CHICAGO — On the 40th anniversary of the “Back to the Future” movie premiere, Illinois-based insurance giant Allstate is traveling back to the past to reveal its little-known role in developing the DeLorean, the futuristic but short-lived, gull-winged, stainless steel car that served as Doc Brown’s time machine.
Without Allstate, Marty McFly might never have left 1985 or perhaps he would have traveled back in time in a Buick, forever disrupting the space-time continuum of the seminal movie trilogy.
“The cars exist because of the partnership Allstate had with DeLorean,” said Sandee Lindorfer, vice president of auto claims for Allstate.
In the words of Doc Brown, “Great Scott!”
“Back to the Future” hit movie theaters on July 3, 1985. A customized 1981 DeLorean DMC-12, which took audiences on joyrides to 1955, 1885 and 2015 over the course of three films, was already relegated to the junkyard of automotive history by the time the movie premiered.
In the mid-1970s, Allstate worked with John DeLorean, an automobile executive and engineer, who left GM to launch his own namesake vehicle. The insurance company invested a reported $500,000 in a safety car project, developing prototypes with advanced seatbelt restraints, airbags and improved bumpers.
“We sponsored three prototypes with the DeLorean-Allstate safety car agreement, and we brought one of the prototypes to Congress to show them what could be done around smaller vehicles being more safe and having better fuel economy,” Lindorfer said.
One prototype evolved into the sleek DeLorean DMC-12, which went into limited but ill-timed production at a Northern Ireland factory during a recession in 1981, generating buzz but few sales.
By 1982, the debt-ridden company was in bankruptcy and its founder in legal trouble, facing indictments on separate drug and fraud charges. John DeLorean was ultimately acquitted on both counts, but his car was seemingly no more than a flash in the pan.
Three years later, the DeLorean was reborn as Doc Brown’s time machine, and the rest is cinematic history.
Initially, the time machine was envisioned as a refrigerator-like chamber that Doc Brown carried on the back of his truck. Then director Robert Zemeckis had the inspiration that the time machine should be mobile, and specifically chose the DeLorean for its futuristic design.
“The way I see it, if you’re going to build a time machine into a car, why not do it with some style?” Doc Brown, played by Christopher Lloyd, explains in the movie.
In the annals of “Back to the Future” lore, a lot of similar nuggets have emerged since the film trilogy premiered.
For example, the 1989 second installment predicted the Cubs would finally end their century-long World Series drought with a 2015 win over the fictional Miami Gators. The Cubs actually broke through in 2016, beating the Cleveland Indians, but the movie was pretty close.
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Also, the role of Marty McFly was initially given to Eric Stoltz, who participated in over a month of filming before he was replaced by Michael J. Fox, the more comedically gifted “Family Ties” star.
But Allstate’s role in developing the car that begot the time machine and an enduring movie star remained buried in a dusty folder in the back of a corporate cabinet for decades. In 2019, an Allstate archivist found the mysterious DeLorean file and began exploring the mostly forgotten connection.
Six years later, on the 40th anniversary of “Back to the Future,” Allstate is finally ready to take a modest bow.
On Tuesday, Allstate rented a pair of vintage DeLoreans to celebrate the movie, the car and the unlikely part the insurance company played in both. Tucked away in the back of an underground garage at Allstate’s downsized Northbrook/Glenview headquarters near Chicago, across the street from its former sprawling corporate campus, the vehicles were briefly on display for the media and a handful of executives.
The cars, which included a stock 1981 DeLorean and a tricked-out version replicating the “Back to the Future” time machine, were rented from an Orland Park company — DeLorean USA Rental — that leases the vehicles for parties and events.
“You can’t drive it because the insurer doesn’t allow it,” said Tom Sedor, who owns the cars and the rental company.
The time machine, which includes a flux capacitor and a Mr. Fusion nuclear reactor in the back — replete with banana peel as fuel — is fully drivable, and the garage and adjacent parking lot offered enough room to get it up to the 88 mph threshold required to go back to the future.
But Sedor, 57, who customized the movie mockup with a 3D printer and assorted parts from Menards and RockAuto, said the replica has yet to successfully make the time jump.
“Nothing happened, no sparks,” said Sedor. “Everything drove normally. Actually, it’s very, very impressive to drive.”
