“Somewhere west of Laramie... and just shy of Olympus Mons, a red roadster dances between planets, chasing the ghost of romance.”
The most famous ad from the Jordan Motor Car Company, “Somewhere West of Laramie” (1923), promoted the Jordan Playboy not as a machine, but as a symbol of freedom, romance, and adventure. Jordan’s legacy lives on not just in vintage car collections, but in the way it redefined automotive advertising—blending emotion, style, and narrative in a way that still resonates.
Elon Musk launched a cherry red Tesla Roadster into space aboard the Falcon Heavy rocket on February 6, 2018—with a mannequin named Starman in the driver’s seat, suited up like a cosmic cowboy. The car entered a heliocentric orbit that crosses Mars’ path, and it’s still out there, silently looping the sun like a surreal billboard for human audacity.
But imagine, instead of the Tesla, a 1923 Jordan Playboy in Crimson Red. Its long hood gleaming, whitewall tires catching starlight, that rakish silhouette slices through the void. The dummy spaceman, call him Red Devil Ned, sits behind the wheel like he’s cruising Route 66 in zero gravity. It’s Ned Jordan whispering across a century:
“Somewhere west of Laramie... we aimed for Mars, and a Playboy was the first to reach the red planet.”
It’s a gesture so grand, so gloriously impractical, that Ned Jordan would’ve toasted it with a grin and a glass of bootleg champagne.
“We’ve built a car for the dreamers, the dancers, the ones who chase sunsets and flirt with the horizon. And now, we’ve sent it to Mars. Because Earth was never enough.”
[Note: As General Patton was fond of saying (quoting Frederick the Great): “L'audace, l'audace, toujours l'audace.” En anglais … “Audacity, audacity, always audacity.”]
“Somewhere west of Laramie... and just shy of Olympus Mons, a red roadster dances between planets, chasing the ghost of romance.”
The most famous ad from the Jordan Motor Car Company, “Somewhere West of Laramie” (1923), promoted the Jordan Playboy not as a machine, but as a symbol of freedom, romance, and adventure. Jordan’s legacy lives on not just in vintage car collections, but in the way it redefined automotive advertising—blending emotion, style, and narrative in a way that still resonates.
Elon Musk launched a cherry red Tesla Roadster into space aboard the Falcon Heavy rocket on February 6, 2018—with a mannequin named Starman in the driver’s seat, suited up like a cosmic cowboy. The car entered a heliocentric orbit that crosses Mars’ path, and it’s still out there, silently looping the sun like a surreal billboard for human audacity.
But imagine, instead of the Tesla, a 1923 Jordan Playboy in Crimson Red. Its long hood gleaming, whitewall tires catching starlight, that rakish silhouette slices through the void. The dummy spaceman, call him Red Devil Ned, sits behind the wheel like he’s cruising Route 66 in zero gravity. It’s Ned Jordan whispering across a century:
“Somewhere west of Laramie... we aimed for Mars, and a Playboy was the first to reach the red planet.”
It’s a gesture so grand, so gloriously impractical, that Ned Jordan would’ve toasted it with a grin and a glass of bootleg champagne.
“We’ve built a car for the dreamers, the dancers, the ones who chase sunsets and flirt with the horizon. And now, we’ve sent it to Mars. Because Earth was never enough.”
[Note: As General Patton was fond of saying (quoting Frederick the Great): “L'audace, l'audace, toujours l'audace.” En anglais … “Audacity, audacity, always audacity.”]