The Hot Rod Reader

These stories highlight the inventors, racers, and show-winners from both past and present who have made hot rodding the art it is today!

Hot rods are built for speed and each is a unique creation reflecting its builder's vision. The Hot Rod Reader offers similar features with writings and excerpts that capture the excitement of hot rodding, the history of how it came to be, and the major events, people, cars, and builders who have brought hot rods to national attention.

The anthology includes diverse contributions from popular writers covering hot rods and custom cars--writers like Tom Wolfe, Jay Leno, Peter Vincent, and more. Also included are stories about the most daring, cutting-edge innovators in the hot rodding field today. The entire collection works like a field guide, helping readers to explore various themes within hot rodding through news articles, essays, fiction, interviews, and more, with more than 60 color and black-and-white illustrations and photographs to illuminate each excerpt and story.

Dig deeper into a hobby that's all about tinkering with machines to make them go faster, look cooler, function better, and exceed expectations. Motivated by both craftsmanship and performance, hot rodders encourage us to push the limits of both mechanical objects and social acceptance, and in the process, they have redefined the driving experience. Read the full story of the hot rod with The Hot Rod Reader.

Dean Batchelor started out as a hot rodder, but ultimately became an automotive renaissance man. He is best known for his motor journalism career, which spanned five decades and included stints at Hop Up and Motor Life in the 1950s, and a lengthy career as editorial director at Road & Track, as well as freelance writing and publishing. He passed away in 1995.

Ed "Big Daddy" Roth (1932-2001) was a major contributor to the custom culture movement of the 1960s. He is well known for creating Rat Fink and other wildly exaggerated characters, and is responsible for pushing the hot rod culture into new territory with cartoonish fiberglass-based creations.

No one has contributed more to hot rodding than Tex Smith. Tex was one of the founders of the National Street Rod Association. He has been an editor and contributor to many American car magazines, written several national best selling books, created TV shows, played professional baseball, and served in the Air Force as a jet fighter, among other things. His impact on our hobby is felt everyday.

Melinda Keefe is a former Motorbooks editor who has contributed to various titles, covering subjects from hot rodding to muscle cars to motorsports. In addition to Hot Rod Reader she edited the automotive anthology Life Is a Highway.

Peter Schletty has been an editor in the Twin Cities area since 2002, formerly at Motorbooks and currently at Hazelden Publishing. He lives in St. Paul, Minnesota.

Gray Baskerville was a hot rodder through and through. Born in 1935, he grew up in car-crazy Southern California. Baskerville logged 35 years writing for both Hot Rod and Rod & Custom magazines where his unique perspective and lingo made his feature articles stand out. He retired from full-time writing in late 2000 and passed away in 2002.