Carroll Shelby came up with the name Cobra during a dream, and in 1962 he founded Shelby American in California to build it. The coiled snake on the badge has been striking at rivals ever since.
- Country
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United States - Active
- Since 1962
- Founded by
- Carroll Shelby
- Website
- Official website ↗
A name that came in a dream
Most car names are argued over in meeting rooms. This one arrived while its creator was asleep. According to Shelby American’s own history, Carroll Shelby came up with the name for his car, the Cobra, during a dream. Everything else about the brand, from the badge to the company, grew out of that one word.
Carroll Hall Shelby was born in 1923 in Leesburg, East Texas. He served in the Army Air Corps from 1942 until the end of the war, won his first race in 1952 in an MG-TC, and in 1954 was invited to join the Aston Martin factory team. In 1959 he won the 24 Hours of Le Mans at the wheel of an Aston Martin. A year later a heart condition forced him to stop racing.
He didn’t stay idle for long. Britannica records that in 1961 he persuaded AC Cars in England to keep building its Ace chassis so he could fit it with a Ford V8. In 1962 he created Shelby American, a new company set up in California to build that car. The Cobra, with the Ford 260 and later the 289 cubic inch engine, was given prime placement in Ford’s exhibit at the 1962 New York Auto Show.
From a round badge to a snake ready to strike
Shelby American’s first employee was a young designer named Peter Brock, and the Motorsports Hall of Fame of America credits him with redesigning what it calls the tacky Cobra emblem that Shelby had chosen. Brock’s own recollection, quoted in Rinsey Mills’ authorised biography of Shelby, is that the brief was blunt: Shelby wanted a snake on it and he wanted it to say Cobra. The result was a round badge with a snake and the word Cobra, sized to fit the same mounting holes as the AC badge it replaced. Brock went on to draw the body of the Cobra Coupe, which became the Daytona Coupe.
The snake most people know today is a later drawing. Designer John Chun, hired by Shelby American in the late 1960s, worked on the 1968 and 1969 GT350 and GT500 and felt the original snake wasn’t quite mean enough. According to his 2013 obituary, he redrew it as a coiled snake readying to strike, and that is the form still in use.
What the coiled cobra stands for
The Shelby emblem is a cobra, coiled and rearing up with its hood spread. Shelby American has never published a symbolic explanation of it, and it doesn’t need one: the snake is simply the Cobra, the car that started the company, drawn to look as dangerous as the car felt. It appears alone on grilles, wheels and fuel caps, inside a circle or next to the Shelby name, and Ford’s own parts catalogue lists the chrome “Cobra” snake fender emblems as original equipment on the 2007 to 2014 Shelby GT500.
Shelby’s names are guarded as closely as the snake. SHELBY, GT350, GT500, SUPER SNAKE and SHELBY AMERICAN are all registered trademarks of Carroll Shelby and Carroll Shelby Licensing. Shelby American itself has been based just off the Las Vegas strip since late 2013, where the Shelby Heritage Center keeps the story on display.
The cars that earned the snake
Shelby’s badge has sat on British roadsters, Ford Mustangs, Dodge hatchbacks and a pickup truck. The thread running through them is a big engine in a car that wasn’t expecting one.
Landmark Shelbys, decade by decade
- 1962: Cobra. An AC Ace chassis with a Ford V8, first the 260 and later the 289. Britannica dates the roadster’s production to 1962 to 1967.
- 1965: Cobra Daytona Coupe. On 4 July 1965 the Cobra, in roadster and coupe form, won the World Manufacturers’ GT Championship.
- 1965: Shelby GT350. Shelby American’s take on the Ford Mustang, built from 1965 to 1970. It won the 1965 SCCA B Production National Championship.
- 1967: Shelby GT500. Added in 1967 with a 428 cubic inch engine and built until 1970. Ford took over production of the Shelby Mustangs in 1968.
- 1983: Dodge Shelby Charger. The first product of Shelby’s collaboration with Chrysler’s Dodge division, which later brought limited production models in house at Shelby Automobiles in Whittier, California, in 1986.
- 1989: Shelby CSX. According to Shelby American, the first American production car to use a variable nozzle turbocharger.
- 2007: Ford Shelby GT500. The supercharged Mustang that marked the full return of the Shelby and Ford partnership, revived in 2005 around the retro-styled new Mustang.
Between the Ford eras, Shelby spent the 1980s with Dodge and Chrysler, where Lee Iacocca had recruited him to sharpen cars such as the Omni, Charger, Lancer and Shadow, and Britannica notes that he later contributed to the Dodge Viper. In 1971 he had also set up the Shelby Wheel Company in Gardena, California, and in 1967 he helped found what his company calls the world’s first championship chili cook off. For more hand-drawn badges from the same era, see our guide to classic car logos.
Frequently asked questions
What does the Shelby logo mean?
The logo is a coiled cobra, and it refers directly to the Cobra, the Ford-powered AC roadster that Carroll Shelby built from 1962. Shelby American says he came up with the Cobra name during a dream. No further symbolism has been published by the company.
Who designed the Shelby cobra emblem?
Two people, in two steps. Peter Brock, Shelby American’s first employee, redesigned the original Cobra badge in the early 1960s. John Chun, hired in the late 1960s, redrew the snake as a coiled cobra ready to strike, which is the version still used.
When was Shelby American founded?
In 1962, when Carroll Shelby set up the company in California to build the Cobra. Since late 2013 it has been headquartered just off the Las Vegas strip in Nevada.
Is Shelby part of Ford?
No. Shelby American is a separate company, and the Shelby trademarks belong to Carroll Shelby and Carroll Shelby Licensing. Ford and Shelby are long-time partners, which is how the Ford Shelby GT500 came about, but in the 1980s Shelby worked with Dodge and Chrysler instead.
Who was Carroll Shelby?
A Texan racing driver born in 1923 who won the 24 Hours of Le Mans in 1959 for Aston Martin, retired because of a heart condition in 1960 and then became a carmaker. He died in May 2012.
From Leesburg to Las Vegas: the snake sheet
- Founded
- 1962
- Founder
- Carroll Shelby
- Country
- United States
- Headquarters
- Las Vegas, Nevada, USA
- Current emblem
- A coiled cobra rearing up with its hood spread, redrawn in the late 1960s by John Chun from Peter Brock's round Cobra badge
- Known for
- The Cobra roadster and Shelby Mustangs
- Website
- Official website ↗
