Car of the Week: George Lucas Once Owned This 1948 Tucker. Now It’s Up for Grabs.

Taking place at Northern California’s Monterey Jet Center on August 14 and 15, Monterey Car Week’s Broad Arrow Auction will host a roster of impressive supercars and sports-car classics. Yet one vehicle stands out as special due to its rarity, provenance, and the remarkable story of how it came to be. That car is a 1948 Tucker ’48.

Preston Tucker’s curious creation, the Tucker ’48 would likely be relegated to a few footnotes in automotive publications and obscure web links, were it not for faithful collectors and historians who have kept the Tucker flame alive since the company’s demise in 1949. But what really put the story, and the car, in the public spotlight was the 1988 Hollywood feature film Tucker: The Man and His Dream, which was directed by Francis Ford Coppola and featured George Lucas as the executive producer.

Following World War II, the American automotive landscape was dominated by the “Big Three,” none especially eager to welcome an innovator like Tucker and his forward-thinking car. Tucker’s project began in 1944, envisioning an American family sedan whose design emphasis was on safety. It had features like a frameless, unibody structure, a pop-out safety windshield, a center headlight that turned with the steering, a padded dashboard, a crash compartment ahead of the front passengers, an integrated roll bar, push-button interior door handles, and other details absent from even the most luxurious cars of the era. Equally innovative was Tucker’s proprietary, rear-mounted flat-six aluminum engine.

As for the model’s sleek body, it was designed by Alex Tremulis, author of the Cord 810 and 812, cars that today are full classics in the Classic Car Club of America (CCCA) pantheon. But the rise and fall of Tucker—the man and the company—was a story of (likely) good intentions quickly followed by failure. Although the Tucker Corporation raised $17 million in an industry-leading stock IPO, the ill will of the Securities and Exchange Commission, and some politicians, doomed the company, which was bankrupt by March of 1949.

A mere 51 examples of the Tucker ’48 were constructed in nine months, improving over that time with features and developmental changes that make each vehicle nearly unique. The first of these 51 is the “Tin Goose” prototype, which used Tucker’s proprietary engine prior to the air-cooled, flat-six Franklin O-355 helicopter engine, converted to water cooling, that was fitted to the 50 subsequent cars.

The third production car by serial number, chassis No. 1003 retains its original 355-cubic-inch engine. The body is finished in the original 600 Royal Maroon colorway and the interior is dressed in 940 Beige. The car’s history has been extensively documented by marque experts Mark Lieberman and Mike Tucker, supported by the Cammack Tucker Archives (named for collector David Cammack) at the Antique Automobile Club of America Museum in Hershey, Pa. According to research, chassis No. 1003 was likely completed after March of 1948, and has numerous details that distinguish it from later siblings, including a modified Cord transaxle, used in 13 of the first 15 cars. Inside, the dash features silver instead of gold trim, and presciently, no ashtrays are fitted. 

In July of 1948, No. 1003 was sold to the Arkansas Tucker Sales Corporation, and by March of 1949, it was no longer listed in corporate inventory. By 1950 and throughout the decade, Art Watson, the first known owner, displayed the car at his dealership, Watson Auto Auction. Nick Jenin, likely the next owner, added the car to his traveling collection of 11 Tuckers. It was acquired by Paul Stern, of Manheim, Pa., in 1962, and brokered to noted collector William Pettit in Virginia, where it remained on display in his museum for more than two decades.

George Lucas was the next owner, acquiring the car with only 13,391 miles on it, though it was in need of restoration. Lucas kept it, as well as another Tucker, at Skywalker Ranch for many years, selling No. 1003 in 2005. (According to Broad Arrow, Coppola has two Tuckers of his own.)

Since its sale, the car has undergone a comprehensive restoration, including body and paint work by Bata Mataja’s B.A.D. Company in Sun Valley, Calif. Martyn Donaldson, the well-known Tucker expert and past historian of the Tucker Automobile Club of America, performed extensive mechanical, electrical, and detail work over the course of four years.

About these special cars, Donaldson says, “They’re not particularly good cars, but they’re interesting cars. Since they never made it into full production, things like steering components were cast in bronze, impossible for volume manufacture. Essentially, each one is a pilot-production prototype, and no two are exactly alike. They were all guinea pigs.”

Yet according to Donaldson, the experience behind the wheel is surprisingly rewarding. “You can actually drive them quite comfortably, because you have a light aluminum aircraft engine in the rear,” he says, “it’s like a big [Porsche] 911.” This early example, in excellent condition and with important provenance, is estimated to fetch as much as $2 million.

Click here for more photos of this 1948 Tucker ’48.

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