Filed under: Porsche, Volkswagen, Design/Style

We all know the story of the Volkswagen Beetle: In his vision to motorize Germany, Adolf Hitler wanted a "People's Car" of sound design and quality to transport the subjects of his Third Reich around an expanding empire. The Beetle became that car. It made automotive and world history, two of Germany's biggest automakers and Ferdinand Porsche's career. But was it really his design as history recorded? New evidence suggests otherwise.

According to Dutch author and historian Paul Schilperoord in his new book Het Ware Verhaal van de Kever ("The True Story of the Beetle"), Porsche may have taken the credit for a design from a Jewish engineer named Josef Ganz (pictured right). The Hungarian-born engineer and automotive journalist had a revolutionary idea for a new type of car which he called the Maik