The Best in Cars — the Model T and the SJ

Vocabulary Multiple Choice

When cars first started appearing in the streets of the world, (1) _______ people took them seriously. They were toys— playthings for grown men who didn’t have much to do. No one thought that the automobile would ever become the world’s most (2) _______ form of transportation.

When Henry Ford started selling his Model T in 1908, he changed all that. Ford believed that a car should be low-cost transportation that everyone could (3) _______ . So he decided to make such a car. First, he wanted a dependable automobile that wouldn’t break down easily. Then he wanted a simple (4) _______ that almost anyone could fix.

Ford wanted to sell the car for a low price, so he had to make it (5) _______ a low cost. So, he made only one model and he made it in only one colour — black.

In 1932, the Duesenberg brothers (6) _______ a car that many people think is the most (7) _______ automobile ever made — the Duesenberg SJ. Every Duesenberg was custom-made, so each one was different. But it usually weighed about 7000 pounds and had a very wide wheelbase — 150 inches. It also had an (8) _______ 400 horsepower engine that could move the (9) _______ car from zero to 100 miles per hour in 17 seconds.

The interior was as luxurious as the motor was big. It had the finest silk, leather, silver and wood. An SJ was (10) _______ (11) _______ , but rich people often felt they had to (12) _______ one.

Unfortunately, the car cost so much to produce that the company lost money. In 1937, after making only 500 of them, the Duesenbergs stopped production of the SJ forever.