The end of a real Volk hero

There can hardly be a family in Ireland that, at one stage or another, did not count a Volkswagon Beetle among its members.

It was the right car in the right place at the right time — its robust, almost Calvinist utilitarianism was a perfect match for workers enjoying the early benefits of an economy in the first stages of modernisation.

The car had almost universal appeal; parish priests were fond of black Beetles, while sheep farmers and hippies — often more similar than might be immediately apparent — relied on them.

Many of today’s grandparents may have driven one to the Carnsore Point anti-nuclear festival 40 years ago. Their grandchildren, however, may have to use a Golf to get to the litter-strewn Electric Picnic.

Volkswagen, reeling from a €25bn fake emissions scandal, will stop making the Beetle next year, bringing seven decades of production to an end.

Created in Hitler’s Germany the car has few equals as a symbol of the 20th century’s unprecedented social and material progress. Created as a car for the “Volk” it became a car for the world.