Harley Earl 1893-1969The legendary General Motors design chief, Harley Earl, began his career, appropriately, in his father's Southern California coachbuilding shop, Earl Carriage Works. Young Harley, after attending Stanford's engineering department, joined the family firm, now known as the Earl Automobile Works, full-time in 1918 and switched the, Works' output to supplying motorcar bodies to the fast-growing motion picture industry. Within this base, Earl began to build up a collateral clientele by designing exotic customized bodies on commission from reigning Hollywood luminaries.
The Earl firm also provided custom body work for the large Southern California Cadillac dealer, Don Lee, who, noticing Earl's success, purchased the company in 1919. Lee insisted that young Harley remain as general manager, "doing the designing and run the body plant for him." The busines of supplying coachbuilt bodies and reconstruction work, in the early 1920s, to the luxury car trade was lucrative and the Lee-Earl partnership prospered. Eventually, they were turning out 300 bodies a year, even shipping some to India and Europe.
By this time, Harley Earl had developed a technique of using modeling clay to make display models. This allowed stylists and modelers greater freedom of expression and wider scope for innovative body work. Equally important, clay provided a more malleable medium than the prevalent plaster and wood model-making process.
In January 1926, Earl was asked to submit a model for a new General Motors companion car to the Cadillac: the LaSalle. His styling inspiration reached back in his admiration for the well-regarded Hispano-Suiza. The model was a success and shortly afterwards Earl was, invited back to discuss a permanent position in the new styling department which was to be called the Art and Colour Section.
It was in May 1927 that he began to organize a centralized styling staff. When word got around GM that Harley Earl and Earnest Seaholm, the engineering operations chief, were looking for key men with special talents, several came forward. Ralph Pew (sketching), Joe Thompson (modeling), Howard O'Leary (administration) were among the first group. By late January 1928, Art and Colour had 50 men. Earl and his new styling department were underway and would, eventually, dominate the history of automotive design.
Earl's success with the Don Lee Cadillac organization attracted the attention of Fred Fisher, patriarch of the famed Fisher Brothers. His enthusiasm for Earl's success with luxury cars eventually prompted Larry Fisher, president of Cadillac, to phone Don Lee and request that Harley Earl be sent to Detroit for consultation.
