The Batmobile was first featured in the Columbia serial Batman movies that ran each week, starting in 1943. The series chose the 1939 Cadillac Series 75 convertible, originally designed by Harley Earl of General Motors. As it was a car designed for the general public, there were barely any modifications or gadgets included.
Here is a snapshot of that Cadillac, and next is as close as I can get to it in 1:43. Is there one even closer?
Oh yes, here are our heroes and the villain, from that serial.
A second serial in the late 1940's used a stock Mercury convertible as the Batmobile. Whee!
But the comic book versions of the 1940's were really great!
A few years ago Corgi released some "1:43" models based on images from the comics. I put that in quotes since how could they tell the scale of a car from comic book pages? They were sold at WalMart for maybe 7 bucks each, with one per decade. I think they followed this group up with another set. Some of the last 1:43s I ever saw ay WalMart.
David H
