# FDR's Car

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fdrs-car/197868>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [August 27, 2003, 12:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fdrs-car/197868 "2003-08-27T00:59:30Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Enola\_Straight](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/dec6dc/32.png) [@Enola\_Straight](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Enola_Straight)\
**Post date:** [August 27, 2003, 12:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fdrs-car/197868/1 "2003-08-27T00:59:30Z")

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Due to Polio leaving hislegs severely weakened, US Presidential hopeful Franklin Delano Roosevelt had a car made for him with hand controls for accelerator and breaks.

Since the automatic transmission had not been invented yet, how did he use the clutch and change gears?

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**Author:** ![Reeder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c6cbf5/32.png) [@Reeder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Reeder)\
**Post date:** [August 27, 2003, 1:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fdrs-car/197868/2 "2003-08-27T01:05:43Z")

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They were available to FDR

> [@](#):
>
> As we learned, automatic transmission was based on technology first developed in the early 1900s by German manufacturers of marine engines. However, it was not adapted for automobiles for several decades. In 1938, General Motors developed the first line of cars to sport automatic transmission – Oldsmobiles that offered “Hydra-Matic drive.” The cars were introduced to the public in 1940. In 1941, Chrysler followed suit and introduced three different cars that offered their version of automatic drive, “Vacamatic” (later called “Fluid Drive”). Automatic transmission was a fairly common option on most American cars by 1948.

[http://ask.yahoo.com/ask/20011022.html](http://ask.yahoo.com/ask/20011022.html)

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**Author:** ![ftg](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ftg/32/2801_2.png) [@ftg](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ftg)\
**Post date:** [August 27, 2003, 2:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fdrs-car/197868/3 "2003-08-27T02:06:31Z")

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Umm, hand controls. The clutch doesn’t need to be on the floor.

I have seen some of [FDR’s cars](http://www.fdr-littlewhitehouse.org/03_information/03_a.html) but I don’t recall the specifics. On handicapped cars of a little more modern vintage that I recall better, the shifter has a squeeze lever on it for the clutch. So squeeze, shift, let loose.