The General Motors Firebird comprises a quartet of prototype cars that General Motors (GM) engineered for the 1953, 1956, and 1959 Motorama auto shows. The cars' designers, headed by Harley Earl, took Earl's inspiration from the innovations in fighter aircraft design at the time. General Motors never intended the cars for production, but rather to showcase the extremes in technology and design that the company was able to achieve.
GM preserved the prototype cars at the GM Heritage Center in Sterling Heights, Michigan. Models of the cars are in the permanent collection of the Henry Ford Museum in Dearborn, and the cars still make regular appearances at car shows.
The tradition of offering prototype vehicles continued with the Pontiac Banshee series. From 1967 to 2002, the Pontiac division of GM marketed its Firebird line of pony cars, which had no direct relation to these series of Firebird concept cars.