30 Facts About Bill Cushenbery

Bill Cushenbery was an American car customizer, show car builder, and model kit designer.

Bill Cushenbery worked in autobody repair shops to learn to do bodywork.

Several members of his family were already in the trade and helped train him, but Bill Cushenbery wanted to build new instead of repair damage.

Bill Cushenbery started customizing cars in 1947, in a small shop set up in the back of his parents' house behind a service station in Wichita, Kansas.

Bill Cushenbery soon established his own business called the Kansas Kustom Shop.

Bill Cushenbery worked at a Cadillac dealership for about one year, while picking up work from a local car club.

In 1965, Bill Cushenbery relocated his shop to Burbank, California, just blocks from Barris' North Hollywood location.

Bill Cushenbery opened a new shop in Bakersfield in 1974.

Bill Cushenbery customized a number of Porsches, and a De Tomaso Pantera.

Bill Cushenbery worked on Frank Sinatra's Dual-Ghia and worked with Steve McQueen on the cars for the Le Mans film, developing camera mounts and specialized body panels.

Bill Cushenbery became well known as a restorer of Mercedes-Benz 300 SLs.

In late 1959, Bill Cushenbery began work on his first show car, El Matador, as a rolling advertisement.

Bill Cushenbery was just one of the customizers involved in building this 1940 Ford Coupe for Bob Crespo.

Exodus was a 1959 Chevrolet Impala that Bill Cushenbery built for Tony Cardoza.

Bud Millard acquired the car in 1998 and made plans for the original builder to restore the car himself, but Bill Cushenbery died before he could start.

In 1962, Bill Cushenbery collaborated with artist Don Varner to create Silhouette, his first show car not based on a production body.

Silhouette was mistakenly sold to a bodyshop in North Hollywood, then later bought by a friend of Bill Cushenbery's who had plans to restore it.

Bill Cushenbery started work on another bubble car, originally called the Scorpion, in 1963.

Bill Cushenbery later changed the name to Silhouette II Space Coupe.

Bill Cushenbery built a custom chassis with a dropped center section.

When Bill Cushenbery lost control of that shop, he took some critical parts of the car with him but lost track of the rest, and the car essentially vanished.

In 1963, Bill Cushenbery began work on Marquis for Gene Boucher, a project which took two and a half years to complete.

The Astro was a customized 1963 Ford Galaxie that Bill Cushenbery designed and built for the Ford Custom Car Caravan.

Bill Cushenbery started with a convertible body, and added a landau half-roof covered in white vinyl and a removable center panel.

Bill Cushenbery replicated the Ford's jet-inspired round taillamp treatment on the front of the car, stacking dual Lucas headlamps in circular surrounds with a horizontal dividing bar on each side.

In October 1965, Barris hired Bill Cushenbery to do the metalwork that would turn the Lincoln Futura concept car into the Batmobile car featured in the 1960s Batman television series.

Bill Cushenbery kept The Gypsy himself, intending to put fiberglass replicas into production, but never did.

Bill Cushenbery was contracted to build Surfin' Bird with a budget of $5,000 and a tight completion deadline.

Boss radio ran multiple promotional spots for the contest, several of which include background grinder noise to simulate being in a working body shop while the "Big Kahuna", as portrayed by Chris Varez, asks Bill Cushenbery to add features to the car.

Bill Cushenbery married Anna Loretta Head in 1953, and had one daughter in 1954.