Business

Ferruccio Lamborghini

Built tractors from war surplus; by his account, a brush-off from Enzo Ferrari pushed him into sports cars.

Born: 1916 · Renazzo, Emilia-Romagna, Italy
Roots: Italian; grape-farming family
Family: Working class; Viticulturist parents; he preferred the farm machinery to the vines.
Education: Technical institute near Bologna; air-force mechanic in the war
Started with: Surplus engines; Assembled his first tractors after the war from leftover military hardware.
Affiliations & societies: None documented.; Information only — claims like these are often unverifiable and may be wrong.

The pathway

1940 · age 24
Air-force mechanic
Keeps vehicles running on Rhodes with improvised parts — the training that matters.
1948 · age 32
Lamborghini Trattori
Tractors from surplus engines; postwar Italy buys everything he can build.
1962 · age 46
The Ferrari complaint
By his telling, he diagnosed a bad clutch in his own Ferrari and was told to stick to tractors.
1963 · age 47
Automobili Lamborghini
Founds the car company in Sant'Agata, poaching engineers from Ferrari's orbit.
1966 · age 50
Miura
The mid-engine layout that defines the modern supercar.
1974 · age 58
Sells out
Tractor-business setbacks force the sale of his stakes; he retires to a vineyard.

Sources

Compiled from these references and contemporaneous press reporting. Figures are approximate; verify before relying on them.