Dear Reader,

The Ferris wheel in the Vienna Prater amusement park reached this point in 2017; it will be the turn of car production at Opel in 2019: This year, 2018, ATZ is celebrating its 120th anniversary, which makes it the oldest specialist automotive engineering magazine in the world. It began in 1898 as “Der Motorwagen” and over the years has reported on all the latest developments in vehicle and engine technology. The founders of the magazine were leading engineers from Germany, other European countries, and the USA. They included Carl Benz, Gottlieb Daimler, Rudolf Diesel, Friedrich Lutzmann, Emil Rathenau, Edmund Rumpler, Emil Škoda, Ferdinand Graf von Zeppelin, and Julius Springer, who established our publishing company in 1842. Since 1939, when our sister magazine MTZ Motortechnische Zeitschrift was first published, ATZ has focused exclusively on complete vehicles.

A number of important technological developments took place in 1898. Ferdinand Braun invented the crystal diode rectifier. Pierre and Marie Curie discovered radium and William Ramsay discovered the noble gas xenon. The Brazilian inventor and pioneer in the field of engine-powered flight Alberto Santos-Dumont flew the first airship with a gasoline engine and Ferdinand Graf von Zeppelin applied for a patent for his rigid airship. In 1898 Renault, Goodyear, and RWE, the German electricity company, were founded. It was also the year in which the Daimler Phönix was launched. This was the first car with a four-cylinder engine and was fitted with the low-voltage magneto ignition system invented just over a year before by Robert Bosch.

Over the decades we have reported on many technological developments in ATZ. We hope that you enjoy reading both the past and present issues of ATZ in our anniversary year.

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P.S.: A little something to look forward to for all ATZ subscribers: For our anniversary we are producing an exclusive reprint of the first issue of “Der Motorwagen” from 1898 and including it with our February issue.