Damon C. Woods, FIDSA
(d. 1968)

US automotive designer who was manager of the Body Development Studio at the Ford Motor Company, and part of the team that designed the Ford Thunderbird, which was introduced in 1955

In the early 1960s, he was promoted to chief interior designer, and was on the team that designed the Ford Mustang, which was introduced in 1964. For a period of time he was assigned to Ford England to broaden his experience.

Ford's Thunderbird, its first sports car, was designed by Bill Burnett, William F. Boyer, and Franklin Quick Hershey. It was introduced in 1955 to compete with Chevrolet's 1953 Corvette sports car, GM's answer to sporty European imports.

In their early forms, both cars were mostly caricatures of sports cars, concerned with superficial connotations of speed and maneuverability than with their mechanical accomplishments.

This was one of the most successful post-war car designs, that Ford Motor Company from decline. Henry Ford II chose the 1949 Ford design by independent designer George W. Walker over a competing design by Ford Styling Chief Eugene "Bob" Gregorie. The design sold more than a million, and led to Walker being named to replace Gregorie in 1955.

At the Chicago Century of Progress Exhibition (1933-1934), Ford displayed a concept vehicle called the Briggs Dream Car, a rear-engine car with unitized body designed by John Tjaarda of Briggs Manufacturing Company, Ford's major body supplier.

1896-1993

1880-1956

U.S. automotive and aeronautical designer who was born in Quincy, Illinois, and attended Hamline University and the University of Minnesota. He founded the Model Aero Club of Illinois. In 1909 he worked as a tracer in the drafting room for the Schurmeier Motor Truck Company until it went bankrupt in 1912. Then he became automobile and aviation editor of the Chicago Tribune, as well as founder of the first aviation magazine published in the U.S., Aerial Age. In 1914 he became Chief Engineer for the Scripps-Booth Auto Company, whose new car he designed.

1898-1982

1907-1997

An automotive designer who was born in Michigan and raised in Beverly Hills and La Puente, CA. He attended Occidental College in Los Angeles where he majored in forestry. He began his career in 1927 at Murphy Coach Works of Pasadena under the guidance of Frank Spring, who was  a good friend of Hershey’s mother’s financial advisor. Within a few months the younger Frank was designing custom car bodies for Duesenbergs and the 1932 Peerless X-D V-16 prototype. When Murphy went out of business, both Franks went to Detroit.

Tucker Madawick, FIDSA (b. 1917) President of the Industrial Designers Society of America (IDSA), 1969-1970