Preston Tucker: The Man And His Dream

When we tell the story of the American dream the image that should be conjured up is that of Preston Tucker the protagonist in Tucker: The Man and His Dream. With an eye for design and a heart for speed Tucker set out to build the car of the future. It was the end of the Second World War and as the GI came home Tucker theorized that he would want a car, but not just any car that they could’ve purchased before the war but a new car, a better car, one with safety standards, ones that would save lives, like a pop out windshield and the revolutionary new idea of seatbelts. Preston Tucker had seen the future and with his vision and leadership led a team that would try and change the face of the automobile. Preston Tucker was a leader who could get his

The Big Three auto companies were stonewalling him into having to pay almost twice as much for steel making it impossible for him to sell the car at the price he had originally wanted. However, despite these setbacks Tucker is still able to empower his followers into believing in the end goal. He does this in multiple ways, his most preferred method, however, seems to be passionate speeches to small groups. When the engineers say something can’t be done such as fuel injection he pounds his fists on the table, raises his voice and tells them to make it happen. He uses brute will power to inspire his subordinates to do great things. Another tactic he uses is to shake off setbacks, when it was made clear to him by Senator Homer Ferguson that he was to stay out of the automobile industry and not threaten the Big Three auto makers with building his own line of cars in Chicago he responded by pressing forward unperturbed. He found a helicopter company going out of business and followed their model of using an aluminum engine instead of a steal one to reduce costs once