German engineers pioneered the rear-engine layout from the very dawn of motoring and the launch of the Benz Patent Motorwagen.
Like the Volkswagen Beetle, the Renault 4CV was a product of the wartime years, though rather than being state-sponsored.
Rear-engined cars were considerably more common in Europe than they were in the United States, with one of the notable exceptions being the Tucker 48.
Although the Volkswagen Beetle was hugely successful, it was by no means a ball of fire. And it wasn’t long before people began to appreciate the potential of the rear-engined layout as the basis for a sports car.
While Ferry Porsche was putting his first 356s together in a sawmill in Gmund, in the Austrian capital Vienna another gifted engineer began work on his own VW Beetle-based racer.
Like fellow Czech manufacturer Škoda, Tatra had a long history producing rear-engined, rear-wheel-drive cars – but it also had form for designing streamlined machines that dated back to the T77 of 1933.
Few manufacturers embraced the rear-engined layout with quite the same enthusiasm as Automobilové závody, národní podnik – Škoda.
Like Porsche and Denzel before him, Jean Rédélé saw the potential to turn an uninspiring rear-engined saloon into a true competition contender.
Amphicar’s Model 770 is perhaps one of the most intriguing rear-engined cars ever built, in that it also served as a boat.