April 28: Ferruccio Lamborghini was born on this date in 1916

The Big Bang of Italian supercars dates to 1962, when Enzo Ferrari met with a disgruntled customer, an Italian tractor magnate who kept burning out clutches in his Ferrari. Many years later, Ferruccio Lamborghini would describe the meeting this way: "Ferrari, your cars are rubbish!' I complained. Il Commendatore was furious. "Lamborghini, you may be able to drive a tractor but you will never be able to handle a Ferrari properly.' This was the point when I finally decided to make a perfect car." Having built his tractor business from scratch, Lamborghini did the same with his sports car business, choosing his zodiac symbol — a snorting bull — as the company's logo. The company met with instant acclaim when it revealed its first model, the 350 GT, in 1963, and under Lamborghini's watch would go on to build the Miura, one of the most beautiful machines ever to grace a road. Financial troubles and the oil crisis forced Lamborghini to sell his entire stake by 1974; he retired to a central Italian estate, where he died in 1993. Lamborghini remained proud of his firm in retirement — demonstrating its products when 60 Minutes came calling in 1979: