Ed Roth Pontiac Power Jacket

Ed 'Big Daddy' Roth(March 4, 1932– April 4, 2001) was an American artist, cartoonist, illustrator, pinstriper, and custom car designer and builder who created the hot rod icon Rat Finkand other characters. Roth was a key figure inSouthern California'sKustom Kultureand hot rod movement of the late 1950s and 1960s.

Roth is best known for his grotesque caricatures— typified byRat Fink— depicting imaginary, out-sized monsters driving representations of the hot rods that he and his contemporaries built. Roth began airbrushing and selling 'Weirdo' T-shirts at car shows and in the pages ofCar Craftmagazine as early as July 1958. By the August 1959 issue ofCar Craft'Weirdo shirts' had become a full-blown craze with Roth at the forefront of the movement.