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Buckle up for the remarkable story of Ferdinand Porsche: from early hybrid cars to the Beetle and the birth of Porsche. Discover the bold engineering, racing legends, wartime projects, and troubling moral choices behind two iconic car brands. #Cars #History #Engineering
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0:00 - Ferdinand Porsche and a Difficult Legacy
1:48 - Porscheās Early Life and Engineering
5:11 - From Austro-Daimler to Auto Union
8:13 - Porscheās Alliance with Hitler
11:01 - Designing and Funding the Volkswagen Beetle
13:52 - Wartime Vehicles and Tank Designs
18:11 - Forced Labor, Arrest, and Denazification
21:38 - The Porsche Company and a Complicated Legacy
Subscribe for more fascinating stories.
Comment and tell us what you liked most about the video.
š This channel was created in collaboration with https://www.youtube.com/@dentrolastoria
0:00 - Ferdinand Porsche and a Difficult Legacy
1:48 - Porscheās Early Life and Engineering
5:11 - From Austro-Daimler to Auto Union
8:13 - Porscheās Alliance with Hitler
11:01 - Designing and Funding the Volkswagen Beetle
13:52 - Wartime Vehicles and Tank Designs
18:11 - Forced Labor, Arrest, and Denazification
21:38 - The Porsche Company and a Complicated Legacy
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LearningTranscript
00:00Today we're talking about a very special topic. We touched on it in one of this summer's shorts
00:06when we talked to you very briefly about the final chapter in the story of one of the most
00:14produced and most loved cars in the world, the Beetle. Do you remember it? Well, given your
00:20positive responses to the short, and since some of you even wrote to me asking for the story of
00:27the Beetle and its designer, here we are with a special story for you. A story that mixes technology,
00:35war, industry, business, innovation, and even Nazism. There's a bit of everything. There's a bit
00:42of everything in the deep, complex, even dramatic story of Ferdinand Porsche, the genius, who created
00:51not only the Beetle, but also a car company. Actually, it would be better to say two car
00:57companies. One dedicated to the masses. The other, more sporty, which still dominate markets all over
01:05the world today. But there's much more behind that story. The genius of Ferdinand Porsche, his
01:11engineering skill. These are topics that unfortunately have been inextricably linked to one of the darkest
01:19chapters of modern times, to Hitler's Third Reich. Analyzing the figure of Ferdinand Porsche means
01:29walking on a thin and dangerous line that connects and at the same time separates pure engineering
01:36ambition from a very strong moral and political responsibility. So, start your engines and join us
01:46on our journey today. Satisfied or your money back? Ferdinand Porsche was born on September 3rd,
01:531875 in Maffersdorf, a town in Bohemia. At the time, it was the Austro-Hungarian Empire. Today,
02:00it's located in the Czech Republic. Even as a boy, Ferdinand showed an extraordinary inclination for
02:07science and technology, especially for mechanics and electricity, which were the frontiers of progress
02:14at the end of the 19th century. Ferdinand's father, Anton, is not exactly that enthusiastic
02:22about his son's passions. Anton is a master boiler maker and would prefer his son to have a career as
02:31a craftsman as well, perhaps specifically in building and repairing boilers. But Ferdinand has
02:38other ideas. He turns, for example, the attic of his house into a real electrical laboratory. He is only
02:4518 years old, yet he manages to equip his family home with an electric lighting system. If today it
02:53seems like something obvious to you, something trivial, you should know that at the end of the
02:5919th century, being able to have electric lighting in your own home was something extraordinary that
03:05made all the neighbors jealous. In 1893, Ferdinand moves to Vienna. He goes to work in an electric
03:14company, Bella Egger, Bella Egger, the one that would later become Braun Bouverie. He doesn't attend
03:22university, at least not regularly. He learns on the job. He has a strong intuition, especially for mechanics.
03:31The talents of this young man are noticed by Ludwig Lohner, a carriage builder who sees where the future
03:40is headed. A future that will quickly abandon horses in favor of motor vehicles. Lohner hires the young
03:48Porsche. And from this partnership, in 1900, a famous car is born, the Lohner Porsche Semper Vivas,
03:56which is presented at the Paris World's Fair. Astonishing the world, it's a car powered by
04:03electric motors integrated directly into the front wheel hubs. However, immediately understanding
04:10the limitations of electric batteries, Porsche gets back to work and develops a variant called
04:16Mixed. And you can already guess from the name. It's a variant that introduces an internal combustion
04:24engine, which acts as a generator to produce electricity. In short, certain modern electric
04:31motors powered by gasoline were certainly not invented today. In fact, at just 25 years old,
04:37Ferdinand Porsche invented the first hybrid car. And this was in 1900, not 2000. The success of the Lohner
04:47Porsche launched the career of this Bohemian engineer. Engineer in practice, actually, even though he didn't
04:53have a degree. In 1906, he was hired by Austro Daimler as technical director. Under his leadership,
05:01the company produced cars that were successful, both commercially and in racing, like the Prince
05:07Heinrich, a racing car that Porsche personally took to the races. The outbreak of the Great War,
05:13the First World War, saw Porsche involved in the Austro-Hungarian war effort.
05:19He designed, for example, enormous trains for transporting heavy artillery. These trains were
05:25powered by a hybrid gasoline electric system, a development of his early ideas. Also for this
05:31reason, the University of Vienna first awarded him an honorary degree in mechanical engineering,
05:38and then recommended him to the emperor for an honor, the Imperial Cross of Merit. The end of the war,
05:45the breakup of the Austro-Hungarian Empire forced Ferdinand Porsche to make a choice. And the choice
05:52was to move to Germany, to Stuttgart, in 1923. There, Porsche became the technical director of Daimler
06:00Motorin Gesellschaft. And here he designed some of the most legendary cars of the era, including the
06:07Mercedes-Benz S-Series, SS, and SSK supercharged cars, using a Roots-type supercharger while still maintaining an
06:16extremely luxurious standard for the time. Porsche, with his path to success now wide open, realized that his,
06:24not only his future, but even his present is there in Germany. To the point that on March 6, 1931,
06:32he founded his own
06:33company, a design and consulting studio for engines and vehicles. It's not yet a car factory, mind you.
06:40It's just an engineering consulting studio. But that's enough to attract attention. Also because in his
06:48studio, there are some real geniuses. Chief designer Carl Rabe, the chassis expert engineer Carl Froelich,
06:57an engine specialist like Joseph Callis, and above all, Ferry Ferdinand Anton Ernst Porsche,
07:04the son of Ferdinand, and the one who will be his heir in every way. The Porsche studio in those
07:09years,
07:10the early 1930s, undertook projects commissioned by several companies. It worked, for example, for
07:17Zundap, which produced, yes, motorcycles, but also the first cars. Zundap at that time was thinking
07:25about an affordable car for the general public, then NSU. The Great Depression, however, hit Germany,
07:32so much so that these projects couldn't reach production and remained at the prototype stage.
07:37At the same time, Porsche was also involved in racing. He worked for Auto Union, against his old
07:43friends at Mercedes. He produced the Type A, B, and C. Not only that, Porsche's cars, with a monumental
07:53V-16 engine mounted amid ships or at the rear, driven by legendary champions like Bert Rosemeyer,
08:01or the Italian Tadzio Nuvallari, achieved success and set new records. And it is precisely this success
08:08that brings Porsche into the orbit of another rising figure. Who is not an engine expert, not an entrepreneur,
08:17not a designer? He is a politician, a former corporal, also Austrian, who has risen to prominence,
08:25and who in January 1933 is appointed chancellor by President Hindenburg. His name is Adolf Hitler,
08:32and he is about to shape Germany in his own image and likeness. Hitler basically wants two things.
08:38First of all, to demonstrate German power through technological superiority, for example, in racing.
08:46And then he wants, again, by exploiting this technological superiority, to motorize the German
08:53population with a car that is affordable, sturdy, and within reach of all workers. It's 1934,
09:01the automobile show, and it's there that Hitler and Porsche meet for the first time.
09:07Porsche is essentially apolitical. He had never declared his sympathies or antipathies until that
09:14moment. Rather, he is an extremely ambitious man, especially when it comes to the possibility
09:19of designing freely. What leads to the meeting between the designer and the dictator is the Nazi
09:27state's guarantee of unlimited funding for Porsche's research. Porsche until that moment had clashed
09:36with Germany's financial constraints due to the problems of the Great Depression and its effects.
09:42But he and the Fuhrer reach an understanding right away. Hitler sees in Porsche the epitome of German
09:48genius. Even though it must be said that Porsche, like Hitler himself, is actually Austrian. In fact,
09:56Porsche is even Bohemian. But Hitler doesn't care about this. He appoints him head of the RDA,
10:02the association of the German automotive industry. And the goal is this, the people's car. Porsche
10:09lets himself be seduced. He lets himself be convinced. He takes the Nazi party membership card.
10:15It's number 5,643,287. He also accepts the SS uniform and the honorary rank of Oberfuhrer,
10:25which he receives from Heinrich Himmler himself. Then come the awards, the German national prize for
10:31art and for science. The honors all to prevent Porsche from showing any discontent. Also because
10:39Germans could not compete for the Nobel prize during that period. At that time, Porsche is not a fanatic
10:44Nazi. If anything, he is described as a sort of technocratic opportunist. He understood that Nazism
10:51could be useful to him. He understood that Nazism considered him indispensable. But he himself
10:58did not consider himself a Nazi. But let's get to the point. In 1934, shortly after Hitler and Porsche
11:06got to know each other, the dictator launched the idea of the Volkswagen, the people's car. That's what
11:12the name means in German. And it is Hitler himself who dictates the specifications of the car. It has to
11:18be a
11:19car designed to carry five people, ideally a family made up of a father, mother, and three children.
11:25It must reach 100 kilometers per hour on German highways, consume less than seven liters of fuel
11:33per 100 kilometers, and, above all, cost less than 1,000 Reichsmarks, which at the time was about the
11:41price of a good motorcycle. For all the manufacturers of the period, Mercedes, von Fonapel, it was madness.
11:49It was something that couldn't be done. Porsche sees Hitler's bold claim as a challenge, the challenge
11:56of his life. And that's exactly what he does. For five years, Porsche works in his laboratories in
12:01Stuttgart. Designing, he designs the engines, the chassis, the bodywork. The final result of the first
12:08prototype is a highly aerodynamic body shaped like a beetle shell, which is where the name beetle comes
12:14from. The chassis has a central platform, suspension with torsion bars, and as a power unit, a four
12:21cylinder opposed boxer engine, air cooled, mounted behind the rear axle. It's an ideal design because
12:29it guarantees traction in any condition, even on snow. And we know that in Germany during winter,
12:35the risk of snow is very high. The ease of maintenance, also the easy accessibility to the
12:43engine. Resistance to practically any climate, since there's no water or radiator, there can't be any
12:49freezing, and even less so with the heating. To produce this revolutionary car, Hitler gives Porsche
12:55what Porsche never had before, a factory of his own. Actually, a city that contains a factory within it.
13:03It's today's Wolfsburg. In Wolfsburg, there's the KDF wagon, the Kraft Dirk Freude. Strength through joy,
13:13it's the slogan of the Nazi Union. But that's not enough. A very good project is not enough. A huge
13:20factory is not enough. With a city surrounding it, no, something more is needed. How do you sell this car?
13:28A new method, collecting stamps. Yes, you heard right. Just like people used to do with supermarket
13:35cards. German citizens buy weekly stamps to stick on a special card. Once this card is completed, they can
13:45send it in and request the delivery of the car. The problem is that Hitler has other plans. It's not
13:52a scam
13:52against the citizens. Simply, Hitler wants to conquer Europe by military force. For this reason,
13:59in September 1939, the gigantic Wolfsburg factory, which is managed and supervised by Porsche as general
14:07manager, is repurposed for the war effort. The beetle will have to wait. During the Second World War,
14:16Ferdinand Porsche takes on a central role in the German war economy. In fact, he is appointed chairman
14:23of the tank commission within the armaments ministry led by Albert Speer. The Porsche engineering firm
14:30becomes a nerve center for the production of military vehicles, heavy weaponry, tanks. However,
14:39Porsche does not throw away what he has done before. For example, he resumes the beetle project and adapts
14:47it. That's how the Kubelwagen was born, a light reconnaissance vehicle, what was called the Nazi Jeep.
14:54You also see it in many war movies. It's a Spartan vehicle without much comfort, but very, very effective
15:03off-road, even though it only has two-wheel drive, but with a reduced weight and a self-locking
15:10differential that is a real advantage. From the Kubelwagen, we move on to the Schwimmwagen,
15:15the amphibious version, this time with four-wheel drive and a swing-down propeller at the rear.
15:21A vehicle designed to Ford Rivers, but not only that, also for that operation, Operation Sea Loaf,
15:27Operation Sea Lion, the amphibious invasion of England, which in reality will never see the light
15:33of day. But Porsche doesn't stop. He also has other plans, other projects, other ambitions. One of these
15:40concerns, a request that comes from the German Armaments Inspectorate, a new heavy tank. Germany enters
15:48the war with the Panzer III, the Panzer II, which is still a light tank, with the tanks requisitioned
15:56from the dissolved Czechoslovak army. Later, Germany develops the Panzer IV,
16:02and then the Panzer V, the Panther, but they're missing a heavy tank, a tank that can
16:09break through enemy lines and cause destruction. In 1941, the Porsche design team bids on the contract
16:16for what will become the Tiger. We've already talked about it in another video. You can find it on the
16:23channel. The Porsche prototype, codename WK4501, WK4501P, is very complex. For example, it features a fairly
16:35complex gasoline electric propulsion system. The system is structurally fragile, and unfortunately,
16:41during testing, it overheats to the point of breaking. For this reason, the examination committee,
16:46from the Ministry of Armaments, prefers the competing project from Henschel, the Tiger. However,
16:52Porsche doesn't give up. Also, because he already had some hulls ready, about a hundred,
16:59for what would have been his tank. So he presents another type of project, a tank destroyer. A heavy
17:05tank destroyer, very well armored, at the front, and especially equipped with the 88mm cannon derived
17:13from anti-aircraft guns. The elephant is born. Or rather, the Ferdinand, named in honor of its
17:22designer. The first models are sent to two battalions that fight at Kursk, in the largest tank battle in
17:28history, with excellent results. For this reason, the Armaments Inspectorate authorizes further production
17:35of the Ferdinand, which enters service with various units. It's not enough. During those years,
17:42Porsche also takes part in another project, that of the Ferdinand, the most absurd vehicle Germany has
17:48ever put on the road. The Panzer 8. Maus, a super heavy tank, 188 tons in weight. A steel monster.
17:59That, however, will remain at the prototype stage. The only one existing today, actually assembled from
18:06various parts of other prototypes, is kept at the Kubinka Armored Vehicle Museum in Russia. However,
18:13Porsche's wartime and industrial activities hide something tragic. To keep production rates high,
18:21in the Wolfsburg factory, where the Kubelwagen is produced, Porsche and the company management make
18:27massive use of forced labor. Tens of thousands of prisoners of war, political deportees, internees,
18:34slaves from concentration camps are forced to work in inhuman conditions, malnutrition,
18:42beatings, exhausting work shifts. All this causes the death of many forced laborers.
18:49Ferdinand Porsche knows all this. He knows what happens in his factory. But once again,
18:55he puts achieving his goals and Germany's military objectives first. Above everything else,
19:00even above the dignity of human life, with the collapse of Germany, with the surrender on May 8,
19:071945, the Allies, the French, the British, the Americans, begin to investigate what happened
19:15in Germany in the previous years. And in December 1945, the Porsche family receives
19:22a special summons. The French occupation authorities summon Ferdinand, his son Ferry,
19:29and his son-in-law, Anton Peach, to a meeting in Baden-Baden. The letter states that the French
19:36occupation authorities would be pleased to meet with the Porsche management to discuss a possible
19:45people's car project. Based on the same model, or at least the same idea as Hitler's Volkswagen,
19:52it's a trap. As soon as they arrive in Baden-Baden, the three are arrested by the French.
19:59The charge is war crimes, and it's related to the use of those slave workers at Volkswagen. In addition,
20:06they are accused of having used French materials stolen through deception during the war. Ferry Porsche,
20:13released after a few months, posts a substantial bond. His father, who is now 70 years old, and Anton Peach
20:20are instead transferred to Dijon, to a very harsh prison. From that experience, Ferdinand will struggle
20:27to recover. While his father is in prison, Ferry Porsche changes the family history forever. He moves
20:36all his operations to Gmund in Austria, where he had already relocated the design studio to escape the
20:42bombings that had devastated Stuttgart. There, Ferry initially accepts any job, even menial mechanical
20:49work repairing water pumps, tractors, agricultural machinery. In 1947, the Italian entrepreneur Piero
20:57Dugio gives him an assignment to design what would become the Cisitalia 360, a revolutionary Grand Prix
21:06car with four-wheel drive. With the money from that job, Ferry is able to pay the bail for his
21:13father and
21:14for Anton Pieck. After 22 months of imprisonment, in August 1947, Ferdinand Porsche returns home. He has
21:23to wait a few more months for a court to formally acquit him of the more serious charges of war
21:28crimes.
21:28But he also has to undergo the denazification process, and his reputation remains historically
21:35tainted by his connections with Hitler and with Himmler. But, during Ferdinand Porsche's imprisonment,
21:42Ferry pursued an ambitious idea, already theorized by his father, to build a lightweight sports car
21:49that would finally bear the family name. No more working for other companies. Using mechanical
21:56components still derived from the Beetle, like the boxer engine, but also the suspension and the
22:02gearbox. Ferry designs the Porsche 356, and it's a revolutionary car. In June of 48, the first 356
22:12officially comes out of the Gemund workshops. It's the birth of the Porsche car company. Porsche,
22:18as a manufacturer of a production car. In 1949, the Porsche family returns to Stuttgart in the
22:26Zuffenhausen district, where the production of the 356 begins on an industrial scale. They also
22:33abandoned the hand-beaten aluminum panels in favor of more modern steel frames. Meanwhile, the Wolfsburg
22:40factory, which was saved by a British major named Ivan Ernst, resumes the civilian production of the
22:46Beetle under the guidance of a new engineer, Heinz Nordhoff. The contracts signed before the war
22:52guarantee Ferdinand Porsche royalties and a share of the proceeds for every Beetle sold in the world.
22:59In addition to exclusive consulting for future Volkswagen models, this agreement guarantees the Porsche
23:06family great financial stability, which is ideal for starting their own business.
23:12Ferdinand Porsche visits the old Wolfsburg factory for the last time in November 1950.
23:20From that point on, thousands of Beetles will appear on all the roads of Europe and in all the markets
23:26of Western Europe, the French, Dutch, Italian, and Spanish markets. It is the fulfillment of an old dream,
23:35and it probably also represents his greatest professional achievement. But the story of Ferdinand
23:40Porsche ends here. A few weeks later, it's January 30, 1951. A stroke proves fatal. Ferdinand Porsche dies
23:51at the age of 75. His legacy is taken up by his son Ferry, but it's a legacy that's complex.
23:58You can't just
23:59talk about the industrial and engineering legacy. Ferdinand Porsche's legacy is a complex mosaic
24:06of many bright spots, but also some shadows. On one hand, there's the engineer, the brilliant figure,
24:12the man who first envisioned hybrid electric motors, the man who created the Beetle, which became the
24:19longest lasting and best selling car in history, over 21 million units. No other model so far has achieved
24:28such longevity and such success. Ferdinand Porsche is also the man who laid the foundations for the
24:36legend of Porsche. Porsche as an elite sports car, a synonym for speed and elegance. But there is also
24:44the other side, often forgotten, the disturbing side of the scientist who put his technical expertise
24:51and his genius at the service of a dictatorship. The genius who, in order to work freely and to have
24:59access to unlimited funds, accepted a Nazi party membership card, the SS uniform, an honorary rank,
25:07and who has above all accepted, and this is the darkest side of his life, that thousands of forced
25:16laborers, not to say slaves, were worked to exhaustion and even death. On his assembly lines,
25:23Ferdinand Porsche's life story embodies the drama of the 20th century, the short century, an era in which
25:31the most extraordinary scientific progress raced ahead at an ever-increasing speed, producing great
25:38great achievements, great products, great innovations. But sometimes all of this was made possible only by
25:46sacrifice, only by giving up humanity, only by a pact with the devil. A devil who, in the case of
25:56Ferdinand
25:56Porsche, took the form of Adolf Hitler.
26:08Ferdinand Maurice