Head GM stylist Harley Earl was inspired to add tiny tail fins to the 1948 Caddy models after seeing a Lockheed P-38 fighter airplane. By 1957, what was tiny on one hiney grew to a fad where nearly every U.S. car was adorned with the useless appendages on its rear.

Not to be outdone, the 1959 "Standard of the World" trumped them with the biggest and boldest fins of all, creating arguably the most grotesque Cadillac ever made. Fortunately, the public was becoming finned-out and by 1962 virtually all U.S. car makers stripped off their fins for a "new" clean look. Fins were fin-ished!

"The more things change..."
-The Editors