Inventor of subtle car feature that has helped millions of drivers around the world dies aged 80
The simple idea was thought up by former Ford employee James Moylan in the late 1980s, solving an inconvenience that drivers had to deal with for more than a century.
The inventor of the arrow on a car's dashboard which indicates which side of the vehicle the fuel filler is located on has died at the age of 80.
James Moylan came up with the inventive solution in the late 1980s and has made life easier for millions of drivers ever since.
Moylan died on December 11 at Henry Ford Hospital in Detroit. The exact circumstances of his death were not made public.
According to Moylan's obituary he, 'would have said his greatest career accomplishment was the friendships he built with many colleagues along the way,' rather than the little arrow he came up with.
'Dad always chuckled about all the attention the arrow received in later years,' his son, Andrew Moylan, said in an interview with Automotive News.
It is hard to imagine a world without the eponymous Moylan arrow, yet prior to 1989, drivers had to memorize or guess the location of the gas caps in their cars.
Moylan came up with his simple but revolutionary idea on a rainy April day in 1986. He had taken a Ford employee fleet car to drive to a meeting, and when he stopped for gas, he parked with the wrong side of the car facing the pump.
He only realized his mistake after leaving the car and getting soaked, which led him to think of an indicator that would have prevented him from making the mistake in the first place.
James Moylan, inventor of the little arrow on a car's dashboard that shows which side of the vehicle the fuel filler is on, died at the age of 80 earlier this month
It is hard to imagine a world without the Moylan arrow, yet prior to 1989, drivers had to memorize or guess the location of the fuel fillers in their cars
As a Ford employee, he was in a position to recommend the feature to his superiors, so he drafted a 'product convenience suggestion' proposal the same day.
Moylan included a sketch of what the indicator could look like, drawing an open fuel door rather than an arrow and sent it to his boss.
In the proposal, he wrote: 'Even if all Ford product lines eventually locate on the same side, for the minor investment involved on the company's part, I think it would be a worthwhile convenience not only for two car families, but also pool car users and especially car rental customers.'
Seven months later, Moylan received a response from then-Director of Interior Design, R F Zokas, that said an arrow would be added to the dashboards of the company's 1989 model year cars that were being developed.
As promised, the 1989 Ford Escort and Mercury Tracer featured the fuel filler indicator. The Ford Thunderbird and Mercury Cougar closely followed.
The arrow was a hit, and over the next few decades it would become a fixture of nearly every car that has come off production lines across companies and countries around the world.