Citroën: Impossible Adventures, Surprising Successes

One hundred years ago, faced with desert, jungle and unknown territories, André Citroën saw not obstacles but opportunities. The idea was born in 1922: the automobile was now a reality with the recent war finally over and the opportunities of tracked vehicles became known. Why not take advantage of this with precise objectives of publicising the company's mechanical quality and helping to get to know a continent with many resources like Africa? Thus were born what was christened the ‘Great Cruises’: The effect is astonishing: the Kégresse rubber half-track system allows the curious half-tracked vehicles to climb up and down sand dunes where camels trudge. The first experience goes from Touggourt to Timbuctù without any real problems. Thus the car, even if in a modified version to cope with the desert, becomes an instrument of daring discovery and no longer just a means of transport.