Continuing our Ridler Award Winners Through The Ages, we are now at 1967. This one particular was such a knock-out of the park home run that it is arguably the most popular custom truck of all time. The Dodge Deora quickly became the icon of the customization and concept world.

The Alexander Brothers used a 1960 Ford station wagon rear lift glass as a basis for the front of the Dodge Deora.

Originally designed by Harry Bradley, a California-based artist and designer, the Deora was hand built by the already popular Alexander Brothers. Mike and Larry asked Bradley to design something based on a Detroit built cab-over pick-up, starting with the fresh Dodge A100 and having the then new Ford cab-over as an if-needed back-up. Dodge took one look at the hand drawn rendering by Bradley and sent a stripped down A100 to the Alexanders.

The intention of the build was to ditch the awkward cab in favor of something one-piece without any cut lines. The design eliminated the doors and chopped the roof drastically. Over the span of two years, Mike and Larry cut and shaped the sheetmetal to conform to Bradley’s artwork. Since the doors were deleted, Bradley proposed a front opening hatch to get in and out. A lift up rear window from a 1960 Ford station wagon was used as a base and a funky pivoting panel was built. Since the engine of the A100 was basically inside the cab, tons of modifications were possible on the front end.

The interior of the Dodge Deora was most certainly not stock. The Alexander Brothers had their way with it.

That’s not the best part though. What made this truck so famous was that its design was used for some of the very first Hot Wheels by Matel. In an interview with Jonnie King in his “Legends of the Rod and Custom” show, Mike Alexander said “Hot wheels didn’t exist when we got a letter from Matel.” They explained to him that they wanted to use it for this new toy line. That was also followed up by a Model by AMT. Kids around the world had a piece of Custom history, all thanks to the Alexander Brothers.

We’ll be back next week with the 1968 Ridler Award Winner Chuck Miller and his hand built “Fire Truck”. For more info on the Ridler Award and the Detroit Autorama, head over to www.autorama.com.