Author: Petra

In 1959 the craze for fins on cars reached its pinnacle. None other than the car maker Cadillac, famous for the most elegant and glamorous cars, set the record: with fins a breathtaking 42 inches (107 centimeters) high, crowning the rear end of the Cadillac Eldorado Biarritz.

To call this Cadillac a car is actually a bit of an understatement; land-yacht would be more appropriate. All models seated six and came with the famous 6.3-litre V-eight engine; the convertible had a whopping 345 bhp.

Fuel consumption was somewhere in the 8mpg range. With gas being slightly cheaper in the days of the glorious finned automobiles, nobody really cared.

And here is a Cadillac Eldorado Biarritz fin in all it’s shiny and chrome-glossy glory. Start drooling. I did. Plenty.

“Der Schimmelreiter” (The Dykemaster) by Theodor Storm paints a very good (and well researched) picture about life in the coastal regions of Northern Germany, which has been threatened by storm surges for thousands of years.

For the more Google-inclined some good links to check out are:

Maeslantkering
Oosterscheldekering

These are projects in the Netherlands, even more endangered by floods and storms.

Of course these storm barriers/levees are expensive to build and keep in running order. But they bring safety to the people living there, something they are very well aware of. Nobody complains about money spent on these structures. They are indispensable.