C is for countach. I had a countach poster as a dumb kid. It wasn’t until much later that I read some stuff. Now I use words like internal combustion suspension configuration via analog downforce joystick settings in single sentences to confuse and distract impressionable young women from finding the keys. This usually works for the first thousand rpms. Between the subscriptions to numerous publications, lawless excursions and random drooling, I grasped the necessities of long-travel suspension, torque, low-gear crawling and horsepower.
While researching the legendary supercar manufacturer, the thought occurred to me that, weather permitting, Lamborghini’s original intent had not been to produce just a car or just a tractor, but integration. Lam was making his dream, in pieces, unknowingly developing the ultimate superior vehicle or USV. In retrospect, I am most likely overanalyzing but for the sake of circumspection, the story continues…
Ferrucio Lamborghini was born in a vast expanse of plains surrounding the Po River on April 28, 1916 in the small farming community of Renazzo, Italy. Here, miles of deserted roadways divide “endless tracts of land where an appreciation of vehicles is second only to agriculture”. At 18 years old, Ferris left his fathers farm for a job as a mechanic with some Bologna for less than a dollar a week.
In 1939, Lamborghini threw a couple of wrenches around the Island of Rhodes at the Air Force Motor Unit Center fulfilling his service commitment. Ferrucio dismantled tanks, jeeps and trucks from all over the world and put them in a big pile… His experience in both Italian and foreign motor vehicle maintenance excelled and in short time gained command of the center.
After World War II, Italy’s economy was comparable to my salary working for Dr. Doom Towing in Arizona. Lamborghini used his intuition and knowledge of mechanics to create his first tractor in 1947. The powerful Tractor ‘Carioca’ was an agricultural vehicle inexpensively produced from WWII surplus. Lamborghini set up shop converting military vehicles for civilian use. He started with trucks and soon began producing powerful tracked tractors. They successfully competed with well established names like Massey-Ferguson and Fiat. Ferrucio Lamborghini was not your average torque converter.
The 50s were a time for economic restructure and industrial recuperation. With executive precision, Ferrucio mobilized a couple of other adventures; Lamborghini Oleodinamica (hydraulics), Lamborghini Calor (heating and cooling) and an underground helicopter development studio. His projects were abundantly successful and by the dawn of the 60s accumulated monolithic financial reserves.
“I was a Ferrarista,” Lamborghini recalls. “I had already bought three or four Ferraris. In those days, the autos weren’t perfect as they are today, and I, being young, had a heavy foot. I kept burning out the clutch. One day I approached Ferrari with this obvious defect and asked him, How is it possible that a Ferrari needs a new clutch every week?” Imagine that moment in time. Two of the coolest dudes on the planet, kickin’ it. “You don’t know how to drive a Ferrari", he told me. "You only know about tractors." "I said, Fine, I’ll take care of it myself.”
With auto in tow, Lamborghini withdrew to his garage. There he took apart and rebuilt the tired clutch. A short while later he built a car to go with it – the Lamborghini 350GT. Five other models would soon follow, including the futuristic Countach and the legendary Miura, named after a particularly fierce breed of Spanish fighting bull which has since become the Lamborghini emblem.
Il Commandante Concore emptied his safe opening the doors to the Automobili Ferrucio Lamborghini SpA. A strategic move just to hang out with some other cool dudes… Giotto Bizzarrini played with F cars. Franco Scaglione chilled with the Pininfarina posse and Def Bertone. Gian Paolo Dallara of the Ferrari Maserati cartel and Paolo Stanzani, the new kid. By the end of the sixties, Lamborghini had roughly 4,500 ticket holders at his daily get-togethers and his tractor company currently rips dirt in Italy’s hood.
The modern phenomenon known simply as rockcrawling, was nonexistent in the 60s. Offroad-capable vehicles were utilitarian concepts purpose-built for military and agricultural needs. Although I doubt the mechanical prodigy daily drooled dwelling on the of integration of tractor and supercar, Ferrucio Lamborghini was an offroader.