Andrew Roberts The finest flashy-tailed Brits : I n February 1948, the Cadillac Series 62 Coupe became the first American car with tailfins, inspired by the Lockheed P38 Lightning aircraft. A decade later, they reached such baroque heights on US cars that their next logical evolutionary stage was their demise. Meanwhile, on the other side of the Atlantic, various models copied the design trope with equally varying degrees of success.