I found this old hubcap at a local sale and I grabbed it, not having any idea who the car maker was.
I spent just all day today trying to find it, and have had zero luck.
I think it’s pretty cool looking, but when people ask me about it I get kind of tired just shrugging my shoulders.
The hubcap is about 10 inches wide. The logo is about 2 inches or so wide.
It’s an old Oldsmobile symbol.
fineartamerica.com/featured/1948-oldsmobile-emblem-jill-reger.html
Nice work @wentwest I would have thought it looked like a Buick or something. So polish it up and hang on the wall, or somebody will want it.
A tip of the hat, wentwest. I looked through countless pages of old car logos without success.
Wonder who designed that oddity? And why? It sort of looked like a stylized W, but mostly it looks like a good challenge for a heraldry expert.
MAN! That was fast!
I was planning on checking this thread later this week to see if I got even a single response, but I got the answer in just hours after posting it!
Thanks to wentwest for the quick answer and to all others for participating!!
And it is pretty cool. I think it will look nice hanging right above my desk.
That is an unusual logo, I never would have guessed it was Oldsmobile. But it turns out they used it, or a version of it, for a number of years. Google ‘Oldsmobile crest’ and check out the images.
The dirty little secret is you can go to Google, then chose to search images (the button for that is the word images in the upper right corner of the screen), and in the open search space you will see a camera. If you click it you can upload a picture as the search subject and it will search images for look-alikes. That’s all I did. Look at a few and someone will have labelled the info you want.
A woman in Algeria requested to be my friend on Facebook, since she wanted to practice English. Another Facebook friend, with a light touch of xenophobia, took the profile photo she had given, and found it was a Russian woman, a stock photo. She used a similar online service.
She assumed I was going to do something stupid, I guess.
Anyway, it turns out the Algerian woman used a stock photo because of family concern about putting her face on the Web.
So, yes, you can find images that match what you have. Pretty slick.
Reminds me of the story about the guy that was called in to fix a piece of machinery that no one else could fix. He spent ten minutes studying the problem, then took a hammer and wacked it once. Presented a bill for $510. The customer complained because he only spent ten minutes on it. The guy replied it was $10 for the time spent and $500 for knowing where to hit it with the hammer.
Might be a piece of cake for some of you folks but I appreciate the expertise.
Looking at the images helped. By the time of the hubcap the parts of the Crest had become so stylized they are unrecognizable. On older versions the upside-down ‘U’ in the middle is a spur and the notched dohickeys are bird wings. I much prefer the older versions, though an inverted spur is an odd idea for a car emblem. I guess you can wear your spurs however you like if you have a car instead of a horse.
I don’t really understand all the symbols and things in these kinds of marks. What’s with the acorns? What does that have to do with cars, or a family name? I guess if your name is Oakes, maybe, but the car is named after Ransom E. Olds, who also lent his name to the Reo. Maybe they should put a picture of some old geezer like me in the symbol, so it could be an “old’s mobile”.
According to a list of symbols that appear on a coat of arms, “Acorn = Antiquity and strength”
It must have been the 50’s when they came up with the rocket symbol. I think when they came out with the rocket V8. I made a display stand with my rocket hood emblem and hub cap cover from my ole diesel. Its on my desk. I figured after 480,000 miles it was the least I could do in memory.
The Rocket V8 came out in 1949, the hubcap pictured is from 1950. I am not as computer savy as Wentwest, I just googled " what car had 3 acorns on the hubcap? " and it was the first image shown.
The hubcap design is a version of the family crest of Ransom E Olds. founder of R. E. O. cars and trucks and Oldsmobile. I tried to attach an image of the crest but didn’t know how.
Hmm, somehow I suspect they made up that crest for Mr. Olds. Unless he came from a distinguished family there wouldn’t have been an existing one, and an upside-down winged spur doesn’t look old at all. It was popular in the 19th and early 20th century for people to have their family histories researched back to Charlemagne and Henry VIII. The research standards were decidedly low.
So now you know what it’s from, what are you going to do with it? List it on eBay? How much?