The history of the Corvette started in the 1950's when Harley, a top designer at GM, Earl told General Motor's high executives that GM should build a sports car. He though if Jaguar, Ferrari, and Porsche ruled the roads of Europe, then GM should build a sport car that could rule the roads of America. But as usual they disagreed because it would cost too much. And finally they agreed because the public loved the prototype that was first shown in the 1953 Motorama in New York. He later called it Corvette after a warship which was used in World War II. Chevy's Chief Engineer, Ed Cole wanted to build the Corvette with fiberglass because it was lightweight and did not rust. The 1953 Corvettes had an engine called the Blue Fame Special. The engine that was supposed to go in the 1953 model was going to be a V-8 engine. The Blue Fame Special was a substituted because GM didn't have the V-8 engine ready yet. The Blue Flame Special had 150 horsepower. The corvette could go to173 km per hour, which was not very fast. Only 300 Corvettes were sold in 1953, and only 200 still exist today. The Corvette was not sold to the public in 1953; it was sold to certain people only. The people who bought them had no choice of which color to buy. The entire 1953 model had a polo white exterior and a sportsman- red interior. In 1954 Chevy built 3,640 Corvettes. This time the people had a choice of four colors: polo white, pennant blue, sportsman red, and black. Chevy did not sell many Vettes that year, people did not like the automatic transmission, they though that a real sports car had a manual transmission. Another reason people didn't buy the 1954 Corvette was that it had leaky convertible tops. Because the 1954 model was so poor, Chevy built 700 Corvettes in 1955. The 1955 Corvette had Chevy's first V-8 engines; this increased the speed from 173 Km per hour to 189 Km per hour. Even with the new engine Corvettes did not sell ver
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