WWII
Its hard to imagine, but characters have been being put on vehicles for longer than one would think. The widely accepted earliest this trend was started was WWII, where pilots would paint art on the nose of their fighter or bombers. While not all pilots would chose to put pinup girls on their warplane, many did like the plane above, Rebel Queen, mount of Lt. Fred Glover. This practice was not only used by the Americans as a morale booster, but also the Germans who primarily painted mickey mouse, however ironically the Japanese themselves largely refrained from this practice.

1970’s
The next major advancement towards modern Itasha was in the 1970’s on the tail end of the Hippie movement in the US when people with Vans would painstakingly paint or airbrush elaborate murals on their vans. This practice was still far from the Itasha we know and love (or hate) today, however it is a stepping stone towards the popularization to art on vehicles.

1980s
In the 80s, anime had its first wave of popular shows, the two big ones being Macross and Gundam which still run today. While the modern idea of Itasha was still far fetched for this time due to the price of vinyl, anime themed cars were still being explored in a diffrent way. People would often have merchandise and stickers of a character, or in some cases, Anime themed pain schemes would be used like this Shakotan Boogie themed Toyota soarer:

1990’s
In the 90’s the proliferation of Itashas most important tool began, Adhesive Vinyl. While still not used for Itasha as we see it today this was the beginning of the ability to create liveries and designs for cars. Like the 70’s, anime stickers and merchandise was still used to show appreciation for characters, there were few custom stickers and character driven designs, however anime themed cars continued to be popular due to anime like Initial D, where although uncommon, there is documentation of cars being set up just like the show.

But when did Itasha actually start?
The start of the true idea will be explored in the next chapter, Modern Itasha. While much of the information on this page may seem irrelevant, this was the groundwork for modern Itasha and these were the steps to bring the automotive industry to make the idea of Itasha even remotely possibile. Each of these decades are irrevocably linked to modern Itasha, with that being said, I hope to see you on the next page: Modern Itasha.