“In the spring,” famed English poet Alfred, Lord Tennyson (1809-1892) wrote, “a young man’s fancy lightly turns to thoughts of love.” Well, it’s spring, and that’s still true.
But young American men’s springtime love affairs have long involved cars as well. New models may generally come out in the fall – and how excited motorists get about new cars from General Motors, Ford and Chrysler historically determined how well our economy would run. But driving with the windows or the top down in spring has a special allure.
For decades, of course, many cars have entered the American market from Japan, Germany, South Korea and other countries as well.
But for many a year, the car business in America centered around Detroit, the Motor City.
Sadly, for reasons ranging from poor management to bloated union contracts to outside competition, U.S. automobile manufacturing fell on hard times in more recent years. And that means Detroit has fallen on hard times, too.
Detroit in 1950 – booming with U.S. car production – had an impressive population of 1.8 million. It was our fifth-largest city. But Detroit’s population in 2010 was down to only 713,777.
We feel for the people of Detroit and for the entire state of Michigan, where unemployment is 10.4 percent – compared with 8.9 percent nationally.
But we are glad that many “foreign” cars are going to be made in Chattanooga. Chattanoogans and residents of the surrounding area soon will be turning out thousands of Volkswagens.
Well, it’s spring. Cars (and love) still stir a young man’s fancy. And wherever they are produced, cars are still very important to the economy.