Category Archives: Site Info / News

DeLurking Cadillac Fans

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I popped over to the post office to mail off a free CaddyInfo.com Hat and a few site postcards & magnet to one of our new CaddyInfo Forum Community Members, CarlaValentine.

CarlaValentine

Carla was the first recipient of our new CaddyInfo New Member Who’s Doing it Right Award.

On Forums the majority of our audience — Cadillac fans who came to the site to read about Cadillac Automobiles — never register or log in to the site.  They ‘Lurk’ as Guests, read the site, but don’t comment or post.  This is not unique at the CaddyInfo Community.  At most forums in the membership listing you can observe 70-80% guests and 20% registered users online.

Guests are always welcome at CaddyInfo of course, but the strength of our Cadillac Community is the shared knowledge and experience of all of our participants.  So the more people who come into the light of Registered Member and out of the darkness of Lurking, the better our conversation is.

One of the points to having the “New Member Who’s Doing it Right” Award is to recognize Carla’s participation.

Caddyinfo.com New Member Who’s Doing It Right is a new concept intended to recognize relatively new arrivals to our CaddyInfo Cadillac Community who are fitting right in, participating, posting new threads or ongoing posts to topics. Carla also filled in her profile correctly, with Avatar image, car details, personal photo, and personal info that help members understand her questions or comments in context.

The award also helps to communicate to new Readers (or experienced Lurkers) that Caddyinfo is a new-participant friendly environment.    Pretty much the only things to avoid are open, hostile attitude toward Cadillac Automobiles (them’s fightin’ words), and advertising without a relationship with the Caddyinfo Forum (PM me on the Forum about advertising).  Otherwise I find that our Membership is very tolerant of almost any style of discussion about Cadillac automobiles.

My Lovely Wife suggested that we have a De-Lurker Award — as a way to recognize people who have Registered and begun to participate.  That might be slightly different from our Doing it Right award.   Do you have any other suggestions on how to encourage Cadillac owners to participate at CaddyInfo?

CaddyInfo Site redesign (pardon the dust)

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I reached out to an expert I respect and asked for some input or coaching on how to improve CaddyInfo.

His first response was a question:  “Are you sure you want a frank response?”

I could tell that the news was not good, but certainly I wanted to have his input on what to change to improve.  (And I filed away in my head this was a good way to start an intervention).

Caddyinfo has developed over the last (almost) 12 years from a single html page to multiple pages with a forum to a forum and blog and gallery and content system and website pages.   I have done a couple of makeovers and redesigns along the way, but each time coherency of vision and appearance has been more complex.  As I try different content management systems, different forums, different website approaches, the result has unfortunately been a patchwork of ideas executed with varying success.

So the bottom line on the new input was: Start over with a new design from top to bottom.  Add color.  Get a new professional logo.  Get a professional design.

Immediately I ditched our logo across the 3 main sites — blog, website, forum — and went with a cleaner look.   I also changed to the current theme here on the blog.  Meanwhile I have posted to solicit Designer inputs for a new Caddyinfo Logo, and I have contracted with a Skin design house to redesign the Caddyinfo Forum.   We have also recently moved the forum to a new faster server.

My goal is to get an overall clean, colorful, eye-catching look on a responsive, inviting site and bring more Cadillac readers to Caddyinfo to stay.

Please bear with me if you see sawdust or hear hammering during our transition.

Please, You’re Tinkering with my Art – Dagmar

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Cadillac automobiles have often featured a lot of chrome.  From early on Cadillac has been a premium American brand, and that meant a lot of chrome to buyers.  The more the better.

Dagmar bumpers, also known simply as Dagmars (D-HAG-mar) is a slang term for the artillery shell shaped styling elements found on the front bumper/grille assemblies on some Cadillacs.  Artistically, the bumpers were probably supposed to suggest a feature from an aircraft.  However, to the Viewer they suggested a popular actress of the day, Virginia Lewis (Dagmar).

Standing 5 feet 11 inches in her heels, Dagmar combined ”the voluptuous curves of a Venus, the provocative grace of a young Mae West and the virtue of a Girl Scout,” Murray Schumach wrote in The New York Times in 1950.

NY Times’ Douglas Martin wrote:

Dagmar’s significance transcended [television,] beating Cher and Madonna to first-name-only status. Her necklines were debated on the floor of the House of Representatives, and when her salary soared from $75 a week to $3,000, the government’s Wage Stabilization Board took public notice.

Wikipedia has this info on Virginia Lewis (Dagmar):

In 1950, when Virginia Lewis was hired by Jerry Lester for NBC’s first late-night show Broadway Open House (1950-52), he renamed her Dagmar. Lester devised the name as a satirical reference to the huge success on television of the TV series Mama (1949-57), in which the younger sister, Dagmar Hansen, was portrayed by Robin Morgan.

As Dagmar, Lewis was instructed to wear a low-cut gown, sit on a stool and play the role of a stereotypical dumb blonde. With tight sweaters displaying her curvy 5′ 8″ figure (measuring 42″-23″-39″), her dim-bulb character was an immediate success, soon attracting much more attention than Lester. Lewis quickly showed that regardless of appearances she was quite bright and quick-witted. She appeared in sketches, and Lester made occasional jokes about her “hidden talents.”

Virginia Lewis’ success as a performer was stated eloquently in an article in Huntington Quarterly magazine (Issue 35) which read:

“The secret of Dagmar’s success was a star quality that transcended sex appeal. Beneath the bust line and the punch line beat the heart of the nicest hometown girl you would ever want to meet. And to a generation of men separated from home — and from mothers, and sisters, and wives and sweethearts — Dagmar was American womanhood in its most appealing outward form. She was the farmer’s daughter and the Pretty Girl come to life. She was nothing less than an icon — a living, breathing example of the pinups painted on the noses of U.S. military aircraft during World War II and Korea.”

Says Milton Berle: “She was extra-talented. She could sing, she could dance, she knew how to throw a line, and she was a good ‘feed,’ like a straight woman. She was a pro.”

Certainly this is one classic Cadillac anthropomorphic detail that should make a return in the modern cars.  Celebrating the beauty of a Woman who found her own voice in early media as a genuinely talented comedic actress would be a good thing.