Baja 1000 Starts This Month gringogazette.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from gringogazette.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
A Navy Veteran Revolutionized Dune Buggy Racing After Serving in World War II military.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from military.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
Brendan McAleer
A Manx is the opposite of elaborate. It is made out of a simple fibreglass frame set on the shortened chassis of a Volkswagen Beetle. The name comes from the Manx cat, a stump-tailed feline from the Isle of Man, skilled at hunting. Lightweight, simple, and durable, Meyers’ buggy took the everyman appeal of the original VW and infused it with a dash of surf and sun. It was affordable, fun, and immediately iconic.
However, the story isn’t as simple as that. Bruce Meyers’ life had more ups and downs than the dunes his machines bounded over.
Bruce Meyers, Who Built the First Fiberglass Dune Buggy, Dies at 94
His creation revolutionized off-road riding. But he fell victim to companies that knocked off his design for kits that turned Beetles into buggies.
Bruce Meyers in his invention, the Meyers Manx, which ignited the dune buggy craze in the 1960s.Credit.Eric Rickman/The Enthusiast Network, via Getty Images
March 6, 2021
Bruce Meyers, who used his skills as a boat builder to invent the first fiberglass dune buggy, igniting the late-1960s craze for off-road riding, and thrived until copycats flooded the market, died on Feb. 19 at his home in Valley Center, Calif. He was 94.