying in a voice I could hardly recognize as my own, “Please, never get in it.” I looked at my watch.”It is now ten o’clock, Friday the 23rd of September, 1955. If you get in that car you will be found dead in it by this time next week.” He laughed. “Oh, shucks! Don’t be so mean!” I apologized for what I had said, explaining it was lack of sleep and food. Thelma Moss and I joined him at his table and he proved an agreeable, generous host, and was very funny about Lee Strasberg, the Actors’ Studio and the Method. We parted an hour later, full of smiles. No further reference was made to the wrapped-up car. Thelma was relieved by the outcome of the evening and rather impressed. In my heart I was uneasy—with myself. At four o’clock in the afternoon of the following Friday James Dean was dead, killed while driving the car.

a cool clutch and four gears and even reverse

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Above Roy R. Behrens, Hammer Smith (© 2021). Digital montage.

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An unidentified aging British chaffeur and auto mechanic, recalling his youth as a worker on an estate, in Ronald Blythe, The View in Winter: Reflections on Old Age. New York: Penguin Books, 1980, p. 65—

I’ll tell you how I learned to drive. There was a shooting party and I had just got this car all washed and polished and clean, ready for the pick-up—the guns—when a boy came out of the house to put some dirt in the dustbin. I called out, “Come for a ride, Harry?” just as a joke, laughing, you know, but then in Harry jumps aside of me, looking pleased and excited. So what could I do? I was sixteen. I'd watched old Crossley [the estate chauffeur] with the gear-lever and the brake, and I told myself, “If he can do it, I can do it.” So I reached for the pedals and suddenly there we were, dashing down the front drive! That drive was a mile long and ended at the bottom lodge, where the village policeman lived. I was driving straight to prison, I told myself, for taking the motor. And could I turn it round and bring it back? But that lovely motor had a cool clutch and four gears and a reverse, and by luck I managed them all—brought it back safe, washed it all over again, and nothing was seen or said. That was the first time I had a drive and I’ve been driving ever since.

how structured and deliberate designers are

Above Streamlined-era magazine page layout for an Oldsmobile advertisement.

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Mirra Merriman in Wendy Deutelbaum and Carol de Saint Victor, “The Art of Teaching: Interviews with Three Masters” in The Iowa Review Vol 28 No I (1998), p. 13—

One of the illusions people have who don't know about the making of art is that it’s an activity that comes out of a creative surge, a genius or passion. What is missed most of the time is how deliberate and how structured the choices that artists [especially designers] make are, and how one can read in the works of art the intellectual process that was taking place in the mind of the artist.

Sculptor / Printmaker Dallas Guffey

Epochal Descent © Dallas Guffey (2017)

We really respond to these woodcuts by sculptor/printmaker (and clandestine graphic designer) Dallas Guffey. See more at his website.

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Rebecca Loncraine, The Real Wizard of Oz: The Life and Times of L. Frank Baum. NY: Gotham Books, 2009, p. 252—

In 1913, [Henry] Ford began making the Model T automobile in his Michigan plant through a researched, rationalized assembly-line production method. Before 1913, automobiles were custom-made. One of Ford's engineers was inspired by a visit to a meatpacking factory on Chicago, where he saw dead cows butchered in a rational assembly-line process, where a carcass was chopped into recognizable joints as it moved along a conveyor. The engineer reversed the idea and envisaged building an automobile along a moving line where static workers performed the same repetitive task over and over again. The cost of a Model T fell rapidly from $575 to $240, and became affordable to middle-income households.

Divulge © Dallas Guffey (2017)

Amelia Earhart | Megan Lehman

Portrait of Amelia Earhart (2012) © Megan Lehman

Above In a class about designing digital images, I asked my students to invent "interpretive portraits" of extraordinary men or women from the past, sung or unsung. Megan Lehman chose American aviation pioneer Amelia Earhart (1897-1937), who died when she was 39.

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Roy Paul Nelson, The Cartoonist: An Illustrated Story. Eugene OR: Seven Gables Press, 1994, pp. 66-67—

At the time a graduate student in engineering, Ryan had once worked for an American automaker, but he was fired for installing the steering wheels on the right sides of the dashboards. That was his first inkling that he had dyslexia. Fortunately, he got a job with an automaker in England, where he did quite well.