Article: MOTORING: IS IT A BOAT? IS A PLANE? No, it's a car. John Bullock reports on the more eccentric flourishings of the motor industry, from the Ornithopter to the Amphicar

IT IS A HUNDRED years since Gottlieb Daimler produced the first automobile capable of taking people long distances by road. Since then, many optimistic entrepreneurs and madcap inventors have attempted to give the motorcar all sorts of extraordinary powers, to allow it to travel on the water, in the air, or just plain strangely. Although attempted at different times in different countries by many different designers, with varying degrees of success, all these creations do have something in common - every one of them was a total commercial flop.

Roussier, a French inventor and motorcar racer, designed the first "car ferry" in 1907. His idea was quite simple - a motorcar powered barge. The ...

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