Seems worthy of a movie ?, 1974 Twentieth Century Dale

Turbo360 · Jun 25, 2014

1974 Twentieth Century Dale | Hemmings Motor News

Feature Article from Hemmings Motor News
March, 2010 - Daniel Strohl

If anything can be said of the strange tale of the Dale, it's that Geraldine Elizabeth Carmichael certainly had ambition. That, and a closetful of secrets.
Carmichael sprung onto an America still reeling from the first gas crisis in 1974, promising a lightweight, fuel-efficient and inexpensive car--the same thing promised at the same time by hundreds of inventors and innovators across the country. Except Carmichael--tall, broad-shouldered, impudent, tactless--also pledged she would build 88,000 cars in her company's first year of production and soon show GM, Ford, and Chrysler how a car should be built. "I'll knock the hell out of Detroit," she said. "I'll rule the auto industry like a queen."

That company, Twentieth Century Motor Car Corporation (a not-very-subtle, but still perplexing Ayn Rand reference), very quickly had an office in Encino, California, a half-dozen or so employees and a few prototypes of the Dale, a three-wheeled, two-seat sports car. Carmichael said the Dale, weighing in at 1,000 pounds, would sell for less than $2,000 and be good for 70 miles per gallon, thanks to its 40hp two-cylinder, horizontally opposed engine and its lightweight body made of Rigidex, a material supposedly nine times stronger than steel. After the Dale (named for its designer, frustrated inventor Dale Clifft), Twentieth Century planned to introduce two other three-wheeled cars: the Revelle, a sedan, and the Vanagon, a station wagon. The company's factory, a rented hangar at the Burbank airport, would support the manufacture of 250,000 cars a year once fully operational, and cars would start rolling off the assembly line in June 1975.

Starting in November 1974, Carmichael's promises began to attract national attention, no doubt buoyed by the human interest aspect of her story: Raised a farmer's daughter and tomboy, she built her first car at the age of 18, got a degree in mechanical engineering from Ohio State University, and married a NASA structural engineer whose death left her a single mother of five. The National Observer put her on its front page, and newspapers and magazines profiled her in glowing prose. She even convinced the producers of The Price is Right to offer the Dale as a prize on one of the episodes.
Money came flowing in as prospective franchisees offered to buy dealerships and prospective customers sent in deposits to buy Dales. Carmichael at one point claimed she had $30 million from investors backing her, but unorthodox business practices at Twentieth Century began to attract the attention of the California Department of Corporations and the California Department of Motor Vehicles, which soon ordered her to cease operations because Twentieth Century had neither a license to sell shares nor a license to sell cars and dealerships.

The fatal shooting of William D. Miller, a Twentieth Century salesman, in late January 1975 by another Twentieth Century employee brought a wave of critical attention down on Twentieth Century, causing Carmichael to flee to Dallas. Soon after, she and nine other Twentieth Century employees were indicted on charges of fraud--it turned out the Dale was nothing more than a fiberglass body with a generator engine that couldn't adequately drive down the block. Investigators discovered that Carmichael, along with several of Twentieth Century's "employees," were formerly employed by United States Marketing Institute, a company that promotes inventions. Dale Clifft had submitted his design for a three-wheeler to USMI, but Carmichael and the others saw the potential for the design and formed Twentieth Century to promote it themselves.
And when Carmichael hastily fled Dallas, investigators also discovered that she was really a he--Jerry Dean Michael, a counterfeiter who had been on the run from the FBI since 1961.
Michael was found soon afterward in Miami and confessed to have been undergoing hormone treatments and surgeries in his effort to become a woman. At trial in 1977, Michael was found guilty on 29 counts of grand theft, three counts of corporate security fraud and one count of conspiracy, but he disappeared on a $50,000 bail bond shortly before sentencing. Not until 1989, with the help of an episode of Unsolved Mysteries, was Michael apprehended. He served two years, and reportedly died in 2004.

Only three Dales were ever built: two mockups and one running prototype. All three still exist, two in the hands of private collectors and one at the Petersen Automotive Museum in Los Angeles.
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rdefabri · Jul 7, 2014

Ah yes, posted here a few times before, strange story indeed!

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Seems worthy of a movie ?, 1974 Twentieth Century Dale

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