Page 20 - Sample pages "Raymond Henri Dietrich" by Necah S. Furman

your eyes and therefore was, theoretically, not a blind spot.”40
Technically, Dietrich did not invent this design feature; however, he was among the first to use these pillars on his Lincoln and Packard convertible coupe designs at Dietrich, Inc. Others employing it during 1925-1926 were J. Frank de Causse and Brunn & Company. Walter M. Murphy Company, coachbuilders in Pasadena, followed their lead with Murphy’s 1926 designs. Dietrich was obviously in good company as an early adherent of the Clear Vision principal achieved through thin manganese bronze pillar casting.41
Dietrich favored the long Packard chassis for the design latitude it afforded. Not only did the longer chassis provide room for an extended and more elegant hood line, it also allowed him to create a more comfortable seating position for the passenger. It was necessary, he said, “to
build the body around the passenger” with the human anatomy in mind when designing seat cushions and their positioning. The longer chassis also allowed for sloping the kick-up of the frame slightly backward to prevent the passenger from sliding forward and being bounced by bumps in the road. To accomplish this, Dietrich said, “It is necessary to bend the frame by the rear wheel housing so that it runs parallel to the rear seat.”42
At the time of the interview on cheat lines, Dietrich was preparing a design for King Alfonso XIII of Spain. The writer recalled that Ray pulled out his pen and started sketching the body of the car starting from the inside out, seats first. For the front seat, he used the position of the steering wheel and pedals as the determining factor, followed by the headroom needed. Dietrich claimed that “an angle of 110 degrees [for the seat] has been found the most comfortable ... with a bulge ... to fit the small of the
174 RAYMOND DIETRICH: AUTOMOTIVE ARCHITECT
© DALTON WATSON FINE B
© DALTON WATSON FINE BOOKS © DALTON WATSON FINE BOOKS DALTON WATSON FINE BOOKS TON WATSON FINE B