George W. Walker (May 22, 1896 – January 19, 1993) was an American industrial and automotive designer. His most notable work was the original

Ford Thunderbird The Ford Thunderbird is a personal luxury car manufactured and marketed by Ford Motor Company for model years 1955 to 2005, with a hiatus from 1998 to 2001. Ultimately gaining a broadly used colloquial nickname, the ''T-Bird'', Ford Introduce ...

Early life

Walker was born in

Chicago, Illinois Chicago is the List of municipalities in Illinois, most populous city in the U.S. state of Illinois and in the Midwestern United States. With a population of 2,746,388, as of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, it is the List of Unite ...

. His father worked for the

Erie Railroad The Erie Railroad was a railroad that operated in the Northeastern United States, originally connecting Pavonia Terminal in Jersey City, New Jersey, with Lake Erie at Dunkirk, New York. The railroad expanded west to Chicago following its 1865 ...

and the family moved several times, settling in

Cleveland, Ohio Cleveland is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the county seat of Cuyahoga County, Ohio, Cuyahoga County. Located along the southern shore of Lake Erie, it is situated across the Canada–United States border, Canada–U.S. maritime border ...

, when Walker was in his teens. He played

semi-professional Semi-professional sports are sports in which athletes are not participating on a full-time basis, but still receive some payment. Semi-professionals are not amateur because they receive regular payment from their team, but generally at a cons ...

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kick (football), kicking a football (ball), ball to score a goal (sports), goal. Unqualified, football (word), the word ''football'' generally means the form of football t ...

and held down odd jobs, but his interest in art led to art school in

Los Angeles Los Angeles, often referred to by its initials L.A., is the List of municipalities in California, most populous city in the U.S. state of California, and the commercial, Financial District, Los Angeles, financial, and Culture of Los Angeles, ...

Career

He began his professional career as an illustrator for department store advertising, initially as a student in Los Angeles and then as an independent in Cleveland. He broke into the auto business doing illustration work for the failing Peerless automobile company in the late 1920s. He went on to a brief stint working for

Harley Earl Harley Jarvis Earl (November 22, 1893 – April 10, 1969) was an American Automotive design, automotive designer and business executive. He was the initial designated head of design at General Motors, later becoming vice president, the first ...

and

John Tjaarda Joop "Jan" Tjaarda van Starkenburg (4 February 1897–20 March 1962), later known as John Tjaarda van Sterkenburg, was a Dutch product and automotive designer and stylist in the United States. Tjaarda was born in 1897 in Arnhem, as the son of He ...

General Motors General Motors Company (GM) is an American Multinational corporation, multinational Automotive industry, automotive manufacturing company headquartered in Detroit, Michigan, United States. The company is most known for owning and manufacturing f ...

, then to

Graham-Paige Graham-Paige was an American automobile manufacturer founded by brothers Joseph B. Graham (1882–1970), Robert C. Graham (1885–1967), and Ray A. Graham (1887–1932) in 1927. Automobile production ceased in 1940, and its automotive asse ...

. In 1929 the

stock market crash A stock market crash is a sudden dramatic decline of stock prices across a major cross-section of a stock market, resulting in a significant loss of paper wealth. Crashes are driven by panic selling and underlying economic factors. They often fol ...

spelled the end for many companies, including Graham-Paige, and Walker went looking for work. He found it with a hardware supplier, Dura. This company supplied several automakers with parts. This job led to contact with

József Galamb József Galamb (; 3 February 1881 – 4 December 1955) was a Hungarian mechanical engineer, most known as main-engineer for designing the Ford Model T. Born in the town of Makó in 1881, Galamb finished his education at the Budapest Industrial ...

, the primary designer for

Ford Motor Company Ford Motor Company (commonly known as Ford) is an American multinational corporation, multinational automobile manufacturer headquartered in Dearborn, Michigan, United States. It was founded by Henry Ford and incorporated on June 16, 1903. T ...

. Walker's firm did substantial design work for Ford parts, then in the late 1940s began styling work for some Ford cars. In the early 1950s he joined Ford at the behest of Ford executive Ernie Breech, bringing colleagues

Elwood Engel Elwood Paul Engel (February 10, 1917 – June 24, 1986) was Chrysler Corporation's design chief from 1961 until 1974. Early days Engel first joined General Motors as a student under Harley Earl's watchful eye at GM's school of design. In 1939 ...

and

Joe Oros Joseph E. Oros Jr. (; June 15, 1916, in Cleveland, Ohio – August 2, 2012) was an automobile stylist for Ford Motor Company over a period of 21 years — known as the Chief Designer of the team at Ford that styled the original Mustang, an ...

(later a primary designer on the

Mustang The mustang is a free-roaming horse of the Western United States, descended from horses brought to the Americas by the Spanish conquistadors. Mustangs are often referred to as wild horses, but because they are descended from once-domesticate ...

). Walker became corporate vice-president of

for design in 1955. He stepped down from all his positions at Ford in 1961 after reaching the company's mandatory retirement age of 65. Walker appeared on the November 4, 1957, cover of ''Time''. On October 15, 1959, he appeared as a guest challenger on the TV panel show ''

To Tell the Truth ''To Tell the Truth'' is an American television panel show. Four celebrity panelists are presented with three contestants (the "team of challengers", each an individual or pair) and must identify which is the "central character" whose unusual ...

''. Walker's career also included industrial design for clocks, bread boxes,

chemistry set A chemistry set is an educational toy allowing the user (typically a teenager) to perform simple chemistry experiments. History Forerunners The forerunners of the chemistry set were 17th-century books on "natural magick", "which all excelle ...

s, bicycles, and roller skates, among other products.

Personal life

He moved to

Gulf Stream, Florida Gulf Stream is a town in Palm Beach County, Florida, United States. The population of the town was at 954 as of the 2020 US Census. History Gulf Stream was founded around 1916, and throughout the early 1920s, the planned community centered ...

, where he became mayor in 1976. He died on January 19, 1993, in

Tucson, Arizona Tucson (; ; ) is a city in Pima County, Arizona, United States, and its county seat. It is the second-most populous city in Arizona, behind Phoenix, Arizona, Phoenix, with a population of 542,630 in the 2020 United States census. The Tucson ...

, at the age of 96.

References

External links

George Walker oral history interview

TBird retrospective {{DEFAULTSORT:Walker, George W. 1896 births 1993 deaths Ford designers Ford executives American industrial designers Artists from Chicago Artists from Cleveland Artists from Tucson, Arizona People from Gulf Stream, Florida Mayors of places in Florida