From the Cadillac to the Apple Mac, the skyscraper to the Tiffany lampshade, the world we live in has been profoundly influenced by the work of American designers. Below is an extract from Design in the USA by Jeffrey L. Meikle, part of the Oxford History of Art series, which discusses automobile design and the marketing strategies by Ford and General Motors in the 1920s. The automobile was the most significant technology of the twentieth century, transforming the way almost all people