After World War II, many young men wanted nothing more than to buy a house, settle down with a nice girl, and start a family. But for others, there was motor oil in their blood and pistons in their heart, and it would not do to not open up a hot rod shop and customize cars in ways they’d never been done before. Thus emerged the era of great hot rodders and the Kings of Kustom like George Barris and Bo Huff.

But there is a king among the kings, and this brief video gives an introduction to a man whose work we are familiar with, even if we don’t know the name. He is Gene Winfield.

From racing to hot rodding to painting and customizing, Winfield was involved in every aspect of the kustom car movement. He helped Hollywood design some of the most memorable cars of the silver screen, from the time-travelling DeLorean of Back to the Future to the Sunbeam Tiger used by the spies in Get Smart.

Few people know that Gene Winfield designed and built the full-sized prop of the "Star Trek" Galileo Shuttlecraft while working at AMT in Phoenix, AZ. Photo from Chadwick/Warlow Enterprises.

Winfield even helped sort out many of the techniques used by today’s hot rodders, like the “Winfield Fade”, a top-to-bottom fade that blends together a lighter and darker shade of the same color. This brief video is a great primer for getting to better know those who made hot rodding what it is today, and Gene Winfield is the first name you should know.

Want to know more? Pick up the Kings of Kustom DVD to get Winfield’s story, as well as the story from other pioneers of hot rodding.