Video: Chevrolet's version of the news, circa 1935

Back when the world was a kinder, simpler place, carmakers made all kinds of thrilling-at-the-time propaganda promotional reels that we now derive no end of joy from. It was a time when a company could film its 80-horsepower sedan driving over a railroad trestle, like the one in the picture, and not worry about getting sued when someone actually did it and ended up in the Gulf of Mexico.

Chevrolet did one such vid that looked at company developments all around the country, including a bunch of octogenarian workers visiting Baltimore to receive the keys to the city. And In the year's first great display of meta, the video from 1935 then goes on to take an incredulous look at car advertisements from 1898 and 1899. Follow the jump for six minutes of American glory in black-and-white.

[Source: Auto Trader Classic]

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