Honda Gives History Lesson With Civic Heritage Video

There’s no marketing ploy more useful for otherwise boring cars than reminding people there’s breeding involved, and that the formula was refined over decades. That has absolutely nothing to do with the fact that, in celebration of Honda’s 39th anniversary of the popular compact, the Japanese automaker has put together a video titled “Heritage”, where we take a short look at how the car has evolved over the years and how it has impacted people’s lives.

Using a bit of house music from Dirty Vegas to tie things in with boy-racers, Honda takes us all the way back to the first generation and its round headlights. That was back in the early 70s, and the design has changed in order to stay relevant. The company has something to show for it as well: an impressive 19,000,000 units sold, making the Civic one of the biggest volume cars ever.

The Civic was revealed back in July of 1972 as a two-door car, with a three-door hatchback following it in September. The first generation was designed with a compact 1,169 cc engine to compete with American compact vehicles and offered features such as front power disc brakes and reclining vinyl bucket seats and AM radio. The design was refined over the years and we are currently seeing the ninth generation model.

Both coupe and sedan concept versions of the new car were show in January at the 2011 NAIAS, though they were almost ready for production by then. Factory-built versions were revealed in April, sporting gasoline, hybrid and natural gas variants to impress the eco crowd. The gasoline-engined lineup includes a sedan, coupe and two Si performance versions to suit people who like to race their Hondas.