Wednesday, September 30, 2026
James Dean was not driving a Chevrolet Corvair when he died. He died driving a silver 1955 Porsche 550 Spyder , which he nicknamed "Little Bastard." The fatal crash occurred on September 30, 1955 , on Route 466 (now State Route 46) near Cholame, California. Dean and his mechanic, Rolf Wütherich, were on their way to a sports car race in Salinas when a 1950 Ford Tudor coupe driven by college student Donald Turnupseed turned across their path at an intersection. Dean was pronounced dead shortly after arriving at the hospital; the Chevrolet Corvair did not even enter production until the 1960 model year, five years after Dean's death. Why the Corvair gets confused with Dean's crash As a teen I had a Corvair and always believed it and yes the rear would slide and if not careful you could lose control. The common mix-up between James Dean and the Chevrolet Corvair stems almost entirely from Ralph Nader's groundbreaking 1965 automotive safety book, Unsafe at Any Speed :...
