William Jeanes

Editor-at-Large, AOL Autos

William Jeanes has been a recognized figure in the automotive world for nearly four decades. He was editor-in-chief at Car and Driver and later publisher of that …magazine as well as Road & Track. His writings have appeared in a score of global automotive magazines and in Playboy, American Heritage, Sports Illustrated, The New York Times, Parade, AARP The Magazine, and Air & Space Smithsonian. His military history writings and book reviews have appeared in a number of scholarly journals. As a participant in the infamous Cannonball, he drove a 37-foot motor home from New York to Redondo Beach, California, in 45 hours and 36 minutes. Today he lives quietly in Ridgeland, Mississippi.

Who In Their Right Mind Would Race Non-Stop From New York to L.A.?

Published Feb 01, 2011 By William Jeanes

Why would anyone drive across the United States as fast as possible with no promise of a reward? I once did it, and I don't have a real answer. ...

How Car Companies Pick Names

Published Jan 14, 2011 By William Jeanes

Imagine that you are an auto executive who has just overseen the spending of a couple of billion bucks on a brand new model. Now you must select a name for it; it's your baby, after all. ...

Backward Looking Cameras Are in Your Car's Future

Published Dec 23, 2010 By William Jeanes

Your government, not content with having bailed out two-thirds of the American auto industry with your money, in December announced a Christmas gift for the entire industry: Mandated rear-mounted video cameras and in-vehicle displays aimed at keeping you from backing over anything. Yes, boys and girls, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, after being in business for only 41 years, ...

Does Where You Live Determine What You Drive?

Published Dec 03, 2010 By William Jeanes

Anyone who reads or listens to anything beyond package labels and Kmart shopper alerts knows that the United States is an oxymoron (are an oxymoron?). People in Seattle are different from people in Savannah, and the citizens of Boston are unlike the citizens of Bakersfield. Recent data from our partners at car-shopping website Honk has confirmed this. Using a sales database of 85,000 vehicles, the ...

Saab, Volvo, And A Tradition Of Difference

Published Sep 24, 2010 By William Jeanes

Recent events raise these questions: What if there were no Swedish cars? Would automotive enthusiasts, as we know them in the 21st Century, suffer the cultural equivalent of permanent brain damage, or would the sun go on rising and the appearance of mindless X-Men sequels continue unabated? Little would change for most of us, but for dedicated Saab cultists, whose number grows ever smaller through ...

Looking for All-American Gasoline?

Published Aug 24, 2010 By William Jeanes

It now looks as if the Gulf Coast oil spill, brought to you in part by BP and the government’s Minerals Management Service, will not cause the northern hemisphere to close down. Yet, memories of BP’s former CEO, Tony Hayward, continue to stoke a national aversion to “foreign oil” and a boycott of the nation’s 10,000 BP stations (almost none of which are owned by BP). ...