Volkswagen (310)Ferdinand Porsche introduced economical automobiles with air-cooled engines in the mid-1930s, but Volkswagen's hundreds of thousands of orders plummeted to 640 received when WWII intervened and the Allied bombs destroyed most of the German factory.
After the war, the small but durable Love Bug and its cousin, the VW Bus, became cult cars. Beetle sales in America reached almost half a million in 1968. By the 1980's the VW rebounded from Japanese import competition, becoming the ultimate customized vehicle — reshaped more than any other car into a variety of sizes, engines and colors.
Major production of the Beetle ceased in 1978, but was revived, to phenomenal response in 1998.
