Can a car also be called Emma?
12/16/2018
Car names were the subject of jokes and discussions over 50 years ago. Fritz B. Busch also joined in this canon (on Auto Motor und Sport) and was particularly annoyed by vehicles labeled only with numbers:
"It (the Ford 12M) almost had a name: "Cardinal"! But now it only has its .twelve and its emm.
Certainly - "Cardinal" was not entirely accurate. Or was he Ford's Cardinal problem? It could have been "Cologne", "Rhineland", "Eifel" or "Tünnes". Why not "Eifel", as it was back then? As a counterpart to the "Kadett", which also has the same name as back then. I can't stand these sober numbers, they always remind me of my tax return.
And how to speak them!
There's actually a "twenty-three hundred", which is that beautiful six-cylinder from Fiat. I sometimes say "Zwoodrei' to it, but people don't buy it. Certainly not in Heilbronn, where they say a sentence later: "Yes, and as for the 'Dreiundzwanzighundert' . . ." Well, it's none of my business, but I wouldn't put a car that sounds like "twenty-three dogs" on the market. The market doesn't like that at all.
. ..
And it would be nice if a car was called what it really is. The old 12 M, for example, could have been called "Emma". And "Emma" is not protected, just like "Emil", and "Emil" could even have been derived from "Einheitsmobil". But nobody ever built the "Einheitsmobil", and if they had, they would certainly have called it "459" - or even "Sturmvogel"."
Little has changed since then - after all, Busch wrote these lines in 1962 - except that a 'Rhineland', 'Eifel' or 'Emil' would hardly be popular in the global world any more. The cars from BMW and Mercedes, Peugeot and Citroën continue to bear numbers, even those from Fiat, which are supposed to remind us of the past, do so, albeit with letters attached (e.g. 500X).
But would a car called "Emma" be a success today?
P.S. You can of course read the entire two-page article by Busch in Auto Motor und Sport issue 22/1962 in the Zwischengas magazine archive .
