We've written this story before, but like Nathaniel Hawthorne's Twice-Told Tales, it's worth another go-round.
It's the story of the auto industry's Great Race, the annual struggle between Chevrolet and Ford for sales supremacy. (Today there's a third participant. Toyota outsold Ford last year. But so far the Japanese brand hasn't led the pack, so this account will be limited to Ford and Chevy.)
All in all, it has been a friendly rivalry. The contestants don't hate each other as Duke hates North Carolina or Ohio State hates Michigan, but that hasn't lessened the competition.
It began in 1912, Chevy's maiden year on the market, and it was hardly a race. The score: Ford, 89,455; Chevrolet, 2,999. Ford won by ever greater margins as the years passed.
But in 1924, Chevrolet named a new leader, William S. Knudsen, a former Ford executive. Ford outsold Chevy 5-to-1 that year, and Knudsen didn't like it.