Where's My Aerocar?

You call this the future?? HA! Where are the rocket packs? Where are the disintegration rays? Where are the flying cars? - Calvin and Hobbes, Dec 30, 1989

When I was a kid I imagined a future with flying cars. Didn't everyone? Many prototypes have been built since the first years of the twentieth century but none have reached production. Read this post from Retronaut to see some of the wackier airplane/car innovations.

1890
The "Au Bon Marche" company issued comical futuristic ad cards
like this one from about 1890 in Paris, France.
IMAGE: TRANSCENDENTAL GRAPHICS/GETTY IMAGES

Nov. 1947
A ConVairCar Model 118 flying car during a test flight.
The hybrid vehicle was designed by Theodore P. Hall for the Consolidated Vultee
Aircraft Company of San Diego, California, but never went into production.
A test pilot had to make a crash landing after the vehicle unexpectedly ran out
of fuel — he'd been reading from the car's fuel gauge, not the plane's.
IMAGE: FPG/HULTON ARCHIVE/GETTY IMAGES

1947
The wreckage of a crashed Convair Model 118.
It made a forced landing in National City, California.
IMAGE: SAN DIEGO AIR & SPACE MUSEUM ARCHIVE

Those who dream of driving through the skies may find that their dream is about to become true: Toyota is developing a flying car that they hope to have ready in time to deliver the Olympic torch along its final stretch to open the 2020 Olympic Games in Tokyo.