decars1-6, Exercise 1: Who designed the Beetle?

Model answer (check the details):

Accurate in part: Ferdinand Porsche was commissioned in 1934 and led the design team that produced the KdF-Wagen prototypes in the mid-1930s, so it is correct to say his team designed the car.

Incomplete: the design drew on earlier ideas and other people.
1. Hans Ledwinka of the Czech firm Tatra had designed rear-engined cars with streamlined bodies, and Tatra brought a legal case over the similarities, which was settled after the war.
2. Josef Ganz, a Jewish engineer who promoted small rear-engined cars in the early 1930s and was persecuted after 1933, is increasingly recognised as an influence.
3. Porsche's own employees and earlier work also contributed.

Better statement: "Ferdinand Porsche led the team that produced the KdF-Wagen, a design shaped by earlier small-car ideas from Ganz, Ledwinka and others." Check the historians' studies for the weight to give each.