Karl Ludvigsen
Encyclopedia
Karl Ludvigsen. Cum Laude graduate of Phillips Exeter Academy
Phillips Exeter Academy
Phillips Exeter Academy is a private secondary school located in Exeter, New Hampshire, in the United States.Exeter is noted for its application of Harkness education, a system based on a conference format of teacher and student interaction, similar to the Socratic method of learning through asking...

 and attended both the Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
The Massachusetts Institute of Technology is a private research university located in Cambridge, Massachusetts. MIT has five schools and one college, containing a total of 32 academic departments, with a strong emphasis on scientific and technological education and research.Founded in 1861 in...

, studying engineering, and Pratt Institute
Pratt Institute
Pratt Institute is a private art college in New York City located in Brooklyn, New York, with satellite campuses in Manhattan and Utica. Pratt is one of the leading undergraduate art schools in the United States and offers programs in Architecture, Graphic Design, History of Art and Design,...

 where he matriculated in industrial design. In 1958-59 he served in the US Army Signal Corps in West Germany.

Ludvigsen is best known for his work over 50 years as a journalist, author and historian. Ludvigsen began his automotive writing and editing for MIT
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
The Massachusetts Institute of Technology is a private research university located in Cambridge, Massachusetts. MIT has five schools and one college, containing a total of 32 academic departments, with a strong emphasis on scientific and technological education and research.Founded in 1861 in...

's Tech Engineering News in 1953. He has served as technical editor of both Auto Age and Sports Cars Illustrated, east coast editor of Motor Trend
Motor Trend
Motor Trend is an American automobile magazine. It first appeared in September 1949, issued by Petersen Publishing Company in Los Angeles, and bearing the tag line "The Magazine for a Motoring World". Petersen Publishing was sold to British publisher EMAP in 1998, who sold the former Petersen...

and editor of Car and Driver
Car and Driver
Car and Driver is an American automotive enthusiast magazine. Its total circulation is 1.31 million. It is owned by Hearst Magazines, who purchased prior owner Hachette Filipacchi Media U.S. in 2011...

. Currently he writes for Automobile Quarterly
Automobile Quarterly
Automobile Quarterly is a hardbound, advertising-free periodical publication that started in Spring 1962 with the sub-title "The Connoisseur's Magazine of Motoring Today, Yesterday, and Tomorrow"....

, The Automobile and Hemmings Sports & Exotic Cars, among others, plus various one-make periodicals and leading website publications Winding Road and Just-Auto.com.

As an author, co-author or editor Ludvigsen has some four dozen books to his credit. Four Ludvigsen books concern the Chevrolet
Chevrolet
Chevrolet , also known as Chevy , is a brand of vehicle produced by General Motors Company . Founded by Louis Chevrolet and ousted GM founder William C. Durant on November 3, 1911, General Motors acquired Chevrolet in 1918...

 Corvette
Chevrolet Corvette
The Chevrolet Corvette is a sports car by the Chevrolet division of General Motors that has been produced in six generations. The first model, a convertible, was designed by Harley Earl and introduced at the GM Motorama in 1953 as a concept show car. Myron Scott is credited for naming the car after...

, one of them that was credited with sparking the Corvette hobby. He has written three times about Mercedes-Benz
Mercedes-Benz
Mercedes-Benz is a German manufacturer of automobiles, buses, coaches, and trucks. Mercedes-Benz is a division of its parent company, Daimler AG...

, twice about its racing cars. His books on the latter subject have won the Montagu Trophy (once) and the Nicholas-Joseph Cugnot Award (twice), both recognizing outstanding automotive historical writing. In 2001 he again received the Cugnot award from the Society of Automotive Historians (SAH) for his book about the early years of the Volkswagen
Volkswagen Beetle
The Volkswagen Type 1, widely known as the Volkswagen Beetle or Volkswagen Bug, is an economy car produced by the German auto maker Volkswagen from 1938 until 2003...

, Battle for the Beetle. In 2002 he was named a Friend of Automotive History by the SAH, the Society's highest award.

Since 1997 Ludvigsen has been drawing on the photographic resources of the Ludvigsen Library to write and illustrate books on the great racing drivers. His first title in this series was Stirling Moss
Stirling Moss
Sir Stirling Craufurd Moss, OBE FIE is a former racing driver from England...

—Racing with the Maestro
. He followed this with Jackie Stewart
Jackie Stewart
Sir John Young Stewart, OBE , better known as Jackie Stewart, and nicknamed The Flying Scotsman, is a Scottish former racing driver and team owner. He competed in Formula One between 1965 and 1973, winning three World Drivers' Championships. He also competed in Can-Am...

—Triple-Crowned King of Speed
and Juan Manuel Fangio
Juan Manuel Fangio
Juan Manuel Fangio , nicknamed El Chueco or El Maestro , was a racing car driver from Argentina, who dominated the first decade of Formula One racing...

—Motor Racing's Grand Master
. Fourth in this series for Haynes Publishing was Dan Gurney
Dan Gurney
Daniel Sexton Gurney is an American racing driver, race car constructor, and team owner.The son of a Metropolitan Opera star, he was born in Port Jefferson, New York, but moved to California as a teenager...

—The Ultimate Racer
and fifth was Alberto Ascari
Alberto Ascari
Alberto Ascari was an Italian racing driver and twice Formula One World Champion. He is one of only two Italian Formula One World Champions in the history of the sport, and the only one winning his two championships in a Ferrari....

Ferrari
Scuderia Ferrari
Scuderia Ferrari is the racing team division of the Ferrari automobile marque. The team currently only races in Formula One but has competed in numerous classes of motorsport since its formation in 1929, including sportscar racing....

's First Double Champion
. Sixth and seventh in the series are Bruce McLaren
Bruce McLaren
Bruce Leslie McLaren , born in Auckland, New Zealand, was a race-car designer, driver, engineer and inventor....

—Life and Legacy of Excellence
and Emerson Fittipaldi
Emerson Fittipaldi
Emerson Fittipaldi |São Paulo]], Brazil) is a Brazilian automobile racing driver who throughout a long and successful career won the Indianapolis 500 twice and championships in both Formula One and CART.-Early and personal life:...

—Heart of a Racer
.

Also in the field of motor sports Karl Ludvigsen has written about the cars of the Can-Am series, the AAR Eagle
Anglo American Racers
All American Racers was an American auto racing team and constructor based in Santa Ana, California. Founded by Dan Gurney and Carroll Shelby in 1964, All American Racers initially participated in American sports car and Champ Car races as well as international Formula One events with cars named...

 racing cars, the Ford GT40
Ford GT40
The Ford GT40 was a high performance sports car and winner of the 24 hours of Le Mans four times in a row, from 1966 to 1969...

s and Prime Movers, the story of Britain's Ilmor Engineering. His introduction to At Speed, a book of Jesse Alexander's racing photography, won the Ken W. Purdy Award for Excellence in Automotive Journalism. Other motor-sports titles include Classic Grand Prix Cars, a history of the front-engined G.P. car, and Classic Racing Engines, Ludvigsen's personal selection of 50 notable power units.

Karl Ludvigsen is the author of definitive histories of Porsche
Porsche
Porsche Automobil Holding SE, usually shortened to Porsche SE a Societas Europaea or European Public Company, is a German based holding company with investments in the automotive industry....

 and Opel
Opel
Adam Opel AG, generally shortened to Opel, is a German automobile company founded by Adam Opel in 1862. Opel has been building automobiles since 1899, and became an Aktiengesellschaft in 1929...

. His Porsche history, Excellence was Expected, is considered to be a model of the researching and writing of the history of an auto company. The updated edition was published in three volumes by Bentley Publishers in 2003. In 1997 Ludvigsen researched and wrote the catalogue for a special exhibition of Ferrari technological innovations on the occasion of the company's 50th anniversary and contributed a major section to the company's official 50-year history. He updated and expanded this work for Ferrari's 60th anniversary in 2007. He is the author of a series of monographs on great Maserati
Maserati
Maserati is an Italian luxury car manufacturer established on December 1, 1914, in Bologna. The company's headquarters is now in Modena, and its emblem is a trident. It has been owned by the Italian car giant Fiat S.p.A. since 1993...

 cars.

In co-operation with publisher Iconografix, Ludvigsen has established a series of photographic books now numbering some nineteen titles, including books on Indy
American Championship Car Racing
Since 1916 there has been a recognized United States national automobile racing National Championship for drivers of professional-level, single-seat open wheel race cars. The championship has been under the auspices of several different sanctioning bodies since 1909. Since 1911, the Indianapolis...

 racing cars from the Speedway's
Indianapolis Motor Speedway
The Indianapolis Motor Speedway, located in Speedway, Indiana in the United States, is the home of the Indianapolis 500-Mile Race and the Brickyard 400....

 first contest in 1911 through the 1970s, the Indy Novis
Novi engine
The Novi engine was a dual overhead cam supercharged V8 engine used in the Indianapolis 500. It was designed by Bud Winfield and Leo Goossen and built by Fred Offenhauser.-Early years:...

, Chevrolet's Corvair
Chevrolet Corvair
-First generation :The 1960 Corvair 500 and 700 series four-door sedans were conceived as economy cars offering few amenities in order to keep the price competitive, with the 500 selling for under $2,000...

 and Corvette, the Mercedes-Benz 300SLs of 1952 and 1954–64, the Porsche Spyders and Porsche 917
Porsche 917
The Porsche 917 is a racecar that gave Porsche its first overall wins at the 24 Hours of Le Mans in 1970 and 1971. Powered by the Type 912 flat-12 engine of 4.5, 4.9, or 5 litres, the 917/30 variant was capable of a 0- time of 2.3 seconds, 0– in 5.3 seconds, and a top speed of over .There are 6...

, the Ferrari Factory, Can-Am racing cars, the sports-racers of Briggs Cunningham
Briggs Cunningham
Briggs Swift Cunningham II was an American entrepreneur and sportsman, who raced automobiles and yachts. Born into a wealthy family, he became a racing car constructor, driver, and team owner as well as a sports car manufacturer and automobile collector.He skippered the victorious yacht Columbia...

 and Jim Hall
Jim Hall (race car driver)
Jim Hall is a former racecar driver and constructor from the United States. He competed in Formula One from to , participating in 12 World Championship Grands Prix and numerous non-Championship races....

's Chaparral cars. More titles are in preparation.

Ludvigsen has collected his library of the same name throughout his career and it now holds extensive original negatives and transparencies from the 1950s forward with special strengths in motor sports, American cars and sports cars. As well it holds original photos and glass negatives from the dawn of the automotive era.

On motor-industry topics Karl Ludvigsen has written books about high-performance engines, the Wankel rotary engine and the histories of American auto makers. He was editor of The Future of the Automobile, the report of the 1981-84 study of the world auto industry by MIT. This was named one of the best business books of the year by Business Week. In the 1980s he established Euromotor Reports Limited, for which he wrote and edited numerous research studies.

In 1996 publishers in Britain and the United States launched Karl Ludvigsen's book on motor-industry management, Creating the Customer-Driven Car Company. It advises industry personnel on customer-pleasing best practice researched during 15 years of in charge of a London-based motor-industry management consultancy, which he founded in 1983. Ludvigsen and his team worked for most of the world's leading motor manufacturers in strategic planning, brand reinforcement, distribution, company structure and organization, mergers and acquisitions, and on design and engineering issues.

To his work as a consultant Karl Ludvigsen brought his personal motor-industry experience. As a designer at General Motors
General Motors
General Motors Company , commonly known as GM, formerly incorporated as General Motors Corporation, is an American multinational automotive corporation headquartered in Detroit, Michigan and the world's second-largest automaker in 2010...

 in 1956, Ludvigsen planned experimental front-drive prototypes. He also worked on the design and development of heavy-duty truck transmissions in the engineering and experimental departments of the Fuller Manufacturing Company, a subsidiary of the Eaton Corporation
Eaton Corporation
Eaton Corporation is a global diversified power management company with 2010 sales of $13.7 billion. The company is a leading provider of electrical components and systems for power quality, distribution and control; hydraulics components, systems and services for industrial and mobile equipment;...

. As a public-affairs official with General Motors Overseas Operations in the 1960s, Ludvigsen was responsible for all the company's product information outside the USA. He also supervised its financial advertising abroad. Prior to that he assisted the General Motors technical staffs in press relations, with special emphasis on the Styling Staff.

When Ludvigsen was president of Formula 1 Enterprises, an importer and distributor of motor vehicle equipment, several of his friends were injured in motor racing accidents. This led him and his company to become active in racing safety at the end of the 1960s. Ludvigsen helped invent the practical modern Halon
Halon
Halon can refer to:* Haloalkane, or halogenoalkane, a group of chemical compounds consisting of alkanes with linked halogens. In particular, bromine-containing haloalkanes.* Halomethane fire extinguishing systems...

-gas fire extinguishing system for racing vehicles and founded the Motor Racing Safety Society to bring together professionals working in this field.

At the end of the 1970s Ludvigsen joined Fiat
Fiat
FIAT, an acronym for Fabbrica Italiana Automobili Torino , is an Italian automobile manufacturer, engine manufacturer, financial, and industrial group based in Turin in the Italian region of Piedmont. Fiat was founded in 1899 by a group of investors including Giovanni Agnelli...

 Motors of North America as vice president of corporate affairs, with responsibilities including legal affairs and relations with customers, dealers, governments and the press. He took part in the product development of Fiat
Fiat
FIAT, an acronym for Fabbrica Italiana Automobili Torino , is an Italian automobile manufacturer, engine manufacturer, financial, and industrial group based in Turin in the Italian region of Piedmont. Fiat was founded in 1899 by a group of investors including Giovanni Agnelli...

 and Lancia
Lancia
Lancia Automobiles S.p.A. is an Italian automobile manufacturer founded in 1906 by Vincenzo Lancia and which became part of the Fiat Group in 1969. The company has a long history of producing distinctive cars and also has a strong rally heritage. Some modern Lancias are seen as presenting a more...

 cars both in the USA and Turin
Turin
Turin is a city and major business and cultural centre in northern Italy, capital of the Piedmont region, located mainly on the left bank of the Po River and surrounded by the Alpine arch. The population of the city proper is 909,193 while the population of the urban area is estimated by Eurostat...

. His team obtained unprecedented public awareness for Fiat, Lancia, and Ferrari products in the United States and successfully launched the Fiat Strada
Fiat Ritmo
The Fiat Ritmo is an automobile from the Italian manufacturer Fiat, launched in 1978. Styled by Bertone of Italy, it was seen by some as the most distinctive looking small family car in Europe on its launch in 1978 Turin Motorshow. It was badged in Great Britain and North America as the Fiat Strada...

 range.

In 1980 Ludvigsen joined Ford of Europe as a vice president. One of his briefs for Ford included government affairs. This included European governmental assessments and lobbying activities, as well as the preparation and presentation of Ford's External Factors Study, a ten-year rolling forecast of the external environment within which Ford would operate in Europe.

Another Ford of Europe responsibility for Ludvigsen was Ford's European motor sports activity. This encompassed the design, engineering, tooling, production, marketing, distribution and sale throughout Europe of special automobiles, light trucks and parts. He was in charge of the design and launching of the RS1600i Escort, which was named Motor Sports Car of the Year in France and which led Ford's RS Products operation to record profitability. In addition, Ludvigsen played a key role in the creation of the AC-Ghia
Carrozzeria Ghia
Carrozzeria Ghia SpA is one of the most famous Italian automobile design and coachbuilding firms, established by Giacinto Ghia and Gariglio as Carrozzeria Ghia & Gariglio, located at 4 Corso Valentino in Turin....

 and Barchetta prototype sports cars.

From 1980 through 1984 Ludvigsen was a member of the Policy Forum of the MIT Future of the Automobile Programme, the most comprehensive trilateral study of the motor industry ever undertaken. He also chaired the Auto & Transport Design Forum, an international conference on design and transport infrastructures held in Lugano, Switzerland and Stuttgart, Germany. His tutorial responsibilities have included the University of Syracuse, The Royal College of Art and the Bavarian Academy of Advertising.

Ludvigsen has been a Member of the Society of Automotive Engineers (SAE) since 1960 and has been active on both Standards and Activities Committees of the SAE. He is currently a member of the Historical Committee. He is a founder member of the International Motor Press Association
International Motor Press Association
The International Motor Press Association , is the oldest trade association representing automotive journalists and Public Relations professionals in the United States. It was established in 1909.- Monthly meetings :...

 and a member of the Society of Automotive Historians, the Society of Authors
Society of Authors
The Society of Authors is a trade union for professional writers that was founded in 1884 to protect the rights of writers and fight to retain those rights .It has counted amongst its members and presidents numerous notable writers and poets including Tennyson The Society of Authors (UK) is a...

, the Society for the History of Technology
Society for the History of Technology
The Society for the History of Technology, or SHOT, is the primary professional society for historians of technology. Founded in 1958, its flagship publication is the journal Technology and Culture...

 and the Guild of Motoring Writers. Ludvigsen is an honorary member of the Vintage Sports Car Club of America and the Corvair Society of America. He is also a member of the council of Historic Automobile Group
Historic Automobile Group
The Historic Automobile Group International is a London based in the area of rare historic motorcars and collectors’ automobiles. HAGI is known for its classic car market indices, which have been , based on a proprietary market capitalization formula called “survivor weighting”.Founded in 2007...



Karl Ludvigsen has been resident in England since 1980 and lives in Suffolk
Suffolk
Suffolk is a non-metropolitan county of historic origin in East Anglia, England. It has borders with Norfolk to the north, Cambridgeshire to the west and Essex to the south. The North Sea lies to the east...

 with his wife Annette.

Books

  • Stirling Moss
    Stirling Moss
    Sir Stirling Craufurd Moss, OBE FIE is a former racing driver from England...

    —Racing with the Maestro
  • Jackie Stewart
    Jackie Stewart
    Sir John Young Stewart, OBE , better known as Jackie Stewart, and nicknamed The Flying Scotsman, is a Scottish former racing driver and team owner. He competed in Formula One between 1965 and 1973, winning three World Drivers' Championships. He also competed in Can-Am...

    —Triple-Crowned King of Speed
  • Juan Manuel Fangio
    Juan Manuel Fangio
    Juan Manuel Fangio , nicknamed El Chueco or El Maestro , was a racing car driver from Argentina, who dominated the first decade of Formula One racing...

    —Motor Racing's Grand Master
  • Dan Gurney
    Dan Gurney
    Daniel Sexton Gurney is an American racing driver, race car constructor, and team owner.The son of a Metropolitan Opera star, he was born in Port Jefferson, New York, but moved to California as a teenager...

    —The Ultimate Racer
  • Alberto Ascari
    Alberto Ascari
    Alberto Ascari was an Italian racing driver and twice Formula One World Champion. He is one of only two Italian Formula One World Champions in the history of the sport, and the only one winning his two championships in a Ferrari....

    Ferrari
    Scuderia Ferrari
    Scuderia Ferrari is the racing team division of the Ferrari automobile marque. The team currently only races in Formula One but has competed in numerous classes of motorsport since its formation in 1929, including sportscar racing....

    's First Double Champion
  • Bruce McLaren
    Bruce McLaren
    Bruce Leslie McLaren , born in Auckland, New Zealand, was a race-car designer, driver, engineer and inventor....

    —Life and Legacy of Excellence
  • Emerson Fittipaldi
    Emerson Fittipaldi
    Emerson Fittipaldi |São Paulo]], Brazil) is a Brazilian automobile racing driver who throughout a long and successful career won the Indianapolis 500 twice and championships in both Formula One and CART.-Early and personal life:...

    —Heart of a Racer
  • Classic Grand Prix Cars
  • Creating the Customer-Driven Car Company
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