Ultra-Rare & Ultra-Cool: 1936 Stout Scarab

"SteveLehto" (stevelehto) 01/11/2015 at 12:30 • Filed to: None

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This is a 1936 Stout Scarab. It is a very unusual car and I recently got to take a look at it – Up Close and Personal as they used to say – and shoot a video about it. It is one of only 5 remaining examples and it is in pristine condition.

In between me flubbing my lines, I broke out my camera and got some photographs. The video production crew will do what they do and I will post the video when they are done. In the meantime, here are some photos I took of it and some random facts, just to show how cool a vehicle this is. The production numbers are hazy but no more than 9 were built, and perhaps as few as 6. How's that for rare?

William Bushnell Stout was an old school inventor. The kind who dabbled in different disciplines and often wondered what would happen if you took ideas from one arena and applied them in another. So, he built airplanes and then wondered how some of those ideas might work on cars. In 1932 he built his first Scarab, named after the Egyptian beetle with the cool shell.

He decided on some modifications and then built his second. This model, a 1936, is one of the second generation. The Scarab is rear-engine, rear wheel drive and will remind many people of a certain vehicle Volkswagen would make a little over a decade later.

Stout used copious amounts of aluminum and magnesium in his car. And made it streamlined to cut through the air better. He removed the door handles and replaced them with electric door-opening switches. Press that mother of pearl button and the door pops open.

Long before minivans invaded our consciousness, Stout considered other uses for the interior of his Scarab. It could be used as an office. Or a mobile living room. Maybe it would help if the seats could be moved around - not adjusted - but actually moved by simply sliding them from one place to another.

Oh, NHTSA would never allow such a thing today but NHTSA wasn't around yet.

Stout apparently liked materials, and didn't seem to care what convention called for. So along with the aluminum and magnesium he used on the body, you can see the wood he used on the interior and the wicker woven into the headliner.

Yes, wicker .

Stout had considered what kinds of material were strong but also lightweight and lent sound-deadening qualities. I did not get to go for a drive in the Scarab so I cannot attest to the accuracy of his vision on this one. But I can tell you - the headliner in the Stout Scarab is the coolest headliner I've ever seen. If you are into that sort of thing.

And of course, there is the large bench seat in the back. I suppose one could lay on that bench and just gaze at the wicker ceiling for hours.

The drive train was conventional in one sense: Stout bought a flathead V-8 and 3-speed tranny from his friend Henry Ford and put them in the rear of his Scarab. This eliminated the dreaded hump down the middle of the car for the drive shaft and allowed him to have a low and flat floor. It was unconventional in the sense that Stout designed his own chain-driven transaxle to tie it all together.

Stout was a genius at a lot of things but marketing was probably not one of his fields of expertise. He tried selling his Scarabs for $5,000 at a time when that would buy you a coach-built Packard. Which probably explains why he only made as many as he did.

Shortly, this Scarab will be in a museum and in a few weeks, I'll post the video we shot of it. In the meantime, there is a rumor that another Scarab - less the drive train - was used as a fishing shack by Stout out on the small lake he lived near in Michigan. When the ice melted, the Scarab was still out there but now rests on the bottom. Perhaps a little detective work and some snorkeling will allow you to get your hands on your very own Scarab. You'll need a drivetrain but how hard can that be to come up with?

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All photos by me. Special Thanks to Mark Lieberman of Nostalgic Motoring.

ly2v8-Brian > SteveLehto 01/11/2015 at 12:38

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Beautiful example of Streamline Moderne in a car.

505Turbeaux > SteveLehto 01/11/2015 at 12:41

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my ultimate road trip car. Didnt the prototype cover something like 250K miles?

SteveLehto > 505Turbeaux 01/11/2015 at 12:43

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I am not an expert on these cars by any means but I do know that Stout drove them all over the place - as in, all over the country. It was such a simple and durable design that I'm sure they would go for quite a while.

505Turbeaux > SteveLehto 01/11/2015 at 12:45

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yeah just double checked it, Stouts own scarab covered over 250K all over the us on promo drives. Awesome, I always had a thing for that uniqueness.

SteveLehto > 505Turbeaux 01/11/2015 at 12:49

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Very cool. This thing was amazing. It's in a private collection (which I also got to see and IT was also amazing) but is going to a museum shortly.

505Turbeaux > SteveLehto 01/11/2015 at 12:54

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Against all of my going on about cars that should be driven instead of displayed, the Scarab is just too rare to get miles put on it. Though if that were my private collection I might have other ideas...

SteveLehto > 505Turbeaux 01/11/2015 at 13:00

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It's kind of funny because this car is almost as rare as a Chrysler Turbine Car (9 exist but only two privately owned - only 4 run). Jay Leno drives his. He let me drive it in traffic. It was an amazing experience but can you imagine the things that could go wrong? I am a great driver (just ask me) but what about the knuckleheads out there?

If I owned it I'd put ropes around it and just look at it and sit in it. But then again, I'll never have that kind of money.

505Turbeaux > SteveLehto 01/11/2015 at 13:13

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this is why Jay is a hero to many...and he has the funds, goodwill and contacts to have the thing rebuilt should anything happen to it. I could never afford it in the first place

Sn210 > SteveLehto 01/11/2015 at 20:48

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very cool! I got to see one a few years ago at a museum just outside of Boston. Definitely an awesome car to put on the Unicorn Sightings list

Arch > SteveLehto 01/14/2015 at 17:26

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Man. This might very well be the coolest car ever built.

SteveLehto > Arch 01/14/2015 at 17:29

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Especially because it was built in 1936!

Miles Teg > SteveLehto 01/15/2015 at 00:58

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I can see why it didn't catch on, but it's a damn shame it didn't.

IDriveASaabAndNobodyIsToBlame > SteveLehto 01/23/2015 at 01:23

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This is just....COOL. i'd like to have a huge poster of this on my garage wall.