Talk:Popemobile

- My reference for the Canadian GMC popemobiles is this CBC news report: http://archives.cbc.ca/IDC-1-69-242-1179/life_society/papal_visit/clip1

Possible origin as joke?

I thought "popemobile" was something the writers of Not Necessarily the News made up. The first time I heard the term, it was during a comedy sketch (something along the lines of "Win a brand-new popemobile!"). This would have been around 1983 or 1984. I personally don't remember hearing the term used again until 20 or so years later, and it was in a mainstream news report! I certainly don't have any resources detailing the etymology of "popemobile" but I have a feeling it started out as a joke on "NNTN." -- Gyrofrog (talk) 05:03, 3 Apr 2005 (UTC)

OED original quote

1979 Irish Times 1 Oct. 10/1 "The Pope drove through the crowds in the specially constructed ‘Popemobile’."

So it clearly predates NNTN, and has a non-comical etymology.

Fiat in the picture but not mentioned in article

The article mentions a number of manufacturers who have built popemobiles but misses out Fiat, whose logo is clearly visible on the popemobile in the picture. I guess that makes it a papal fiat, boom boom.

Official Name??

Is Popemobile really the official name for this vehicle? It may be a common name, or an informal name (as wikipedia stated a few days ago), but I don't think it is the official name. I found several websites that state it is not an official name (and should be lower case) so I will correct it. --Rickscholz 00:51, 26 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Picture order

This is sort of trivial, but I'm not sure how to fix it: the pictures' captions do not match with their order; namely, the first picture's caption contains the word "another". Clarkefreak ∞ 02:41, 27 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Pope John Paul II, Longtime Owner Of Popemobile, Dead At 84

VATICAN CITY—Pope John Paul II, who owned the Popemobile for more than a quarter of a century, passed away last Saturday. "The Popemobile was known the world over," said Peter Egan, a writer for Road & Track. "A fine example of European craftsmanship, the hand-built, 4.3 litre, V-8 powered, pearl-gray vehicle was exceptionally well-loved, even more so after the bulletproof bubble was added in 1981 to safeguard its passengers against assassination attempts. During the time he owned the Popemobile, John Paul II visited more than 120 countries. He loved the open road." The specially altered Mercedes-Benz ML-series off-road vehicle has been maintained by papal staff since the pope fell ill in August 2004. The pope's will is expected to grant its use to either the next pope or John Paul II's young cousin Zbigniew.

"Batmobile"

isn't a phrase. —tilde 18:42, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

Informal? Don't think so

I don't think it's a joke. If you look at italian TV they all call it the popemobile and I remember when JP2 came to my country all the news were calling it the popemobile.

Citation 3

doesn't actually cite the statement it follows. 70.43.199.66 06:15, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

The bullets are real

evidently, God is not.