The Chevrolet Corvette rolled out of Flint, Michigan in 1953 and has never stopped—eight generations, no domestic rivals left standing. It nearly didn't happen. Fiberglass over a 3.9-liter straight-six, two-speed automatic, Chevrolet's answer to the lean British roadsters of the postwar years—it debuted at GM's Motorama in the Waldorf-Astoria and promptly sold almost none of its 300 hand-assembled units. A quiet beginning for what would become America's sports car.