The “Eichmann as used streetcar salesman” story is more entertaining than the “Hitler lives” story that started this thread. At least it’s different. What’s your real beef with GM, anyway? And skip the sci-fi about Eichmann selling trolleys in Indianapolis.
It was considered quite an intelligence coup.
GM, though, had some folks on its board of directors (and probably in some of the more esoteric divisions in the operating company) who took competition with rail quite seriously.
I've never heard anyone tell me Hitler went to Indianapolis, but I really did know people who were familiar with the Adolph Eichmann tale of selling the trolley system to Argentina. Their parents were among those the OSS brought to town so if anyone knew, they'd know.
In the mid 1950s we had a young Hungarian lad who was placed with a family of German WWII immigrants with the requisite SS and OSS relationships ~ went to highschool with him. Actually, he rode with me 3 years! He had some interesting tales ~ and again, the high ranking Nazis involved in selling the trolley story.
I didn't invent this one ~ but I sure never forgot it.
Was it an OSS/SS joke? Is there anything to it beyond the koinkydinks? No one really knows but I think it would make a whale of a great adventure movie ~ midnight rides through town on clattering trolley cars, electrocutions as bad guys grabbed the power bar, jack turners, mysterious Hungarian mathematicians and Latvian musclemen driving fast Studebakers and slow 38 Ford flathead tractors through city streets all over the Midwest ~ they sabotage rail cars, they disrupt power lines ~ blow up silos and burn down outhouses!
You can hang anything you want on this one but don't forget to include David Sarnoff, Zarkes Tarzian, Claire Chennault, and the very model for the Dragon Lady in Terry and the Pirates, Madame Chennault!.