valve covers on a vintage Hampton Amusement park ride car since the early 70’s. Hampton Rides was a flat ride manufacturer that operated from 1942 to 1993

https://www.facebook.com/photo/?fbid=26804782762495570&set=gm.4634557700154805&idorvanity=2695731877370740

https://isewcute.blogspot.com/2009/10/wordless-wednesday-carnival-at-twilight.html

great little kid and pedal car photo, with obvious rich parents. Who else takes the time to greenhouse grow veggies around the house?

https://forums.aaca.org/topic/341211-period-images-to-relieve-some-of-the-stress/page/374/

the (Wehrman) Machine Shop Special... what a cool name for a custom hand built race car. It looks a lot like the Wisconsin Special in miniature

https://forums.aaca.org/topic/341211-period-images-to-relieve-some-of-the-stress/page/544/

it was over the moment it began, the kid in the blue car was in about 7th position on the grid, and was off to the fast start, instantly took 1st, and held it to the finish line

Robert (15 to 18 years of frequent emails) just told me his brother went to Prague, and found a pedal car museum!

https://www.pedalplanet.cz/eng/

https://pedalplanet.sk

In 1945 David Grenfell, who himself had worked in mining, proposed a scheme to rehabilitate miners suffering from pneumoconiosis, and the newly elected Labour government backed his idea. At about the same time, the Austin Motor Company was desperate to find a new export product with high added value, relatively cheap to manufacture, but which could command a premium price. (thank you Stephen R!)

"It was important that the work wasn't too arduous for the men, but that it should be profitable and meaningful, not an act of charity."

 "The pedal cars - based on their full-size Austin A40 Devon - could utilize scraps of leftover material but would be, in the words of Austin's chairman Leonard Lord: 'Something which every Hollywood star's child will be pictured playing in'."

Dr Whyley said workers started producing parts for real cars as well as the pedal ones and "for most of the factory's existence, it was the only profitable arm of the company".

The pedal cars' attention to detail was exquisite.

The dials, dashboard and steering wheels were exact miniatures of the Devon's, mock spark plugs were sourced from duds on the Longbridge production line, drive only went to the rear right wheel to allow the left to spin at a different speed during "high-speed" cornering and the handbrake was said to be strong enough to prevent a full-size car from rolling down a hill.

The ex-miners went above and beyond when, on 11 January 1962, a gas explosion blew the roof clean off the factory. Thanks to their quick-thinking it was up and running again inside a week.

After 22 years and 32,098 cars, in 1971 it was decided the Austin Pedal Car could no longer compete with cheaper imports.

Nonetheless, there remains a thriving Austin Pedal Car community, with the new company supporting the Settrington Cup J40 Grand Prix each year for youngsters at the Goodwood Revival.

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cdx5zlkz9lpo

https://justacarguy.blogspot.com/2017/09/goodwood-revival-2017.html

SEMA even had some kids cars!

 

Amoco pedal cars given away as promotion 1930's

 

https://www.facebook.com/photo/?fbid=10228868407004931&set=gm.958223715355465&idorvanity=319578812553295

I doubt you recall a 1976 musical movie, entirely fielded by teens, playing gangsters and molls, with Jodie Foster, called Bugsy Malone... but it had pretty cool pedal cars

New York, 1929, a war rages between two rival gangsters, Fat Sam and Dandy Dan. Dan is in possession of a new and deadly weapon, the dreaded "splurge gun". As the custard pies fly, Bugsy Malone, an all-round nice guy, falls for Blousey Brown, a singer at Fat Sam's speakeasy. His designs on her are disrupted by the seductive songstress Tallulah who wants Bugsy for herself.

the cute gimmic of the movie, and one that makes it easy for realistic recreation in school theaters, are the ping pong ball guns. In the movie the resulot was a cream/pudding/cool whip "splatter"

 The signature mess shot by the splurge guns is quoted in the DVD notes by Alan Parker, the director and writer, as being ‘doughnut cream’, with the production getting through 100 gallons of the stuff. This wasn’t actually fired by the guns as the early experiments proved them to be too dangerous, with Alan and other members of the production staff injuring themselves when experimenting. As a result, the guns fired ping-pong balls, with the cream thrown by hand from off camera, an effective solution with careful editing  

The other lead actress, never had another role, and went into the Air Force after high school

https://www.worthpoint.com/worthopedia/bugsy-malone-original-1976-promo-1909685538

The 1930s style pedal cars could run at a maximum speed of approximately 10mph and were both built by hand. They were initially only capable of being driven with the weight of one driver, so in a number of clips where there are passengers, often the cars were being pushed by strong men out of shot

https://www.tennants.co.uk/discover/news-insights/bugsy-malone-pedal-cars/

https://beta.flim.ai/movie/9c43d2a0-0708-4af8-8ddf-97154a0a7866

https://thecinemaarchives.com/2020/04/30/bugsy-malone-1976-parker/

http://superpants.net/bugsy.html

you can see that there were very few of these pedal cars made for the movie: the above white and black ones, the below one with the copper grill

and this green cargo flat bed, seen above and below

and here you can see that the pedal cars are so heavy with a couple kids in them that they must be pushed in addition to being pedaled. 

here you see the same copper grill car

and the copper flat bed cargo van again

and this is one other car they made, a convertible, only seen very briefly once prior in the movie when it wasn't marked as a cop car

Currently on Amazon video for only two more days. Hey, I only looked it up yesterday, I didn't think ANY streaming service would have it

thank you Gary for sharing the news about the Van Der Brink pedal car auction! There are 118 of them. Thanks Gary!

https://vanderbrinkauction.proxibid.com/Art-Antiques-Collectibles/Toys-Hobbies/Rolls-Royce-Pedal-Car/lotInformation/60196519

https://vanderbrinkauction.proxibid.com/VanDerBrink-Auctions-LLC/Amazing-and-Rare-Pedal-Cars/event-catalog/196949 is where you can look through them

quite the collection

https://www.facebook.com/marcantoine.giorgi/posts/10158319407455236

these are now worth a couple thousand apiece, this collection was repaired and restored by Bruce Callis and his grandson. That is a really cool family hobby

sold for 2400

above sold for 9900

sold for 5500, and I bet you could go into business making these and selling them for a couple hundred at least.

above sold for 2160

above sold for 1800

Above sold for 1980

above sold for 3600

https://classicmotorsports.com/news/rm-sothebys-latest-auction-making-us-wish-we-were-kids-again/
https://rmsothebys.com/en/home/lots/pp20
https://www.facebook.com/RMSothebys/posts/10158260687788815
https://www.thedrive.com/news/34000/this-rare-us-air-force-jeep-pedal-car-from-1958-has-really-shot-up-in-value

the beauty in the design of the simple and unsophisticated pedal car

https://www.facebook.com/groups/yachtclubdesavionsdelaroute/permalink/10158358645049556/