And it was, no doubt in some part because he did. I expect his reputation today would be rather different if, despite his efforts, he’d not been able to hold back the dark forces that had swept across Europe. History is written by the victors. If you don’t believe me, think back to your history lessons at school and remember how many battles you learned about that the ‘goodies’ actually lost. Not many, I’ll wager.

So it is with cars. Those we most readily remember tend to be the most successful, not necessarily the most significant. Often they are cars that learned from the mistakes of the true pioneers, and used that experience to secure their place in history, while the real originals were overshadowed, some almost entirely lost in the mists of time. So here are 10 examples as my attempt to redress the balance just a little: