The legendary Rebel Without a Cause actor died aged 24, at the peak of his career. On 30th September 1955, James Dean met his fate in a fatal 85mph pile-up on Route 46 in California.
Despite his Porsche 550 Spyder supercar being a write-off, its remains have been involved in various macabre exhibitions and incidents over the years.
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There were even rumours of a curse after salvaged parts from the 1955 racing car were used on other vehicles which crashed, causing the death of another driver.
As the 70th anniversary of Dean’s death approaches in 2025, the strange mystique of his silver Spyder is reaching fever pitch.
Why is James Dean so famous?
Born in February 1931 in the city of Marion, Dean shot to fame during his five-year career in roles that typified an era of teenagers disillusioned with life.
In the 1950s, the press wrote a lot about “juvenile delinquency”, which was linked to gangs and the birth of rock and roll. In America, the authorities became obsessed with moulding “ideal” teenage citizens.
After graduating in 1949, Dean majored in drama at the University of California, dropping out in 1951 to pursue acting full-time. Initially, he won small roles in TV series, commercials and films. His big break came in 1953, when he starred as Cal Trask, a troubled young man, in the film, East of Eden, based on John Steinbeck’s 1952 novel. Director Elia Kazan said he wanted a brooding “Brando-type” to play Trask, so 21-year-old Dean was the ideal choice.
The film rocketed him to stardom, and he gained a following of young fans, who adored his anti-hero image as an antidote to the clean-cut teens society demanded.
James Dean Porsche 550 Spyder
Dean’s next role-playing rebellious teen Jim Stark in the 1955 film Rebel Without a Cause firmly cemented his place as a young icon. The script was lauded as an accurate portrayal of teenage angst, with Stark, a suburban, emotionally confused, middle-class youth being arrested for being drunk in public. Tragedy ensues when one of his friends is killed in a car crash during a dangerous “chicken run” game in stolen cars. The film was a huge box office hit, raking in £3.4 million.
While the characters Dean played lived a fast and dangerous lifestyle, the actor’s real-life obsession with racing cars led to his second career in motorsports. He had started filming Giant, an epic western, when he bought a new Porsche 550 Spyder on 23rd September 1955, trading in his existing Porsche Speedster car. The Spyder was likened to a “rocket ship”, with a top speed of 211mph. Dean decided to take part in the gruelling Salinas Road Race meeting in October 1955.
Lee Raskin, author of James Dean on the Road to Salinas, described the actor as a “bit of a daredevil”, who “wasn’t afraid of anything”. However, he said Dean wasn’t a great driver, as he was “all accelerator, no brakes.”
Dean had the Spyder custom-painted with his racing number “130” on the bonnet and doors before embarking on the 300-mile drive to Salinas with mechanic Rolf Wütherich, on 30th September 1955. Deciding it was better to drive there to get a feel for his new car, rather than having it transported on a trailer, was a decision that cost Dean his life.
How did James Dean die?
Early in the trip, Dean received a speeding penalty from a California highway patrol officer for driving at 120mph. Less than one hour later, he was travelling at around 85mph along Route 46 when his car collided with a Ford Tudor as it turned off to join Route 41.
Driven by California Polytechnic State University student Donald Turnupseed, the Ford was shunted 40ft down the road on impact, but the driver walked away with minor injuries. Wütherich was thrown out of the Spyder’s passenger seat, surviving the crash with serious injuries, but tragically, Dean was pronounced dead at Paso Robles War Memorial Hospital at 6.20pm.
James Dean car accident aftermath
In the 1950s, there wasn't as much emphasis on car safety as there is today, although Porsche did introduce improvements on its 911 Targa in the 1960s in response to more stringent safety requirements. Today, it’s possible to retrofit Porsche technology, such as reverse cameras, into older models to improve driver safety.
Dean's wrecked Spyder was an insurance write-off, mangled beyond recognition and ending up at a breaker’s yard in Burbank, where it was bought by Dr William Eschrich and stripped for parts. He installed the engine in his own Lotus IX racing car and the suspension and transmission components in his friend Troy McHenry’s car.
Both drivers entered the Pomona sports car race in California in 1956, when Eschrich survived a serious crash in his Lotus. McHenry wasn’t as fortunate, as he suffered a fatal accident in the same race. This was the birth of the “cursed” Porsche Spyder rumour.
George Barris, known as the King of Kustoms, bought what was left of the Spyder and pledged to rebuild it. However, on finding it was beyond salvaging, he capitalised on its notoriety instead. Loaning the wreck to the National Safety Council of Los Angeles between 1957 and 1959, he turned it into a gruesome touring exhibit at car shows, with a placard saying, “James Dean’s Last Sports Car” reminding motorists not to speed.
On display in Sacramento, the car toppled off its plinth, breaking a bystander’s hip. On another occasion, it fell again, killing George Barkus, a truck driver hired to transport it to the road safety event. Later, it also slipped when being unloaded at Barris’s premises, breaking a mechanic’s legs. These accidents all contributed to the “cursed car” theory.
In 1960, the Spyder somehow vanished from a sealed railway freight wagon travelling between Miami and Los Angeles, although rumour had it Barris had invented the story for publicity. The Spyder’s transaxle mysteriously turned up in a box in rural Massachusetts, nearly 1,500 miles from where the car had vanished, in 1990. It was bought by Jack Styles, of the Paul Russell vehicle restoration shop.
On the 50th anniversary of Dean’s death in 2005, a £775,000 reward was offered for information on the rest of the car’s whereabouts, but no-one came forward. Barris died in 2015, aged 89, maintaining it had simply disappeared for 55 years.
The transaxle was bought for £310,000 by Zak Bagans, owner of the Haunted Museum in Las Vegas, in 2020. Known for collecting macabre memorabilia, he believes the car part is “eternally doomed”.
Today, an estimated 48 Porsche 550 Spyders are still on the road, according to How Rare is My Car. Eighteen are silver, like Dean’s model. The remainder are black or grey. Highly collectible, a silver model sold for a world record £4.6 million in 2016 at Bonhams’ auction in Goodwood.
