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Five cursed and haunted cars

Any kid lucky enough to grow up in Detroit is familiar with the Henry Ford Museum. It's huge, full of shiny things and a great place to take a child and let them burn off some energy. After several field trips and weekend outings however, the dusty concept vehicles and famous aircraft tend to lose their punch for youngsters. As a fifth grader, I was already gazing on the museum's many gems with glassy eyes. On yet another school trip, we made our way to John F. Kennedy's death car, a gleaming black Lincoln limo. The aging volunteer docent told our little group something I had never heard before. "You know, this car is haunted. Several employees have reported seeing a gray presence right here," he said, pointing to the back passenger side seat. I perked up. Now here was something I had never heard before. A haunted car? Sure, it happened in Goosebumps, but this was real life. It made sense, in a way. Cars can be violent, emotional places. That's certainly the case with JFK's limo, as well as the other four cars on this list. And maybe those gut-wrenching deaths can permanently doom a car. 5. Archduke Franz Ferdinand's Graf & Stift Death Limo World War I tends to be a forgotten war, despite being pretty terrible in its own right and setting the stage for the entire 20th Century. The French forces, for instance, lost more lives in the first month of WWI than the US did in the entire Civil War. Everyone who has been through a freshman world history course knows the conflict started when Archduke Franz Ferdinand and his wife were shot by a Bosnian anarchist. The crazy thing is, Ferdinand had already avoided an attempt on his life that day, and was actually on his way to the hospital to comfort those who had been injured in the crossfire. One of the would-be assassins simply walked out of a cafe and saw his intended target sitting in front of him where the open-air limo had stalled. The archduke and his wife were shot through their heads and throats. Their deaths would not be the last caused by the limo. Throughout the war and into the 1920s, the limo was owned by fifteen different people and involved in six accidents and thirteen deaths, not counting the 17 million or so killed in the war triggered by the Archduke's assassination. The first person to own the car after the Archduke was an Austrian general named Potiorek, who went insane while riding in the car through Vienna.

Porsche 911 R is made for the purist

Who wouldn't welcome a new version of the Porsche 911 with ultra-light weight, a GT3 RS motor, a stripper interior, and a core philosophy of driving fun over outright lap times? The iconic Porsche 911 has been getting larger and more complicated with each passing generation, and that hasn't sat well with every engineer at Porsche. So there's a ready market out there for 911 R, a limited-edition show stopper of just 911 cars, due to start production in Zuffenhausen, Germany, in May. It's a car that combines a unique version of the six-speed manual gearbox, plenty of raw, naturally aspirated flat-six power, and all the feel of a cut-price version of the 911 GT3 RS pseudo racer. Yes, Porsche is bringing the beloved six-speed stick back to the sharp end of the 911, even though the brand's quickest cars are now dominated by the seven-speed dual-clutch transmission (and the less loved seven-speed manual). Porsche insists that the RS is still the 911 to have if it's stopwatch-bashing you need to do. Instead, the 911 R developers focused on trying to give it the most driving purity it could cram in. The most traditional way for motorsport operations to do that has always been to rip out weight. And Porsche Motorsport didn't diverge from the plan. The 911's rear seats have been thrown out, along with a raft of other pieces Porsche Motorsport thought it could either do without completely, redesign to be lighter or stronger, or both. View 18 Photos The R cuts 110 pounds from the next-lightest 911 variant, hitting 3,020 pounds on the scales. The pound-cutting starts at the body and bores all the way into the 911 R's chassis components, though there are some obvious nods to the marketing department that survived the dietician's axe. There is a lot of 911 GT3 in the body, with a combination of a carbon fiber (bonnet and front guards), a magnesium roof, polycarbonate front and side "glass," and aluminum everywhere else. The R cuts 110 pounds from the next-lightest 911 variant, hitting 3,020 pounds on the scales. While the 911 R has lurid (and deletable) red or green racing stripes as standard, it's not supposed to be as wild looking as the GT3. Porsche replaced the GT3's adjustable, tall-standing rear spoiler with a more-subtle pop-up version, and the R uses a rear diffuser under the bumper to offset any loss of rear downforce. The rear seats are gone, and the two remaining seats use carbon fiber shells upholstered in tartan cloth (another nod to early 911s).

Watch the trailer for Amazon's 24 Hours of Le Mans documentary

Amazon's video streaming service is taking a cue from Netflix and filling its library with new, high-quality original content. This is great news for car enthusiasts, as the company seems interested in tailoring to our diverse tastes. After the successful debut of The Grand Tour, Amazon announced a new documentary based on an annual race in France. Le Mans: Racing is Everything is set to debut later this year. The first action-packed teaser just debuted. The limited series will explore the race's roots and what makes it such a grueling but rewarding place for teams and drivers and such an awesome spectacle for fans. New Black Films, the production company behind the series, embedded itself with the Porsche, Audi, Nissan, Toyota, Aston Martin and Rebellion teams, interviewing drivers like Mark Webber and Andre Lotterer. The series is set to debut on Friday, June 9, plenty of time to catch up before the 24 Hours of Le Mans later next month. Keep an eye and ear out for another Amazon project, a yet-to-be-named series on Formula 1. Related Video: News Source: Amazon, YouTube via The Verge Motorsports TV/Movies Audi Porsche Toyota Amazon le mans 24 hours